You crack me up!
It's good to read posts like yours when I need a laugh. To begin with, you mention "ball" ammo from the .308 and everybody KNOWS it's unethical AND illegal (in most areas) to hunt with FMJ ammo. You need to learn what to load your rifles with. Secondly, you claim to know more about ballistics than the rest of us that simply "can't wrap our heads around" ballistics. Thirdly, you show your true knowledge by saying the .308 is going so fast it don't create as severe wound channel instead of acknowledging bullet design plays a HUGE factor in terminal wound channel size and depth. Not only the bullet expanding creates the wound channel, but also energy transfer (of which you keep harping). Energy transfer of an .308 with a 150 gr rapidly expanding bullet (Nosler Ballistic Tip for example), WILL shed MUCH more energy in a animal than the .40 S&W even produces at the muzzle, and sometimes fails to exit. When you compare the wound channels of the .308 so loaded, and the .40S&W you will HAVE to admit the .308 produces the largest wound channel. Muzzle energy also creates HUGE temporary wound channels as they expend their energy and expand. The .40 S&W is totally incapable of this due to the low energy level. Add up the diameter AND length of the terminal wound channel of both and you will see the .308 WITH EXPANDING BULLET produces a much larger wound channel than the .40 S&W. Just because you can play with fire a few times don't mean you'll be able to get by with it forever, and the same goes for stunts such as shooting hogs with barely adaquate rounds. Also you're not taking into consideration the hogs' temperment. And finally, don't you feel just a bit guilty advising a mere mortal to hunt with the popgun you're so fond of with your obviously superior skills?
ORIGINAL: MM4L
I respect your opinion.
That said, the 47th edition of the Lyman Reloading Handbook lists "optimum game weight" (OGW) for a standard 180 gr. solid base ballistic tip partition-type .308 round at 200 yards is 546 pounds. They don't list an OGW for the .308 at under 200 yards. I have calculated the OGW of a 180 gr. JHP .40 S&W round at 50 yards (fired from a 16" bbl carbine) to be 276 pounds. At 20 yards it is 303 pounds. The foot pound energy of a similar .40 is easily double that of a hunting arrow fired from an average hunting-grade bow (or crossbow). So, any argument you have against hunting with a .40 would go double for archers.
The last 3 hogs I took were under 150 pounds (as small as 75#) and all were single shot kills. I have taken 200# hogs with the .40 at 65 yards with one shot. I have never had a .40 overpenetrate and I have never seen a .308 or 30-06 that did not overpenetrate a hog. In fact, I have fired the kill shot on a maimed hog that was shot with a 30-06. The 30-06 went through and through while the .40 stopped the hog in it's tracks and the round remained in the carcass.
There is no way to accurately measure the energy LOST as a result of overpenetration from one shot to the next. I think you would agree that the .308 is still "lethal" to background targets and similarly, the .40 is less likely to overpenetrate. This means the .40 is more likely to deliver all of it's energy and admittedly, while it is significantly less, it could be much more energy on target if the .308 is moving so fast that it does not create as severe a wound channel and carries that extra (excess?) energy through the target and out the other side.
There is more to wound ballistics than muzzle velocity and foot pounds of energy. By your logic, we should be hunting hogs with .223's!
We'll just have to agree to disagree.