Liberty Overwatch 9mm Review: Fastest Defense Ammo Yet?

Images by the author unless otherwise noted 

As most shooters know, there is an entire cottage industry built around 9mm self-defense loads. It isn’t only civilian shooters who want them. For years, law enforcement agencies from the F.B.I. on down have requested that ammunition companies produce more effective ammunition. We’ve come a long way from the 158-grain lead round nose .38 Special round, for sure.

Two Philosophies

There are two basic philosophies or schools of thought about making effective defense ammo. One of them believes that a heavy, blunt, slow lead bullet at moderate velocities works best, as its mass works to disrupt a target. The British military, especially in the late-19th and 20th centuries, was a proponent of this theory with their heavy-for-caliber loads in Webley revolvers. Jeff Cooper illustrated the justification for this type of load as picturing a heavy safe door being closed by a slow, steady push as opposed to a sharp blow with your hand… This is equated to the slow-heavy bullet versus a light, fast bullet. A modern equivalent would be a Charter Arms 5-shot revolver in .44 Special. I have handloaded a lot of heavy-bullet .44 Spl. loads over the decades. 

That is one philosophy.

The other track, definitely more popular than the first one that modern ammunition makers have taken, uses a light-for-caliber bullet at high velocity. This is not a new concept… I remember reading about Lee Jurras and his Super-Vel ammunition, which, coincidentally, was made here in the Hoosier state, Shelbyville, to be particular. He used a light-for-caliber bullet at some ridiculously fast velocities. That is the other theory for making an effective stopper out of a handgun. I see where the light-bullet folks are coming from. It does tend to do a good job in ballistic gel (which I’m familiar with), and real-world uses (which I’m not familiar with) are generally favorable. There is no perfect “stopper” load… all we have are statistics from real-world uses. I won’t go down that rabbit trail here… that’s not the point of this article. It is, specifically, to introduce shooters to the Liberty Ammunition Overwatch load. 

Liberty Ammunition

Liberty Ammunition is located in Bradenton, Florida. The company was founded in 2005, with an eye towards making niche ammunition that other companies didn’t offer. Through the years, they have earned 15 patents and offer several lines of ammunition, one of which is a 5.56mm armor-piercing load that the military uses.

Here is their ammo line-up. Allow me to quote from their website about each load… that will give you background and information about their various loads more quickly than if I tried to explain it. 

Before I list their ammunition types, here’s a chart that was provided by Liberty Ammunition that compares their 9mm loads against those of competitors…

They compare their loadings with several mainstream offerings. It would be interesting to also see companies that use a light-for-caliber, machined copper bullet, such as the NovX and Black Hills HoneyBadger lines listed, too.

Anyway, here are the lines of 9mm ammo they make that are listed above, minus the Steel Plate & Range and Bear loadings… those are not considered self-defense.

Civil Defense and Ultra-Light: Offered in 9mm and .380, these loads use a very light bullet pushed to very high velocities. An example is the 9mm, which uses a 50-grain bullet at 2040 fps, which yields 462 ft./lbs of energy.   

Overwatch: 9mm only, with a 72-grain bullet at 1720 fps. Here’s what they say about it:

• Designed at the request of a government agency  
• Lighter to Carry
• More Stopping Power
• Deeper Penetration
• Lighter Recoil 

RELATED: Brink’s U.S. Selects Liberty Ammunition for Executive Protection

This is what they sent me… There are more details below about how it shot.

Bear Country: This hardened copper bullet is designed for penetration and does not mushroom. Again, here are the details…

Liberty Bear Country 10mm 2100 fps, 70 grains, 685 ft/.lbs. energy

Liberty Bear Country 9mm 1800 fps, 72 grains, 518 ft./lbs. energy

Designed at the request of hunters

• 100% Hardened Copper to Penetrate Thick Hide
• Deeper Penetration
• Maintains Bullet Shape to Smash Through Bones
• Superior Stopping Power

Liberty Spike: This 55-grain, 1500 fps 380 load generates 275 ft./lbs. energy, according to the site. The bullet features a deep cavity with a central “spike”, a post that penetrates and helps initiate expansion. This design is patent pending. 

The Most Powerful .380 In The World

• Projectile has integral SPIKE
• Deep penetration
• Permanent wound channel
• Light to carry casing – NAS³ (for us non-chemistry-speak folks, that’s nickel alloy).
• 100% copper projectile

It is available in 9mm, as well.

