9x19 DAG / Geco maybe experimental

[Galgenberg]

Hi guys,

I need some help with ID of the following 9x19 cartridge.
Bullet weight are 10,0 g or 154 gr, jacket is nickel platted steel and lead core.
It is a two-piece jacket. By trying to delaborate the cartridge the rear jacket is still in the case and the front jacket with the lead core comes out. Between the rear and front jacket the is a clear groove.
Maybe this cartridge was an experimental for Netherland police in the early 1980 s.
Does someone confirm this or has further informations about this round?

Best regards

Chris

[THV]

This is experimental subsonic round. No info so far…

[Lew]

Interesting item. I have never seen nor heard of a similar item. It looks legit to me. I am having a hard time seeing the utility of the bullet construction.

Good find!

Lew

[Forensic]

Chris, have you asked Rudi K. Inside RUAG? He has access to some old data…this 10gramm bullets are from the end 70thies. The issued ones are 10gramm cncs from lot 1/80 starting…and are one piece jackets…
Pp

[Jaco]

Never seen such one, or hear of this. I am very curious

[EMZ]

From 1980 on the by then new Walther P5 pistol replaced the FN 1922 pistols in use with the Netherlands police forces. The service round became the 9mmx19 8.0 grams FMJ made by the German DAG company. Due to the increased (re)training programs and the larger calibre, police firearms instructors were more exposed to lead containing fumes and dust as previous. At the same time more and more outdoor shooting ranges were closed and replaced by indoor ranges, making the exposure to lead even more intensive.

In 1980-1981 the Netherlands police was on the look out for ammo that gave less lead polution. I suppose police forces from other countries, like West-Germany, had the same interest. I don’t know if it was a Dutch initiative or from some other country. Anyway, the DAG company -which was for dozens of years the main supplier of ammunition for the NLD police, came up with a ‘lead free’ bullet, in which the base of the bullet -where the lead core is in contact with the hot burning powder gases- was encapsulated with an iron cup. In this way the lead core was fully encapsulated and so no lead was exposed.

The first box label of this ‘lead free’ ammunition I have, is dated 1981. (See picture.) To my knowledge this was still in the experimental stage.

The final ‘lead free’ round was distributed to the NLD police in 1983. The box labels of the first lots had a small sticker that reads ‘LOODVRIJ’ (lead free). DAG called this ammunition ‘Sintox’ with ‘SX’ in the headstamp. It had an 8.0 grams FMJ bullet.

In 1981 the Dutch research facility TNO did some testings in order to measure the lead contamination of the standard 9mmx19 8.0 g FMJ round. They compared this standard service round with a special 10.0 grams subsonic training bullet. I don’t know the results of this TNO test.

It is my strong believe this special 10.0 g bullet was also of this new SX type, because at the same time the NLD police were testing all kinds of 9mm bullet shapes to replace the existing FMJ version with a more effective bullet type. (These test resulted in 1990 in the acception of the Action-3 bullet.) One of the experimental bullets tested by NLD police was the ’9mm Para Übungspatrone 10.0 g Spezialgeschoss’. It had an Energy 0 of 420 J.

I was lucky enough to shoot with it and managed to take some spares with me. I sectioned one and it is clear this is a ‘Sintox’ bullet, although it has a standard headstamp!

Now it becomes complicated. The 10.0 grams subsonic load was a more or less standard load, made for the H&K MP5 suppressed submachineguns of the German police. It had no encapsulated lead core; it was just a normal, but heavy FMJ.

I’m pretty sure the cartridge you asked about is an experimental bullet, an intermediate between the standard 10.0 g FMJ version and the 10.0 g SX version that was tested by the NLD police. I have one in my collection too. (See picture.)

PICTURES WILL FOLLOW!

[EMZ]

Pictures:

1. Top is box label from first ‘Sintox’ rounds, dated 1981. Bottom is box label from the very first Sintox duty rounds, dated 1983. Both boxes came from NLD police.

