Dumb Q? .45LC vs. .45GAP

[Scott]

I see .45GAP advertised on LuckyGunner.com as being available, but no .45LC - are they the same thing? I'm pretty now to the handgun world; it sure would be easier if there was a "standard nomenclature" of some sort. LC vs. ACP & mm vs inches, .38 vs .380, Luger vs. 9x19 vs. ".9mm short"; it's driving me crazy!

 

[Jimbo357mag]

Every cartridge name has a history. Sometime it is interesting sometimes it isn't. I won't go into the 45 Colt (long Colt) because it is too long, but it is not the same as the 45 ACP (Automatic Colt Pistol) or the 45 GAP (Glock Automatic Pistol). The 45 Autos are rimless cartridges best suited to loading and ejecting in automatic pistols.

Welcome to the RugerForum and there are no dumb ?'s.

...Jimbo

 

[maxpress]

45 colt. revolver

45 gap/acp. pistol

for the most part.

 

[Knuckles]

Hi'
The .45LC is the oldest cartridge and comes from the late 1800's
It could be fire from mostly Single-Action pistols, but now days you can get Double-Action Revolvers and Riffles that will shoot it, and Colt was the Big Cheese that made it.
It has a very mild recoil for such a big hunk of lead and goes through the air rather slow around 750ft.per second to maybe 1000 fps if hand loaded yourself.

There's some whopper-loads from Buffalo Bore, Cor-Bon, and a few others that travel fast and hit very hard for some gun brands like Ruger, Freedom Arms, and a few others gun makers (warning! not for all .45 LC guns)

Now the .45acp stands for "automatic colt pistol" (it cycles and ejects the round mechanically) which is a John Browning creation from around 1900 and became the US Army side arm until Beretta got the contract (I think in the late seventies or early eighties) with the Beretta-92F in 9mm
It (like the .45Gap) does not have a rim on the case to keep it from falling through the cylinder and into the barrel.
They go about the same feet per seconds but with a bit more recoil because of the smaller space for the gunpowder to go KABOOM!

The .45gap stands for "Glock automatic pistol" a shorter brass case which actually creates even a higher pressure with less space for the KABOOM!
Glock made this special sized round to fit the grip and Magazines that they were producing already.

Like the .45LC (or .45Colt) cartridges, the "acp" and the "gap" can be hot-rodded up with extra gunpowder and that is generally called a .45acp +P(plus-P)

That's about it from me... others can tighten up what I've mentioned here but I think I gave it to you best I could in "Lay-man's Terms.

Bud (knuckles)

 

[Yosemite Sam]

".45 Colt" is the proper name. Sometimes you'll see it, even on gun barrels, as ".45 Long Colt", to differentiate from an even older round that is no longer used much. You'll also see ".45 LC" and many other variations. It's mostly considered the classic cowboy gun round.

.45 ACP is the classic .45 semi auto round made famous by the 1911 style pistols. People used to argue endlessly whether it meant Automatic Colt Pistol, Centerfire Pistol, or Cartridge Pistol.

.45 GAP is Gaston Glock's vanity cartridge, ostensibly developed to offer .45 ACP power in a shorter format so smaller grips could be built around a shorter magazine. This one will probably be gone in 10-15 years, imo.

The 9mm stuff is fun:
9mm Luger == 9mm Parabellum == 9x19mm == "9mm".
9mm Makarov == 9x18mm.
"9mm short" = "9mm Kurz" (German for 'short') == 9x17mm == .380 ACP.

Think of 9mm as .38 Special for semi autos.

Don't mix them up. They'll be a test at 11.

If you find this at all interesting, you should grab a reloading manual and read up on some of the differences in calibers from the cartridge's perspective rather than the "terminal effect" perspective many focus on.

-- Sam

 

[Snake45]

Long story short, if you have a .45 Colt revolver and you want to shoot .45GAP in it because the ammo is available--no, it won't work, unless you have a special cylinder made to take that cartridge. I'm pretty sure that .45GAP won't even work in a .45ACP revolver cylinder, though I have heard stories of .45GAP being fired in .45ACP autopistols, if the extractor holds the cartridge tight enough for ignition. Still, not a good idea.

