I just bought a springfield XD 40 last month. First handgun i ever bought. I have shot about threehurdred factory rounds thrugh it. Now i want to startreloading bullets for it myself. Never reloaded handgun rounds before but ihave loaded alot of rifle.So i dont know what is the best bullet for personal defense. Ive looked into the hornady XTP, remington golden saber, speer gold dot, and a few others. I just dont know what to use . Or wich is the best.I own a box of factoryfederal hydra shock are they any good. I would like to hear your opions and thoughts on this.All help appreciated.


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I know several people who reload the XTPs in their .45 ACP and 454 Casull. I have also seen what XTPs will do to a mule deer and hog from both a 454 Casull, and a .50 cal muzzle loader, and I personally think that it would sweep a man clean off his feet in the event of an attack. If I were loading a self defense round I would rank the XTP near the top of my list.

Big think to remember when reloading these is that the shell
head spaces on the mouth rim,If this aint right you will have
a lot of jams,unless you lucky..So be sure to measure them cases..

Federal Hydra-shock ammo has a good rep as a defense load. In my .45 ACP, I use Hornady 230-grain XTP's as a jacketed bullet, and the Lyman-Keith 452423HP semi-wadcutter hollowpoint with 7.3 grains of Unique (MV 998 FPS).From my mould this bullet casts right at 228 grains from wheelweights. This bullet is as good as, if not better than, ANY jacketed bullet for defense use. Of course, being a semi-wadcutter, the pistol has to be throated to feed them. I shoot mine from a Colt Gold Cup which came from the factory properly throated. Since I am shooting full power ammo in it, I put aWolf 26-pound recoil spring and a stronger firing pin return spring in it. Because the Gold Cup was made to shoot target ammo, I had to keep replacing the rear sight crosspin because the things were too weak. I finally replaced the last Colt-made pin with a pin I made from the shank of an old Herter's stainless steel fishhook of the correct diameter. This pin has held up for over 20 years now!

2 things should drive your choice. 1st and foremost is how well the particular bullet head of choice cycles in your gun.

2nd, is how accurate that particular round is in your gun.

Some guns will not digest certain bullets as well as others. If this is a defense weapon, it needs to cycle flawlessly, it doesn't matter how acurate it is if it won't eject the spent round and load another,each and every time.

the bullets you mentioned have good reputations as far as stopping power statistics go. Find the right head/powder/brass/primer mix and you will be good to go.

watch your headspacing and case stretch. You should be able to reload cases several times before you need to trim them.