The .38 Special, also commonly known as .38 S&W Special, .38 Smith & Wesson Special, .38 Spl, .38 Spc, or 9×29mmR is a rimmed, centerfire cartridge designed by Smith & Wesson.
The .40 S&W (10.2×22mm) is a rimless pistol cartridge developed jointly by American firearms manufacturers Smith & Wesson and Winchester in 1990. The .40 S&W was developed as a law enforcement cartridge designed to duplicate performance of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) reduced-velocity 10mm Auto cartridge which could be retrofitted into medium-frame semi-automatic handguns. It uses 0.40-inch-diameter (10 mm) bullets ranging in weight from 105 to 200 grains.
The .45 ACP, also known as .45 Auto, .45 Automatic, or 11.43×23mm is a rimless straight-walled handgun cartridge designed by John Moses Browning in 1904, for use in his prototype Colt semi-automatic pistol. After successful military trials, it was adopted as the standard chambering for Colt's M1911 pistol. The round was developed due to a lack of stopping power experienced in the Moro Rebellion in places like Sulu. The issued ammunition, .38 Long Colt, had proved inadequate, motivating the search for a better cartridge. This experience and the Thompson–LaGarde Tests of 1904 led the Army and the Cavalry to decide that a minimum of .45 caliber was required in a new handgun cartridge.
The .357 Smith & Wesson Magnum, .357 S&W Magnum, .357 Magnum, or 9×33mmR is a smokeless powder cartridge with a 0.357 in (9.07 mm) bullet diameter. It was created by Elmer Keith, Phillip B. Sharpe, and Douglas B. Wesson of firearm manufacturers Smith & Wesson and Winchester. The .357 Magnum cartridge is notable for its highly effective terminal ballistics.
The .454 Casull is a firearm cartridge, developed as a wildcat cartridge in 1958 by Dick Casull, Duane Marsh and Jack Fullmer. It was announced in November 1959 by Guns & Ammo magazine. The design is a lengthened and structurally improved .45 Colt case. The wildcat cartridge went mainstream when Freedom Arms brought a single action five-shot revolver chambered in .454 Casull to the retail firearms market in 1983. Ruger followed in 1997, chambering its Super Redhawk in this caliber. Taurus followed with the Raging Bull model in 1998 and the Taurus Raging Judge Magnum in 2010. The .45 Schofield and .45 Colt cartridges can fit into the .454's chambers, but not the other way around because of the lengthened case.
The .45 Colt (11.43×33mmR), often called the .45 Long Colt, is a rimmed straight-walled handgun cartridge dating to 1872. It was originally a black-powder revolver round developed for the Colt Single Action Army revolver. This cartridge was adopted by the U.S. Army in 1873 and served as an official US military handgun cartridge for 19 years, before being replaced by the .38 Long Colt in 1892. Although there has never been a ".45 Short Colt" cartridge, the .45 Colt is frequently called the ".45 Long Colt" to better distinguish it from the shorter and less powerful .45 Schofield cartridge, which was also in use around the same time as the .45 Colt.
The .223 Remington is a rimless, bottlenecked, centerfire intermediate cartridge. It was developed in 1957 by Remington Arms and Fairchild Industries for the U.S. Continental Army Command of the United States Army as part of a project to create a small-caliber, high-velocity firearm. The .223 Remington is considered one of the most popular common-use cartridges and is used by a wide range of semi-automatic and manual-action rifles.
The .44 Remington Magnum, also known as .44 Magnum or 10.9x33mmR, is a rimmed, large-bore cartridge originally designed for revolvers and quickly adopted for carbines and rifles. Despite the ".44" designation, guns chambered for the .44 Magnum round, its parent case, the .44 Special, and the .44 Special's parent case, the .44 Russian all use 0.429 in (10.9 mm) diameter bullets. The .44 Magnum is based on the .44 Special case but lengthened and loaded to higher pressures for greater velocity and energy.
The .44 Smith & Wesson Special, also commonly known as .44 S&W Special, .44 Special, .44 Spl, .44 Spc, or 10.9×29mmR, is a smokeless powder center fire metallic revolver cartridge developed by Smith & Wesson in 1907 as the standard chambering for their New Century revolver, introduced in 1908.
The .256 Winchester Magnum is a firearms cartridge developed by Winchester, and was produced by necking-down a .357 Magnum cartridge to .257 diameter. It was designed for shooting small game and varmints.