2. Headstamps of the above mentioned rounds. Top 1981, bottom 1983.

3. At left the standard 10.0 g version. In the middle the experimental SX version. At right the final experimental SX version as tested by NLD police.

4. Close-up of sectioned bullets of standard 10.0 g bullet (left) and Sintox version bullet (right) as tested by NLD police. I substituted the powder charge by plastic inlays.

5. Headstamps of standard 10.0 g bullet (left), experimental SX version (middle), and final experimental SX version (right).

[Galgenberg]

Thank you very much for the responses.

@EMZ thanks a lot for the background infos.
Was the 10 g bullet maybe for use in the HK MP5SD? For normal training with a pistol there is no sense in using a 10 g bullet when the normal bullet for the streets weights only 8 g. So you would have a different recoil impuls and point of impact.

[Jaco]

Hi EMZ, can you confirm the experimental one you have, is the same as the photo at the start of this topic, ic does the bullet excists by 2 separate parts?
Can you tell why it is made on this way?
Grtz Jaco

[Forensic]

Your bullet on the right is the final type, using the same caracteristics as the later DM41/51 Bullet in the 8Gramm version. Whereas the DAG manufactured the DM41/51 8Gramm with a cup to encapsulate the leadcore and MEN manufactured the DM41 only with a metaldisc, to close the leadcore to the bulletbase.
I show the 8 Gram bullets which are used in DM41/DM51 (in factory only named Bullet SX/SN) means with baseclosure (Typ SX and tinned SN)

The explanation whats Sintox Standard, whats DM41 and what is DM51
Here the answer from RUAG:

That says in short in english: Bullet is made by DAG, and MEN.
The ammo with Description SINTOX Standard has a CASE with Boxerprimer (Centralhole) and uses the same bullets as DM41/51. The difference to Ammo Typ DM41/51 is only the casetyp and a different Powder.
The DM41 load for the BMI (Ministry of Interior) has a case with Berdan (2-hole), the DM 51 for the BWB (german army) has the same case construction, but with Hinterstich in the primerhole, means at the end enlarged, so the primer fixing itself on firing into the recess and hold the primer back in its place.
Both DM41 and DM51 using the same powdertype—all 3 have the bullet with base closure disc now. MEN used always a disc as baseclosure, and DAG first used the shown construction by EMZ on the 10Gram with a cup as closure, but now uses also only a disc.
Thats why in the VPAM only the bullet from DAG was allowed, for armortests, as due to the the inserted cup at the base, the jacket in total was more strong and penetrates more. As DAG switched later also to the disc only, the DM51 from DAG or MEN can be used in tests…

The 10 Gram bullets where for the MP5, but why they had developed such a complicated bullet -2 piece design, as shown from Galgenberg and EMZ, I dont knew, but it was shortly replaced by the cup-insert in the base, and the bullet acted as a solid bullet 1piece design…
Here the normal 10Gramm Box for MP5SD:

and a box also mentioned as 8 Gramm Specialgeschoss (forrunner of the SINTOX, not with SINTOX primer, but already with baseplate to avoid contamination with lead from the hot gases on firing…

PP

[EMZ]

Jaco, these two experimental 10.0 g cartridges are the same, except for the primer laquer. But bullets are identical as far as I can judge from the pictures.

The “9mm Para Übungspatrone 10.0 g Spezialgeschoss” was fully tested within the NLD police ammo tests, dated around 1980-1985. It was tested for example on pavement tile (for ricochet), on car tire, steel plate and ordnance gelatine. It went through all the testing programs. I guess the researchers had some leftovers from the previous TNO tests and they decided to give it a try.

BTW: The TNO people called it a ‘training round’, but I doubt if it really was ment as a training round.
In the late Eighties a special Action-3 training round was also tested, but not accepted. However, that’s a different story.

[Galgenberg]

@EMZ and Peter
Thanks for the clearification of this bullet.

Attached the picture of the sectioned bullet/cartridge.

Only nice to know what would be the value of the experimental 10 g, two jacket variant?

[EMZ]

Thanks for sharing the picture of that beautiful sectioned cartridge!
“All for science.”