Certain types of full metal jacket (FMJ) bullets have extra letters at the end of their name: “TC.” This stands for truncated cone, and it describes the unique shape of the FMJ-TC bullet.
What is a Truncated Cone Bullet?
The FMJTC has a cone-shaped profile, but because it is “truncated” it is without its top section. Instead of ending in a pointed or round nose, the FMJTC’s tip is flat and circular like a disc.
What Do You Use Truncated Cone Bullets For?
We use truncated cone bullets mostly for target shooting with pistols – especially when the targets are made of paper.
FMJTC bullets are inexpensive enough for high-volume target shooting, and their flat tips enable them to cut cleaner holes through paper than standard round nose FMJ bullets could manage. FMJTC bullets make it especially easier to assess how closely you are grouping your shots in a paper target because they cause less radial tearing around their points of impact.
Should You Use Truncated Cone Bullets for Self Defense?
Shooters don’t use FMJTC bullets for self-defense very often. Bullets with flat nose profiles generally deal greater damage to soft tissue than bullets with round noses, which poses an obvious advantage when your goal is to neutralize a threat.
Hollow point bullets are superior for self-defense because they expand as they penetrate soft tissue, however, so we typically only see FMJTC bullets utilized by soldiers who must honor the international moratorium on the use of expanding bullets during warfare. Hollow points are also less likely to pass through human-sized targets. Overpenetration is generally not a problem in combat, although most of us consider it undesirable during self-defense scenarios where innocent bystanders may be present.
Note that not all truncated bullets are necessarily FMJs. They may also be soft point (SP) or semi-jacketed. On rare occasions you’ll find them made of solid copper (aka monolithic).
Why Use a Truncated Cone Bullet Instead of a Wadcutter?
Underwood truncated cone ammo (left) next to wadcutter rounds (right).
The wadcutter is a cylindrical bullet. It works reliably in revolvers and lever-action rifles, but its broad nose profile is not conducive to smooth feeding in a semi-automatic firearm (unless that firearm has been modified in some way).
It is easier for a semi-auto’s feeding mechanism to feed a bullet with a sloping profile into the chamber. The FMJTC’s flat nose may cause feeding issues in some firearms, but in the vast majority of cases its profile is still sloping enough for a semi-auto to feed it reliably. In essence, the FMJTC is the closest thing to a wadcutter most semi-autos are able to chamber.
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