Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto  Performance self-defense ammo comes in five different handgun calibers: .380 ACP, 9mm, .40 S&W, .357 Sig, and .45ACP. Each caliber features a single load and bullet weight using Sig’s proprietary “V-Crown” bullet, all with standard pressure (no +P loads). The ammo is loaded in a Sig-owned facility in Eubank, Kentucky.

We got in some of the first batch of Sig Sauer ammo last week, and the .45 ACP and .357 Sig have already sold out. But before we posted it for sale, I grabbed a few boxes to do some testing for those of you who might be curious about what this ammo can do. If you want the short version, just watch the video summary above. The rest of you number loving ballistics nerds can read on for all that spreadsheet goodness I know you crave.

Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto Testing Goals

I tried to keep this pretty simple at straightforward, so no 2000-round reliability tests this time. I basically wanted to know three things about the Sig ammo:

1. Does it function/cycle normally?
2. Is it reasonably accurate?
3. How does it perform compared to other available self-defense loads?

To answer these questions, I fired groups for accuracy, measured velocity on a chronograph, and observed the performance of each load in ballistics gelatin. In the interest of time, I skipped over the .357 Sig load since it’s the least popular of the five calibers. If there are enough requests from you guys, I’ll re-visit that load in a future post.

The test guns used were as follows:

• .380 ACP: CZ-83
• 9mm: Glock 22 w/ Lone Wolf 9mm conversion barrel
• .40 S&W: Sig P226
• .45 ACP: Springfield Armory XDm-45 4.5″

For comparison in the ballistics gel, I also tested loads from a second brand of ammo for each caliber. I used the popular Federal HST self-defense ammo as the counterpart for the 9mm, .40 S&W, and .45 ACP loads.

For .380 ACP, I used Remington Golden Saber as the comparison load.

Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto Accuracy and Reliability

Like I said, I didn’t run a real high round-count for this Sig Sauer ammo test, so the “reliability test” was limited to Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto for each caliber. That’s not much of a true reliability test, but in reality, the dependability of any given load will vary from one gun to the next. Before carrying any load for self-defense, it’s often recommended that you run at least 200 rounds of that load through your firearm to ensure that the load and gun play nice together. I think that’s a pretty good guideline, but from this test, there are a few additional observations that might be helpful:

• None of the test guns exhibited any feeding problems or malfunctions with the Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto
• Ejection patterns for the spent brass casings were consistent with other loads fired from the test guns
• Bullet velocities were normal for each load (details below)
• The Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto bullet has a wide opening relative to many other modern hollow-point loads. It somewhat resembles the Federal Hydra-Shok self-defense ammo. Some pistols may have trouble feeding this kind of ammo. If your gun has had reliability problems with Hydra-Shoks in the past, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Sig ammo exhibits similar issues.

Sig Sauer V-Crown ammo from left: .380 ACP, 9mm, .40 S&W, .45 ACP. On each load, the V-Crown bullet has a relatively wide mouth, most likely to aid in bullet expansion.

For accuracy, I fired one 10-shot group for each load from a bench rest at 15 yards. Those results are on the table below. These numbers are all fairly consistent with the kind of accuracy I’ve come to expect from each of these pistols. The Glock 22 with the Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto conversion barrel has never been a particularly accurate setup for me, so better groups should be achievable with a more accurate gun. Unfortunately, the only other pistol I had available at the range that day was a S&W M&P9, which would have most likely grouped even worse.

This test was intended to be a quick overview to spot any glaringly obvious flaws or problems with the ammo. For self-defense purposes, the Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto seems to perform just fine in the accuracy department.

Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto Ballistics Gelatin

The gelatin used in these tests is not a perfect analog for human tissue, but it’s about as close as we can get practically and still achieve repeatable results. Testing bullets in other mediums like food-grade gelatin, water jugs, wet newspaper, or hunks of meat might be better than nothing, but the results are difficult to interpret in any useful way. Ballistics gelatin has been used as the industry standard for many years, and there’s a large body of existing data to use for comparison.

For a more comprehensive test, ballistics gel is often used along with different barriers to determine how the bullets behave when they encounter fabric, plywood, and glass before striking the target. My tests were only performed on bare gelatin with no barriers. Penetration and expansion of each load may look significantly different in a test with a few layers of denim placed in front of the gel.

Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto Ballistics Testing Procedure

In the photos below, you can also see where the bullets traveled a bit further than their final resting spot, but “bounced back” in the gel before coming to a complete stop. The additional travel looks to be anywhere from one half to a full inch in the gel for each bullet. I could not find any reliable information regarding whether this portion of the channel should be included in the penetration depth measurement, so I have left it out. My measurements start at the entry point on the block, and end at the far end of the bullet’s resting point.

Gathering the bullet velocity data was pretty straightforward. I shot each load through a Chrony Beta Master chronograph to measure bullet velocity. Distance from muzzle to chrono was 10 feet, except for the .45 ACP which had to be moved back to 15 feet to get an accurate reading. The below data shows the average velocity from 10 rounds of each load. I also added the manufacturer’s published velocity for both the Sig ammunition loads and the comparison loads. Sig’s velocity data is very comparable to what I measured, and any discrepancies can be attributed to differences in barrel length (Sig lists test barrel length at 4 inches for .380 ACP, 9mm, and .40S&W and 5 inches for .45 ACP)

Sig Sauer Elite V-Crown 10mm Auto Results

Conclusion

I’ll refrain from giving any hard recommendations based on this data. This is my first substantial and relatively in-depth attempt at ballistics testing, and there are a few things I will do differently next time. That said, I think the data I gathered for the Sig ammo is pretty solid, especially when compared solely to the competing loads of each caliber.

As you can see, the .45 ACP Sig Elite Performance performed closest to its comparison load out of all the Sig ammo tested. Expansion of the .45 ACP Sig load was not as good as the impressive spread of the HST, but the average penetration depth was very close. The .40 S&W load for the Sig ammo did break the magical 12-inch barrier, but was still significantly out-performed by the HST in terms of penetration. Expansion of the two was nearly identical.