You have to remember the Black Talon ammo is now a twenty year old design with twenty year old materials. There have been advancements in powder, primers bullet design and materials over twenty years for sure.
I'm just saying that the Black Talon ammo may have been the top dog of the time but now is no better than any Premium SD ammo.
Here is some interesting info.
Black Talon ammunition was discontinued by Winchester over 10 years ago, now. They have a similar line called the Ranger SXT, which is NOT the same, as the bullet design is significantly different. However, I hear it's still a mighty fine ammunition.
Now Gold Dot ammunition I CAN talk about, at least in 9mm and .45 ACP.
The nice thing about Speer Gold Dot ammunition is this:
They are specifically designed for maximum efficiency of hollow point expansion at the standard velocities that more regular ammunition of a given caliber and mass are available in.
What does this mean? It means that the bullet doesn't require higher than average velocities for optimum bullet expansion.
This means two things:
1. Most importantly, the ballistics of the Gold Dot ammunition match the ballistics of the regular ammunition you shoot.
For example, if you shoot 230 gr. .45 ACP Winchester target ammunition (which has a muzzel velocity of about 850 fps), the 230 gr. Gold Dot .45 hollowpoints will shoot the same. They also have about 850 fps muzzel velocity.
So you can target shoot all you want with your regular 230 gr. ammuntion and then, later, load your pistol with 230 gr. Golg Dots and still hit what you're aiming at, just like at the target range.
2. The next thing important about Gold Dot is, since it's not a higher velocity ammunition, you don't have to worry about the extra wear and tear on your pistol that running hot rounds through it does. Nor do you have to worry about violating any warnings from the manufacturer about using +P or +P+ ammunition.
Speer Gold Dot ammunition also has expansion characteristics that generally outperform most other ammunition. In fact, I saw a gun shop several years ago that had a board posted with various brands of .45 ACP hollowpoints glued to it which had been fired into ballistics gelatin. Each bullet had been measured for maximum diameter and final mass as well. The Gold Dot had not only the LARGEST diameter (1.1 inches, I kid you not), but also the highest remaining mass, with nearly the entire 230 gr. present. [COLOR="Red"]This was even better than the Black Talon sample[/COLOR], though Black Tallon was second behind Gold Dot.
So Speer Gold Dot is about as fine a self defense hollowpoint bullet as you could need.