 

[Scott]

Thanks for the quick info; every question I have seems to come around to reloading in one capacity or the other. I think the reloading gods are calling to me. Now I have a decision to make whether or not to answer that calling!

 

[redsouthpaw]

Completely different animals. GAP is similar to the ACP just shortened and uses +P pressures, also a small pistol primer. Some people have used GAP in an ACP chamber but it is not recommended because pistols are headspaced on the case mouth. With the shortened case it will put severe wear on the extractor and will damage the gun.

.45 G.A.P., .45 ACP, .45 Colt

 

[Yosemite Sam]

Oh, I forgot 9mm Largo == 9x23mm.

Thanks for the quick info; every question I have seems to come around to reloading in one capacity or the other. I think the reloading gods are calling to me. Now I have a decision to make whether or not to answer that calling!

When I first started reloading for rifle, reading up on benchrest techniques, and learned why people go to all that trouble prepping brass, sorting components by weight, etc, it quickly sank home that the firearm and the ammunition are a system. The more you tune your ammunition to your specific gun the better it performs. Commercial ammo is always a lowest common denominator approach, the "fast food" of the ammunition world; It's designed to work "ok" for everyone. You need to roll your own to experience "fine cuisine".

-- Sam

 

[Yosemite Sam]

I'm on a roll...

For even more fun, look into .50 caliber:

.50AE, .50 GI, .50 Beowulf, .50 BMG, .500 S&W Magnum, and .500 Wyoming Express are all very different.

Then there's the fact that none of the foregoing are interchangeable, but that you can often use both .38 and .357 mag in the same gun. Not to mention that .38s really aren't .38", as .44s aren't really .44"...

It's a big subject, when you start gettin' down to particulars.

-- Sam

 

[Snake45]

Long story short, if you have a .45 Colt revolver and you want to shoot .45GAP in it because the ammo is available--no, it won't work, unless you have a special cylinder made to take that cartridge. I'm pretty sure that .45GAP won't even work in a .45ACP revolver cylinder, though I have heard stories of .45GAP being fired in .45ACP autopistols, if the extractor holds the cartridge tight enough for ignition. Still, not a good idea.

Whoops, I was thinking about Ruger SA revolvers in the above answer. If you have a S&W DA .45ACP revolver, you could fire GAPs in it using the little "snowflake" clips that these revolvers take. The GAP has a slightly higher pressure rating than the .45ACP, but the gun--especially if it's a modern one--should be able to handle that with no problem. (I wouldn't try it in one of the WWI-made Colt .45ACP revolvers unless it were some kind of emergency.)

 

[redsouthpaw]

Long story short, if you have a .45 Colt revolver and you want to shoot .45GAP in it because the ammo is available--no, it won't work, unless you have a special cylinder made to take that cartridge. I'm pretty sure that .45GAP won't even work in a .45ACP revolver cylinder, though I have heard stories of .45GAP being fired in .45ACP autopistols, if the extractor holds the cartridge tight enough for ignition. Still, not a good idea.

Whoops, I was thinking about Ruger SA revolvers in the above answer. If you have a S&W DA .45ACP revolver, you could fire GAPs in it using the little "snowflake" clips that these revolvers take. The GAP has a slightly higher pressure rating than the .45ACP, but the gun--especially if it's a modern one--should be able to handle that with no problem. (I wouldn't try it in one of the WWI-made Colt .45ACP revolvers unless it were some kind of emergency.)

Good point snake. If you are using moon clips in a modern revolver you should be ok because it is headspaced on the rim.

 

[Jimbo357mag]

...and then there are cartridges like 30-30 and 30-06, both rifle cartridges with a lot of history.

In general the caliber of a cartridge is expressed as the diameter of the bullet in inches.

22 caliber = .22 inch
32 caliber = .32 inch
45 caliber = .45 inch
50 caliber = .50 inch

9mm = 9mm bullet diameter

Sometimes the caliber designation is close but not right on the button.

38 caliber = .357 inch
357 magnum caliber = .357 inch
41 magnum caliber = .410 inch
44 magnum caliber = .429 Inch

..and on and on. Because cartridges have been named over years and years some do not conform to the standard system

...Jimbo

 

[AgentV3]

Sometimes the caliber designation is close but not right on the button.

