How powerful is AR-15 ammo? 5.56 and .223.......not very, compared to other rifles......

[John Edgar Slow Horses]

a .223 or a 5.56 are so fast it will drill you through

 

[hadit]

In my opinion, it's not so much a question of the impact of the bullets (although, they are lethal and can cause significant damage at ranges of less than 50 yards), but rather the fact that you can throw 30 rounds downrange rather quickly. You can fire them as quickly as you can squeeze the trigger, and they hold a lot of ammo before needing to be reloaded.

Do you REALLY need something that can fire off 30 rounds in less than 30 seconds? If you say that you need it for hunting, then you are piss poor hunter. Most hunters I've known (and I'm one of them incidentally) take pride in the fact that they can bring down a deer or other animal in 1 shot. 2 if they've had a bad shot on the first one.

30 rounds isn't required.

"Required" doesn't enter into the exercising of a Constitutional right. I don't have to demonstrate a "need" to stand on a street corner or to hold up a sign and exercise my right to say that Joe Biden is senile, for just one example. I can do it simply because I want to. If I want to say it 30 times in rapid succession, I can without demonstrating a "need" to do it.

Does that help clear it up for you?

 

[hadit]

For survival against violent criminals, more is better........you don't get to tell a man or a woman ....you only get 10 chances to save your family because I don't like you having more bullets.......

The fact that trained police officers can fire 40 or 50 times at a suspect from less than 25 yards away and miss most of those shots tells you that shooting under stressful conditions, poor lighting, etc. is not the same as taking your time in a well-lighted shooting range and putting 5 shots in small circle on a target.

 

[hadit]

a .223 or a 5.56 are so fast it will drill you through

And if they miss vital organs can leave you mostly unscathed. Certainly not stop you if you are charging the shooter, intent on harming him/her.

 

[John Edgar Slow Horses]

You ever seen a man hit in the torso with .223 or a 5.56? He goes down.

 

[2aguy]

You ever seen a man hit in the torso with .223 or a 5.56? He goes down.

No...actually, that isn't necessarily true.....depends on how close you are and even then, depends on what you hit on his body....the 5.56 is well know to be horrible at putting enemies down at long range, which is why the military is finally replacing the round.....

Mark Bowden's bestselling book Black Hawk Down gives vivid accounts of less-than-lethal performance of the Army's green-tip 5.56mm bullet (M855) in the Battle of Mogadishu in 1993. He describes one Delta operator's rounds as

passing right through his targets. When the Sammies were close enough he could see when he hit them. . . . t was like sticking somebody with an ice pick. The bullet made a small, clean hole, and unless hit happened to hit the heart or spine, it wasn't enough to stop a man in his tracks. [The operator] felt like he had to hit a guy five or six times just to get his attention.

These instances are consistent with Dr. Fackler's own findings. He recounts that

n 1980, I treated a soldier shot accidentally with an M16 M193 bullet from a distance of about ten feet. The bullet entered his left thigh and traveled obliquely upward. It exited after passing through about 11 inches of muscle. The man walked into my clinic with no limp whatsoever: the entrance and exit holes were about 4mm across, and punctate. X-ray films showed intact bones, no bullet fragments, and no evidence of significant tissue disruption caused by the bullet's temporary cavity. The bullet path passed well lateral to the femoral vessels. He was back on duty in a few days. Devastating? Hardly.

Dr. Fackler further notes that "n my experience and research, at least as many M16 users in Vietnam concluded that [the 5.56mm] produced unacceptably minimal, rather than 'massive,' wounds."

Like any firearm, the AR rifle in typical calibers such as .223/5.56mm, can cause serious or lethal wounds, and so can other rifles, shotguns, and handguns. Wound profiles from the Army's Wound Ballistics Laboratory illustrate the permanent and temporary cavities, penetration depth, deformation, and fragmentation of both the deforming (soft-point) .223 caliber bullet, the non-deforming 5.56mm FMJ bullet, and other larger caliber bullets typically used in hunting rifles (e.g., .30-30, .308). A comparison of those profiles shows that the wounding effects of the larger caliber bullets are at least as extensive as the .223/5.56, and typically more so.

According to Dr. Fackler, the .223 Remington is "a 'varmint' cartridge, used effectively for shooting woodchucks, crows, and coyotes." Because of its smaller size, there is an ongoing debate among hunters over whether the .223 round has adequate terminal performance for taking deer or larger game. Some states ban the use of .223 caliber rifles when hunting deer and other animals larger than varmints because their rounds lack sufficient power. The ethos of hunting is to take an animal with a single fatal shot. In the views of some state game commissions, the usual AR calibers of .223 and 5.56mm are too weak; at least a .270 is required for hunting deer, antelope, or anything larger.



How powerful are AR rifles?

Real world experience.....Afghanistan....

KABUL, Afghanistan —
The U.S. military’s workhorse rifle - used in battle for the last 40 years - is proving less effective in Afghanistan against the Taliban’s more primitive but longer range weapons.
-----

But a U.S. Army study found that the 5.56 mm bullets fired from M-4s don’t retain enough velocity at distances greater than 1,000 feet (300 meters) to kill an adversary. In hilly regions of Afghanistan, NATO and insurgent forces are often 2,000 to 2,500 feet (600-800 meters) apart.
----
To counter these tactics, the U.S. military is designating nine soldiers in each infantry company to serve as sharpshooters, according to Maj. Thomas Ehrhart, who wrote the Army study. They are equipped with the new M-110 sniper rifle, which fires a larger 7.62 mm round and is accurate to at least 2,500 feet (800 meters).

US rifles not suited to warfare in Afghan hills

The U.S. military's workhorse rifle - used in battle for the last 40 years - is proving less effective in Afghanistan against the Taliban's more primitive but longer range weapons.

www.sandiegouniontribune.com

 

[2aguy]

You ever seen a man hit in the torso with .223 or a 5.56? He goes down.

Not in every case...again, it depends on where you hit them, and the ammunition you use......

n 1980, I treated a soldier shot accidentally with an M16 M193 bullet from a distance of about ten feet. The bullet entered his left thigh and traveled obliquely upward. It exited after passing through about 11 inches of muscle. The man walked into my clinic with no limp whatsoever: the entrance and exit holes were about 4mm across, and punctate. X-ray films showed intact bones, no bullet fragments, and no evidence of significant tissue disruption caused by the bullet's temporary cavity. The bullet path passed well lateral to the femoral vessels. He was back on duty in a few days. Devastating? Hardly.

 

[Flash]

You ever seen a man hit in the torso with .223 or a 5.56? He goes down.

In Vietnam I saw a Gook get shot by a 5.56 in the right elbow. The bullet exited the left neck. Dead as a door knob.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Do you REALLY need something that can fire off 30 rounds in less than 30 seconds?

Your question is invalid; the Constitution protects my right to own and use such a weapon.
Your opinion doesn't matter.

 

[80zephyr]

18th cartridge from the top left is what an AR fires. Compare that to most other cartridges. It is far less powerful than many other rounds.