The .32-20 Winchester / 7.94x33mmR, also known as .32 WCF , was the first small-game lever-action intermediate cartridge that Winchester produced. It was initially introduced as a black-powder cartridge in 1882 for small-game, varmint hunting, and deer. Colt produced a single-action revolver chambered for this cartridge a few years later.
The .38-40 Winchester (10.17x33mmR) is actually a .40 caliber (10 mm) intermediate cartridge shooting .401 in (10.2 mm) caliber bullets. The cartridge was introduced by Winchester in 1874 and is derived from their .44-40 Winchester. This cartridge was introduced for rifles, but in its reintroduction for cowboy action shooting it has seen some popularity as a revolver cartridge. It is not particularly well suited to hunting larger game, but it was popular when it was introduced, along with the previous .44-40 Winchester, for deer hunting. It can be used successfully on smaller game animals, and for self-defense. Current loadings are intended for revolvers.
The .30-40 Krag, also known as the .30 U.S. and .30 Army, was a rifle cartridge developed in the early 1890s to provide the U.S. armed forces with a smokeless powder cartridge suited for use with modern small-bore repeating rifles to be selected in the 1892 small arm trials. Since the cartridge it was replacing was the .45-70 Government, the new cartridge was considered small-bore at the time. The rifle ultimately selected for use by the Army was the Krag–Jørgensen, formally adopted as the M1892 Springfield. The cartridge was also used in the M1893, M1895, M1897, and M1900 Gatling guns.
The .458 Winchester Magnum is a belted, straight-taper cased, Big Five game rifle cartridge. It was introduced commercially in 1956 by Winchester and first chambered in the Winchester Model 70 African rifle. It was designed to compete against the .450 Nitro Express and the .470 Nitro Express cartridges used in big bore British double rifles. The .458 Winchester Magnum remains one of the most popular large game cartridges, and most major ammunition manufacturers offer a selection of .458 ammunition.
The .30-30 Winchester / 7.8x51mmR cartridge was first marketed for the Winchester Model 1894 lever-action rifle in 1895. The .30-30, as it is most commonly known, along with the .25-35 Winchester, was offered that year as the United States' first small-bore sporting rifle cartridges designed for smokeless powder. Since its introduction, it has been utilized alongside the development of flatter shooting cartridges, most prominently those derived from designs subsidized by interest in military expenditures. The .30-30 has remained in widespread use almost entirely because of reliable effectiveness in civilian applications, and has put food on the table for millions of people in hunting situations.
Overpressure ammunition, commonly designated as +P or +P+, is small arms ammunition that has been loaded to produce a higher internal pressure when fired than is standard for ammunition of its caliber, but less than the pressures generated by a proof round. This is done typically to produce ammunition with higher muzzle velocity, muzzle energy, and stopping power, such as ammunition used for security, defensive, or hunting purposes. Because of this, +P ammunition is typically found in handgun calibers which might be used for paramilitary forces, armed security, and defensive purposes.
The .351 Winchester Self-Loading or 8.9x34mmSR is an American rifle cartridge designed in 1906.
The 7-30 Waters cartridge was originally a wildcat cartridge developed by author Ken Waters in 1976 to give better performance to lever-action rifle shooters than the parent .30-30 Winchester cartridge, by providing a higher velocity and flatter trajectory with a smaller, lighter bullet. By 1984, Winchester introduced a Model 94 rifle chambered for the 7-30 Waters, establishing it as a commercial cartridge. In 1986, Thompson/Center began chambering 10-inch, 14-inch, and 20-inch Contender barrels for the cartridge.
The .348 Winchester / 8.8x57mmR is an American rifle cartridge. It was introduced in 1936, and developed for the Winchester Model 71 lever action rifle. The .348 was one of the most powerful rimmed rounds ever used in a lever action rifle.
The .500 S&W Magnum or 12.7×41mmSR is a .50 caliber semi-rimmed revolver cartridge developed by Cor-Bon in partnership with the Smith & Wesson "X-Gun" engineering team for use in the Smith & Wesson Model 500 X-frame revolver and introduced in February 2003 at the SHOT Show. From its inception, it was intended to be the most powerful handgun cartridge to date, with the capacity to harvest all North American game species. While more powerful handgun cartridges, such as the .500 Bushwhacker, have emerged since, they are only available in custom firearms, and the .500 S&W remains the most powerful production handgun cartridge.
