Soft Point Cast Boolit Expansion

[curioushooter]

Has anyone evidence of solid cast boolits expanding at real world handgun velocities (< 1400 FPS) on water or meat?

I have seen some reports of softer alloys like 20:1 expanding moderately in this velocity range. The trouble would seem to be avoiding leading and maintaining accuracy.

I've read some threads on casting two-alloy bullets and have come to the conclusion that effort is a whole lot more trouble than either paper patching (which allows the use of a much softer alloy) or casting a hollowpoint.

[Outpost75]

1:20 tin-lead alloy with SPG lube will do as you wish in the .44 Magnum without leading and will maintain accuracy.

It does for me and it did for Elmer Keith.

Elmer Keith’s book Sixgun Cartridges and Loads (1936) on pgs. 69-70 states:

“For most revolver cartridges, including all light and normal pressure loads, there is no use to having the bullets harder than one part tin to twenty parts lead for really heavy loads a one to fifteen mixture is hard enough… For automatic pistols, the bullets should be very hard, consisting of about one part tin to ten parts of lead, in order for them to slide up easily out of the magazine into the chamber… A mixture of part tin and part antimony works very well for some heavy loads, but such very hard, brittle bullets are not needed for any revolver load except in the case of extreme penetration, where no upsettage or expansion is wanted.”



I have found Keith's suggestions to work in my last 50 years experience following them.

[curioushooter]

I can quote the Prophet Keith as well. Sixguns, Chapter XVI, Page 232: "A mixture of part tin and part antimony works very well for some heavy loads. Hollow point bullets with velocities up to 1000 feet, to insure proper expansion, need not be over one part tin to sixteen parts lead."

I have shot 358429s made of 16:1 into gel blocks at 1200 FPS. Zero expansion.

[Outpost75]

I can quote the Prophet Keith as well. Sixguns, Chapter XVI, Page 232: "A mixture of part tin and part antimony works very well for some heavy loads. Hollow point bullets with velocities up to 1000 feet, to insure proper expansion, need not be over one part tin to sixteen parts lead."

I have shot 358429s made of 16:1 into gel blocks at 1200 FPS. Zero expansion.

Have you experienced failures and lost game with #358429s which didn't expand?

I'm more concerned with failures of soft HP bullets which come apart and fail to penetrate.

I've never been attacked by a Jello Monster, but seen my share of HP bullet failures on feral hogs and a few bear.

I like to see through and through complete penetration and exit, with a meplat not less than 0.6 of bullet diameter and not harder than 1:20 in .357 and .44 Magnum, and 1:30 in .38 Special +P, .44-40 and .45 Colt.

[megasupermagnum]

To answer your question, yes, I've seen some impressive expansion of soft cast solid bullets from handguns. I have not played with them much, as I consider it much easier to cast a hollow point, plus you can get away with less velocity with a HP.

My favorite was a 120 grain SWC from 327 federal, left the 5" barrel at 1500 fps, and at 25 yards was recovered from water jugs. It had expanded to about 1/2", and was flat fronted, not just mushroomed. To get accuracy with these soft alloys pushed hard, you will likely need a gas check.

Expansion from solid bullets certainly is possible at less than 1400 fps, the question is how soft do you have to go. Look no farther than muzzleloaders. I recently shot a deer with a pure lead round ball. The ball was doing about 1200 fps at the impact 40 yards downrange, it expanded heavily. Since it was such an angled shot, I even caught the ball in the shoulder after penetrating about 20". Hopefully I will recover the ball, but the offside hole was about 3/4".

If I were to look for an expanding bullet in a handgun I would choose a gas check design, with a flat nose, possibly lighter in weight for more velocity. In 357 magnum, I would try a design like the Lee C358-158SWC, or the 158 grain ranchdog gas checked. You can approach 1500 fps with a 158 grain.

[bmortell]

I hunted for 2 weeks and failed to get a deer so i didnt get to show meat results like i was hoping, so all i can show is my test boolits.

Left is 300gr with 100gr of 20-1 nose and heat treated 50-50 bottom 200gr. Tested in paper mush and water at 1350 because its 150 less than MV. Nose expanded from .360 to .630

Right is only 1% tin lead for the front 1/3, same base, tested at 1500 since mv is 1650. Nose expanded from .280 to .655 almost shedding the nose off as you can see.

Its slow making soft points feels like maybe 1 every 2 minutes or something. But if you dont have time to make 10 once a year for hunting you might be in the wrong hobby. Of course hollowpoints can work too but softpoints have the attractive quality of being free assuming you already have a normal mold and some stuff to make alloys

[curioushooter]

I like to see through and through complete penetration and exit, with a meplat not less than 0.6 of bullet diameter and not harder than 1:20 in .357 and .44 Magnum, and 1:30 in .38 Special +P, .44-40 and .45 Colt.