38 caliber = .357 inch
357 magnum caliber = .357 inch
41 magnum caliber = .410 inch
44 magnum caliber = .429 Inch

..and on and on. Because cartridges have been named over years and years some do not conform to the standard system

...Jimbo

We can blame one thing for this whole mess: heeled bullets.

Converted Navy Black Powder Revolvers used a cartridge called the .38 Short Colt, which used a roughly .38 inch heeled bullet. Heeled bullets are the same are the same diameter as the outside of the cartridge case, then step down in the back to fit into the case. Colt then created a more powerful variant called the .38 Long Colt that did not use a heeled bullet, instead it used a .357 inch bullet, but kept the name because it came from the .38 Short Colt. Smith and Wesson kept the tradition going when it introduced an even more powerful round based on the .38 Long Colt, the .38 Special, finally breaking the tradition with the .357 Magnum.

On the other side, The Smith and Wesson Model 3 used a shell called the .44 S&W American that used, once again, a heeled bullet very close to .44 inches. When they exported the Model 3 to Russia, they switched over to a non-heeled bullet (owing to concerns about the external lubrication picking up debris and damaging the bore), producing a internally lubricated bullet that was .429 inches in width. They called the new round the .44 Russian, because it was based on the .44 American. When Smith and Wesson introduced it's New Century revolver, they took the .44 Russian and powered it up to the .44 Special, again, deriving it's name from the parent case. The disappointment enthusiasts had with the new cartridge led them to hot-rod the Special, eventually spawning the .44 Magnum, again, named from it's parent case.

Fun fact, the official issue sidearm of the U.S. military in 1892 was the double action Colt M1892 chambered in .38 Long Colt. However, during the Philippine-American War, the .38 LC was found to be ineffective against the wooden shields of the Moro Tribesmen. This led to the military pulling the .45 Colt Single Action Army out of retirement. This pressed the military into considering a new sidearm, preferably a semi-automatic, and chambered in a 45 caliber cartridge. This led to a competition between Colt, Savage, DWM (Luger), and a few others, which Colt handily won, with it's pistol being officially adopted by the military on March 29, 1911, it's classification being Automatic Pistol, Caliber .45, M1911

This brief history lesson brought to you by Wikipedia and way too much free time.

 

[edlmann]

Sometimes the caliber designation is close but not right on the button.

From memory, the following cartridges:

.218 Bee
.219 Zipper
.220 Swift
.221 Fireball
.222 Remington
.223 Remington
.224 Weatherby Magnum
.225 Winchester

all use bullets of .224 diameter.

 

[Redhawk4]

"45 GAP is Gaston Glock's vanity cartridge"

It always seemed to be just that, serving no purpose other than making the grip frame of the gun fractionally smaller than if chambered in 45 acp. I'm sure there will be those that disagree, and I know I feel that all the cartridges we need were developed long ago, but for me 45 GAP was one of the most pointless new cartridge intros ever, despite the way the gun press lept on it as if it were some amazing development.

 

[maxpress]

then you have the old bullets which had the load as the head stamp such as the 45-70= .45cal over 70gr black powder

 

[Bucks Owin]

then you have the old bullets which had the load as the head stamp such as the 45-70= .45cal over 70gr black powder

.45/70/500...... :wink: 500 gr bullet

 

[Snake45]

"45 GAP is Gaston Glock's vanity cartridge"

It always seemed to be just that, serving no purpose other than making the grip frame of the gun fractionally smaller than if chambered in 45 acp. I'm sure there will be those that disagree, and I know I feel that all the cartridges we need were developed long ago, but for me 45 GAP was one of the most pointless new cartridge intros ever, despite the way the gun press lept on it as if it were some amazing development.

I was looking forward to shooting a dedicated 1911 for the GAP cartridge, as the grip would be a little shorter front-to-back, and the 1911 is marginal for me size-wise (my hand fits it, but just barely). I handled one of these shorty 1911s chambered for 9mm and it felt great--I'd love to shoot one. Apparently no one could get the shorty 1911 in GAP to work, as, although there was much speculation and perhaps even some announcements, I never saw a writeup or report on a single one. Ah shucks oh well.

 

[Ale-8(1)]

"45 GAP is Gaston Glock's vanity cartridge"

Best line of this thread.