Steel Plate & Range: This 100-grain 9mm load uses a non-lead-compressed powdered copper, frangible bullet that shatters on impact, lowering the risk of ricochets. That is all I could find out about it… Go here to read a review of this load. If you shoot steel targets, especially at closer ranges, you will want to try this ammo out.

Range Time

As I said above, I was sent some of the 9mm Overwatch ammo to try. I can’t test out the claims made for the other lines of ammo, but I was able to evaluate the Overwatch at my backyard range. I wanted to check four aspects of this 9mm load:

1. Accuracy. How did it do?  
2. Velocity. Is the advertised velocity close to what I got?
3. Penetration. How far, into a 10% Clear Ballistics 16-inch gel block, will it travel?
4. Bullet Performance. Did the bullet expand as anticipated? Did it fragment?

I grabbed two 9mm pistols… a Tisas Carry 9 DS 2011 with its 4.3-inch barrel and a Viridian CR1620 red dot, and a Canik MC9 subcompact with its 3.18-inch tube, HiLux TD-3E red dot, and a HiLight Tactical weapon light. I wanted to see if there might be a velocity trade-off with a slightly shorter barrel. I also grabbed my Athlon Rangefinder Pro radar chronograph. It has proven to be really consistent when tested against my other radar chrono, the Caldwell Velociradar. Lastly, I set up a Clear Ballistics gel block. This particular block doesn’t look new, but it still functions perfectly. In terms of the pistols, I’ve always had good reliability and service from both of these brands. The Canik, you probably have heard of, as well as the Tisas. These pistols are making waves

(Side note: This is not a chrono review, but if you are looking to upgrade from your optical chrono that needs sky screens, wires, etc., you might want to look at the above two I mentioned or the Garmin Xero. They are SO easy to use, and tiny. You can stick the Athlon or the Garmin in your pocket, and the Caldwell provides downrange ballistic info. You will be glad you switched!)

I set up targets at 15 yards, since this is self-defense ammo, and did some shooting…

This target is representative of what I discovered, regardless of the pistol used. The ammo is plenty accurate enough for its intended purpose.

Results

Let’s look at each of my four points in turn and see how the Liberty Overwatch did.

1. Accuracy.

See the target above. You won’t be disappointed by this load’s accuracy at normal defensive distances.

2. Velocity.

Here is the breakdown of the average velocities and energies I encountered…

Canik Pistol 1614 fps, 730 ft./lbs.

Tisas Pistol 1699 fps, 803 ft./lbs.

Advertised velocity on the box is 1720 fps, so we’re not far off. If I had chosen one of my 5-inch 9mms, we might have hit that. I tried to choose pistols that were easily carried.

3. Penetration.

I got right at 12.5 inches out of the Canik. Again, I chose the gun that would most likely be carried.

(Sorry about the less-than-stellar photo quality… the bullet came to rest just to the right of the 12-inch mark. You can see the bullet a bit better in the photo below. The F.B.I. bullet penetration standard is 12-18 inches… this qualifies. 

4. Bullet Performance.

Note the bullet (red arrow… my block has been used a lot). Also note the expansion cavity on the upper left side of the block, near the entry point… that is one of the larger cavities I’ve seen with 9mm ammo. I am not an expert on forensics, but I believe this is what is called a permanent cavity… it didn’t rebound and close up as temporary cavities do.

Two views, different backgrounds. We lost the forward part of the bullet down to the core, but the rest of it held together. The remaining part weighed 39 grains, down from 72.

Here again is part of the shot I had earlier, so you can see the exposed part of the bullet for comparison. Note the deep cavity.

I think it is pretty obvious, from all of the results I got and the recovered bullet, that this ammo performs pretty much as advertised. So what does this mean?

If you are looking for a defense round for your 9mm, this load should be on your short list. The machined, copper projectile performed well in ballistic gel and fed flawlessly in both pistols. The case is plated with a black zinc coating to ensure good feeding. I had no trouble at all with failures of any type, feeding or firing. The round does not look “typical”… you know, shiny brass case with a copper-colored bullet. But maybe that’s a good thing. I like to use, in some of my reviews, the age-old saying “the proof is in the pudding”. The cartridge could look all 22nd-century with all kinds of claims on the box, but if it doesn’t perform, none of that matters. This cartridge fed well. Fired every time, penetrated to a decent depth, had great terminal performance, and comes highly recommended by people who know about such things. What else do you need? Plus, it’s made in Florida. You might want to check it out. Now, to try some of their other lines of ammo… that bear load looks really interesting! Also, I wonder what the 10mm would do out of my carbine…

Links To Items Used In This Review