5.7x28mm vs 30 Super Carry: Which Should the Industry Support?

30 super carry versus 5.7 by 28, uh, the comparison that maybe nobody asked for and maybe not even is one that makes sense. These are very different rounds, but one of the reasons I wanted to bring these two rounds together is to have the conversation about which one. Would be more appropriate obviously for personal defense. We are doing this video for Personal Defense Network, but also which one really deserves support from the industry. Now the 57 has existed for over a couple decades, um, very, very limited use, um, chambered for very, very, very few firearms until a handful of years ago when we started to see much more interest in the 5.7 by 28 and we saw major manufacturers, uh, producing handguns specifically for it.

Doesn't really lend itself well to just being dropped into another platform, um, something like an AR for a PDW with 5.7 by 28 was something that was very hard to come by. A couple companies had tried it kind of ham-fistedly, um, CMMG, I think, is the company that finally got that to work after a long period of time. Uh, we know Ruger and Smith and Wesson and others have now come out with 5.7 millimeter handguns as well following FM, but other than a couple of government contracts and. And sort of the, the, uh, let's say fortitude of FN sticking with the round that round, um, has not been very popular until a handful of years ago. Enter a few years ago, the 30 super carry a round that had a lot of push behind it, um, originally developed by Federal, uh, that's now you can get it Federal, uh, spear here we're shooting some gold dot in a second, uh, with Remington rounds, um, Hornaday has a round for it now, um, several different ammunition lines feature 30 super carry, but.

Very limited handgun option when it comes to the 30 Super carry. Uh, we saw Smith and Wesson, we saw a very high-end, uh, 1911 come out when it was first launched. Of course my Avidity Arms PD 10 is chambered in 30 Super carry, so I've got a little bit of an investment in the round because I do think it's a great round for personal defense. I think it's a round that deserves a lot more attention, uh, much more than the 5.7, uh, but let's go ahead and take a look at what they do now. I will say about the 5.7, it's a neat looking round, right?

It definitely is cool looking in terms of what it does and what it is um in terms of performance. I also think this is very cool. The stowaway handgun. This is a braced pistol. You can see I do have a suppressor on it, and this is made by a buddy of mine designed this one at Dark Mountain Arms out of North Carolina.

I think it's a very cool gun. It's a very cool round, um, but let's take a look at what it actually does. I've got my ear protection and obviously I'm gonna go ahead and put these eyes on. And we're gonna be shooting into uh Clear gel as we generally do here at Personal Defense Network. We're probably about 15 ft 20 ft.

And I'm gonna go ahead and shoot this. This is um a pistol length barrel, as I said, so it may look like a long gun configuration. I'm gonna shoot it with 4 points of contact, but it is, um, again a pistol caliber. So if you were thinking about shooting the 57 from a personal defense standpoint out of any of the handguns that are chambered for it, this performance you're gonna see with this 40 grain round 40 grain round into the gel is what you can expect from a personal defense standpoint as well. And let's go ahead and fire a 30 super carry round.

Next to it now again, as I described, um, one of the advantages I think of the 30 Super carry is it already has some incredible support from a lot of very respected names in the manufacturing industry from the ammunition standpoint, and this is a gold dot. Gold dot is a well known, well established hollow point design, uh, that a lot of people trust and a lot of other calibers. Let's take a look and see what we get out of this 4 inch barrel into the gel. And in fact, let's do this. Let's let's apples to apples for a second.

I'm gonna go ahead and fire a full metal jacket as well just because I know some people are gonna say, Well, Rob, you fired a full metal jacket out of the 57. How about an apples to apples what is 30 super carrier look like in a target round? This is a federal round. Let's go ahead and see what it looks like as well. Let's head down range.

All right, let's take a look at what we've got here. I am actually for the benefit of the cameras going to flip this around. So that you guys can. See I think the best representation of what actually happened here I'm gonna open this up. This is a 20 inch gel box so you guys may need to move this back just an inch or so.

And what we've got Is sort of what I expected to see and I think it makes the point that I'm trying to help you guys understand the 5.7 round is an incredibly lightweight round and we know when it comes to lightweight fast rounds of personal defense, we tend to see all of the energy dumped very, very quickly. Now in this case the round actually did a flip as it did, did a bit of a little bit of a twist it looks like and then from about. This point forward, which if you look at the measurement from about 10 inches forward, really, I don't know if you can even pick it up on the camera if I move this out of the way, you might be able to see it. There's a little bit of a trail that from this angle goes down out of the gel blocks that was actually going to the side. It went out to the left side out of the gel block.

And that's pretty typical of a bullet that isn't designed to break apart. It's not a hollow point. It's a full metal jacket round, and it just kind of yawed, spun around, and then flew out of the gel block at about this distance, which I put this back up there, you will see that it exited the gel block at about 15 inches. A little bit further than that at 16 inches or so, what you see is the gold dot. You see the spear gold dot of trusted round, one that we would expect in a personal defense caliber, personal defense appropriate caliber to end up right in that range, usually about 15 to 18 inches where you're gonna see that land, and that's right where we saw that land, perfectly expanded looking bullet, and you can see that it too deposited a lot of energy.

Most of the permanent wound cavity is in that 1st 10. Inches but you can still see damage being done much more significantly than with the 5.7 by 28 all the way out here getting past the 1213, 14 inch mark and then again coming to rest at about 16 inches. Now right next to it a little bit closer to the camera but just above in terms of where it entered, we see a very typical linear track from that FMJ that popped right out of the 20 inch. Uh, gel block, so that did nothing in terms of really causing any significant damage because it's a, it's a pistol round not intending to be used for for hunting or for personal defense or any military tactical application. So when we look at the 57, we get what we expect to see.

A lot of damage up close really from the high speed of this projectile. Now it's moving at potentially 1700 1800 ft per second out of a 5 or 6 inch barrel and what you're seeing here is that round spinning and causing permanent wound damage. What you see with the gold dot, of course, is the expansion of the round, but you also see momentum. That's the advantage of having a heavier round, so that heavier 115 grain. bullet that's moving in the 30 super carry carried more energy for a further distance, and that's an incredibly important metric when we start looking at personal defense.

So would, would I feel like I wasn't able to defend myself with a 5.7 by 28 close range going through light clothing, maybe even heavy clothing inside of a house, something like that? Absolutely not, but would I prefer to have that deeper penetration, that deeper linear penetration that I'm getting out of a. Proven design like a gold dot absolutely and that's why I think that while the 5.7 has enjoyed a little bit of a fan following and a and a resurgence, uh, unexpected resurgence over the last few years, 30 Super Carry has not taken off, but I think it deserves a lot more attention than it's getting. And as we make this video in very early 2025, my prediction we're not gonna get out of this decade without seeing a lot more support and a lot more development and interest in the 30 Super carry. I think you should definitely consider it for personal defense.