So, have you observed any expansion with 20:1 (pb:sn) at 1000-1200 FPS or so? All of those cartridges with a bullet weight appropriate to the caliber should easily penetrate through a deer if they don't expand. Unless you deer wear body armor. .495 caliber dead soft lead round ball (only 180 grains or so) out of my Lyman Deerstalker clock 1400 FPS (if the wad doesn't get clocked!) pass through.

[KVO]

Cast from Roto Metals 20:1, fired from 20" barrel Win 92. Fired into Clear Ballistics gel covered w/ 2 layers of cloth. 357 magnum, 360-640 solid loaded over 14.0gr Alliant 2400 and 359-640 cup point HP over 13.5gr 2400. Unfortunately my chronograph was not cooperating that day but I do have velocity data for the same loads out of several handgun barrel lengths.






Not a perfect apples to apples comparison but ~20:1 alloy solids seem to need 1500-1700+ fps to appreciably expand.

Curioushooter I've done a fair amount of gel testing over the last 2 years with the same medium you ate using, PM me if you'd like to compare notes on any particular bullet designs. I have a fair number of Mihec and NOE HP molds I've worked with.

[Outpost75]

So, have you observed any expansion with 20:1 (pb:sn) at 1000-1200 FPS or so? All of those cartridges with a bullet weight appropriate to the caliber should easily penetrate through a deer if they don't expand. Unless you deer wear body armor. .495 caliber dead soft lead round ball (only 180 grains or so) out of my Lyman Deerstalker clock 1400 FPS (if the wad doesn't get clocked!) pass through.

I have neither recovered a bullet nor lost an animal well-hit with solids, so I don't care if the bullet expands or not. Expansion doesn't compensate at all for poor shot placement.

[curioushooter]

Not a perfect apples to apples comparison but ~20:1 alloy solids seem to need 1500-1700+ fps to appreciably expand.

This is pretty much what I expected. I have observed basically only very modest expansion (not mushrooming, more like the bullet looks like an upside down tree stump) right at 1350 FPS with 16:1 alloy.

One of the things I've learned is that there are people who make statements about cast boolit performance and there are people who shoot gel. PM incoming.

[GregLaROCHE]

So why don’t people want to shoot 100% lead for hunting? Is it barrel leading? Can you reduce the charge and still have an effective kill shot? I’ve hunted a lot in the past, but not with cast boolits.

[curioushooter]

I have neither recovered a bullet nor lost an animal well-hit with solids, so I don't care if the bullet expands or not. Expansion doesn't compensate at all for poor shot placement.

I don't see any problem with getting a bigger "well placed" wound channel, do you?

[onelight]

There are pictures of Elmers expanded hollow points recovered from game , but you can't read much that he wrote and not understand that he preferred large solid bullets for the deepest penetration possible from any angle and the best chance of breaking heavy bones.
It is certainly easy to understand his reasoning with the experiences he had with live stock and large and dangerous animals

[Outpost75]

I don't see any problem with getting a bigger "well placed" wound channel, do you?

I prefer to avoid the excessive meat damage, especially on raking shots.

"The rear end of a deer is to eat and not to shoot, (unless you are from Texas)

[curioushooter]

So why don’t people want to shoot 100% lead for hunting? Is it barrel leading? Can you reduce the charge and still have an effective kill shot? I’ve hunted a lot in the past, but not with cast boolits.

I use nearly pure lead (about 99.5% and .5% tin) in my muzzloader (patched round ball). It works plenty well and has taken several deer despite having terrible sectional density, no meplat whatsoever (its a round ball), and only weighing ~180 grains. It is .495" so it makes at least that sized wound.

I've used nearly pure lead in 12 gauge lee slugs. Still the most devastating projectile I've ever witnessed on an animal. No Meplat. It puts about a 1" hole through the animal though and hits them like a piano dropped from from the fourth floor.

The key here is neither comes in contact with the barrel. One is protected by a piece of pillow ticking and the other by a shotgun wad.

[curioushooter]

you can't read much that he wrote and not understand that he preferred large solid bullets for the deepest penetration possible from any angle and the best chance of breaking heavy bones.
It is certainly easy to understand his reasoning with the experiences he had with live stock and large and dangerous animals

That's because he was dealing with big critters. There are no big critters where I live. Our deer weigh about 200 lbs if you are lucky. Their bones are thin.

Basically any solid cast bullet which doesn't expand of reasonable sectional density for the caliber and impacting at a respectable velocity (like a 158 grain .357 hitting at 1000 FPS+) will penetrate more than 28" of calibrated ballistic gelatin. I haven't found one that doesn't. I've never found a deer that thick broadside.

[curioushooter]

The rear end of a deer is to eat and not to shoot, unless you are from Texas

This is unintentionally funny. I process deer semi-professonally and a little doe came to me this year shot near her anus. The .429 240 grain XTP wandered up her body cavity and I found it on the inside of her skin half way up her neck.

Needless to say she was not particularly fun to butcher and there was plenty of corn & bean salad all over the place.

So apparently it's an Indiana thing, too.

[Outpost75]

This is unintentionally funny. I process deer semi-professonally and a little doe came to me this year shot near her anus. The .429 240 grain XTP wandered up her body cavity and I found it on the inside of her skin half way up her neck.

