.224 Boz

The .224 BOZ cartridge was developed in the late 1990s with the purpose of defeating body armour. The .224 BOZ began as a 10mm Auto case necked down to .223. Original trials were exceptionally successful. Worldwide patents were applied for and granted. This innovative round fired a 50 gr projectile chronographed at well over 2500 ft/s. The editor of Guns & Ammo came to the United Kingdom to personally fire the .224 BOZ and wrote a detailed illustrated report in the November 1998 issue with front page banner headlines and eight page review.

In early 1999 .224 BOZ was fired in modified 10mm MP5 and 10mm Glock taking part in a significant head to head trial at DERA Fort Halstead (UK Defence Testing Establishment) against the NATO CRISAT Specification target of layered titanium and Kevlar armour. These trials most favourably compared the .224 BOZ against the 5.7 FN P90 and the HK MP7. .224 BOZ was shown at the Shot Shows 1999 and 2000 generating tremendous interest, however, the inventor's policy of preventing sales to civilians restricted income and funds dried up. The concept was solely to be made available for anti-terrorist and special forces use.

In 2010 work restarted on re-working .224 BOZ into a 9x19mm necked case to .223 and with a partnership with a leading ballistics engineer a new range of projectiles have been created. Despite decreasing the cartridge case volume velocities in excess of 2200 ft/s have been achieved.

New handgun conversions are being developed that allow simple drop-in conversion of any in-service 9mm platform which gives a substantial increase in performance enabling a user to retain weapons already in use. This conversion is a simple recoil spring and barrel swap. Initially, this is being restricted to service handguns with SMG conversions planned for early 2012. Projectile options now give the user a wide selection of terminal effects and anti-armour properties. The .224 BOZ is developed by Civil Defence Supply, Lincoln, United Kingdom.

From original work on lightweight 5.56mm projectiles a new study to improve the NATO SS109 5.56mm began under the title of the SWIFT Project which is on-going,. Similar work is taking place,, in the US with the improved 5.56mm M855 A1 and SOST M318 Mod0 and M319 Mod 0 recently adopted by the US Marine Corps being cartridges developed specifically in response to combat lessons learnt in Iraq and Afghanistan.