Needless to say she was not particularly fun to butcher and there was plenty of corn & bean salad all over the place.

So apparently it's an Indiana thing, too.

I take it the 240 XTP performed as advertised, better than 1.75 times original diameter and 85% weight retention. I've always found the Hornady 240s to be really great .44 Mag handgun bullets and I've used the 200-grain XTP at rifle velocity in .44-40, 1600 fps with 28 grains of IMR4198 in my El Tigre carbine.

That penetration is truly impressive! Imagine the meat damage was too...

[bmortell]

One of the things I've learned is that there are people who make statements about cast boolit performance and there are people who shoot gel.

is there any evidence that gel expands bullets to a more realistic amount than other water based fluids. I feel like gel is just breakable water so you can get a snapshot of what happened when you shot the water. but that don't seem relevant to expansion amount.

[Outpost75]

Some in the law enforcement community question whether clear ballistics gel being sold gives repeatable results which are comparable to those obtained using calibrated gelatin tissue simulant prepared in the manner as used by the Army and other government labs:

https://www.policeone.com/police-pro...FBGUHw79F9s0a/

ABSTRACT

Until the early 1990s, there was no accepted industry standard for evaluating the terminal ballistic performance of duty handgun ammunition for law enforcement. As a result, agencies that wanted to conduct an objective examination of duty ammunition were forced to develop their own test protocols and standards, or rely on the data provided by manufacturers or other agencies (frequently federal agencies, since they had the budgets to do this kind of testing).

A significant limitation of this approach is that it was impossible to compare data from different sources. Every test differed from the next and introduced variables, assumptions and theories that made direct comparisons of the data fruitless. For example, differences in test mediums (water jugs, clay, gelatin of different concentrations and temperatures), pet ballistic theories (temporary cavities versus permanent cavities, “energy dump” versus penetration), and desired performance (penetration depth, expansion, retained weight, cavity measurements) made each set of data individually unique and incomparable.

To illustrate, it’s useful to consider the critical variable of penetration depth, which was measured and rewarded in very different ways in major studies from the 1970s through the early 1990s. In National Institute of Justice testing, bullets were evaluated and scored on their ability to penetrate between 1.6 and 8.7 inches in the test media (20% gelatin), while US Secret Service testing focused on the 1–5.9 inch range (20% gelatin), US Navy testing focused on the 7–12 inch range (20% gelatin), and US Immigration and Naturalization Service testing favored performance in the 9–12 inch range (10% gelatin). Based on this factor alone, it’s easy to see how a bullet that scored highly in one test could fail the test conducted by another agency.

SETTLING ON A STANDARD

When the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) introduced its own standards for terminal ballistic performance in December 1988, they were met with a mix of enthusiasm and resistance. In fairness, there were things to both like and dislike about the FBI standards in their first iteration, but over the course of time, “the protocol” – and, more importantly, the interpretation of the data derived from the protocol – has improved and matured to the point that it’s now the uncontested industry standard.

The protocol has been widely accepted by both the law enforcement and manufacturing communities and has given them a standard to work from. The FBI protocol has established a common language, a standardized testing process and standardized benchmarks for performance that have allowed a variety of different agencies, companies and individuals to conduct their own testing and contribute data that is directly comparable to the data derived from other tests and sources.

This has been a positive influence on the development of duty ammunition. The improvements in communication and information sharing have led to the development of several new generations of duty ammunition that were designed to excel in the stages of the FBI protocol.

The first generation of FBI protocol-inspired bullets – represented by designs such as the Federal HST, Hornady XTP, Remington Golden Saber, Speer Gold Dot and Winchester SXT – dramatically improved the capabilities of law enforcement ammunition. However, a desire for “barrier-blind” bullets that offered more consistent performance after encountering the intermediate barriers of the FBI protocol has led to an even more advanced second generation of bullets, typified by designs such as the Hornady Critical Duty Flexlock bullet, Speer G2 Gold Dot bullet and Winchester Ranger One bullet. Absent the FBI protocol, and its influence on bullet development, it’s doubtful that law enforcement officers would have access to such innovative and capable duty ammunition today.

FULL CIRCLE

In an interesting twist though, the law enforcement community is currently in danger of repeating some of the mistakes of the period that predated the adoption of the FBI protocol. Specifically, they are in jeopardy of returning to the time when data sets were not comparable, due to the choice of different test mediums.

Before the FBI standardized the use of (nominal) 10%, calibrated, ballistic gelatin, various groups used materials as disparate as wet newspaper, clay, water jugs, ballistic soap (still popular in Europe), or 20% ballistic gelatin (favored by the US military), shot at a variety of temperatures, to test ammunition performance. Since the widespread adoption of the FBI protocol however, all serious testing done in the United States has been conducted with organic gelatin prepared according to FBI specifications, promoting a high degree of standardization.

Now, with the introduction of a new, clear, synthetic “gelatin” product to the market, this standardization is potentially in jeopardy...