Ness Safety-Glance proof boolit

[georgewxxx]

I've had this mould for a couple of years and other than making a few samples, it's never been used. The mould was bought from a fellow up in Montana. When I first saw it, I was thinking it was the bottom of a composite mould, where you cast the two halves from two different alloys. The original owner said that was all he had, there was no other parts to the mould. The mould is marked Hensley & Gibbs, #38. It cast a .313 cal 135gr, with a huge hollow nose. After acquisition of it I checked texasflyboy's H&G web-site. ..Nothing! Just recently one of those moulds sold on ebay, and the seller stated it was a hollow wad cutter Ness bullet. I contacted Tom( texasflyboy) again, this time sending a picture and description of weight etc. He forwarded it to Doug(floodgate). Between the three of us we found a few blurbs in Sharps, Complete Guide to Handloading & Ness's, Practical Dope On Big Bores. Doug did some digging in his stash of old 1930's American Rifleman and came up with 3 articles by F.C. Ness, then then main man for the NRA in their testing dept. We find out it goes by a couple of names, Glance proof, Ness safety, etc. It was tested on critters, and of course it was explosive depending on how fast you push it and how far the poor animal was from you. At 100yds they displayed some very nice small groups on paper targets with several loads listed.

So now after finding out just what the thing is, I've casted up a 100rds. and it's one of my to do list when this coming shooting season resumes. I don't expect to hear any cries for group buys on this nasty looking boolit but would like to hear from anyone who's tried it. ...GEO

[MT Gianni]

I have never seen one but with that nose and the name Ness safety it isn't going to overpenetrate. Certainly not much more than through your target animal. Gianni.

[georgewxxx]

As with most all Hensley & Gibbs hollow points I got, the hollow point pin is adjustable for to the depth on the boolit you want to make. H&G experimented with different size pins also. In the articles, they talk about using different nose punches too, to close it up and make it more aerodynamic....Geo

[floodgate]

The main point behind the "Safety" or "Glance-Proof" designation was that the boolit would disintegrate on impact and not ricochet, for use where ricochets could be a problem (as most of us will have noticed, a ricochet ALWAYS sounds as if it's coming right at you). They found that breakup was reliable, with no ricochets even at glancing incidence on smooth concrete. Ballistic coefficients were horrible, but at short range (out to 100 yds.) accuracy was acceptable or better, and results on "varmints" were devastating, to say the least.

floodgate

[georgewxxx]

Doug, In those 1930's Rifleman articles you sent, I see some some of the master casters of the day played with that Safety boolit. E. E. Starr, W. S. Alberts, where among many other hotshots of the 30's. They closed up the nose section to make them more aerodynamic using swaging dies for long range and high velocity shooting. 1700fps was the target velocity with an unchanged boolit. They got up to 2400fps with nose looking rounded.

[45 2.1]

georgewxxx-
Could I get about a dozen of those for a boolit sample so I could draw it up and experiment with it.

[nighthunter]

WOW .... that is an awsum looking boolit. To have originated back in the 30's is also a good to know fact. Some of those old American Rifleman magazines are some very good reading. My father has years and years of issues of the originals that belonged to my great grandfather. When I was a kid I always wondered why he kept them old things. Now, I'm glad he did.
Nighthunter

[quack1]

Not to completely hijack this thread, but nighthunter reminded me of a question I have been thinking about. Is there a way to scan the yearly indexes of magazines on a disc then be able to use the computer to do a search for specific calibers, authors, etc? Like the search feature here. I have American Rifleman from 1946 and all the issues of Handloader and Rifle. I copied all the indexes, but when looking for loading data for a new caliber, there is still a lot of pages to read through. 60 yearly indexes for Rifleman alone. Any of you more computer-literate guys know how this might be done?

[georgewxxx]

45 2.1
Send me a private mesage and I'll get back to you....Geo

[georgewxxx]

Quack1,

I'm trying find a way to post a few of those pages Doug sent without going over the max ammout of file space allowed here. I've got them set in jpg's now they're all too big to upload. ...Geo

[Scrounger]

Here is a link to a free photo host which will allow you to past pretty good sized documents. Then you need only post a link to the posted document.

http://www.putfile.com/loggedin

[georgewxxx]

Thanks scrounger I'll try it..Geo

[Sundogg1911]

if it's still to big of a pic, let me know. I can host it on my web server and give you a link to view it

[georgewxxx]

To view those American Rifleman articles try this linlk

http://www.putfile.com/georgewxxx/images/75662

Hope it works for everyone. i couldn't quite get how to sort the pages so you'll have jump around a bit to read the texts in order....geo

[HORNET]

georgewxxx,
Congratulations, you found something for.30 cal that looks even nastier than the Lyman 31133 HP. I believe BEAGLE has played with that one some. I've got some poured but haven't had time to try them yet (too many squirrels to chase).
Yours looks like it's cut for a gas check which should allow very explosive velocities.
Now you need Carpetman to loan you a few test cats..........[smilie=1:

[georgewxxx]

Rick,

I've got the that bullet too only mine is an old Ideal 30833. Still a hollow point. I was talking to John(Beagle) this morning, and he mentioned shooting a hollow pointed version of the 311359 loaded in a 30 carbine that was almost worse. Makes a big difference how big the pin is of course. I've shot deer with a old 1886 Winchester 38-56 loaded with a Lyman hollow pointed 375296. Believe me, it does the job. ...Geo

[georgewxxx]

Bobby (45 2.1), your samples are in the mail...Have fun.....Geo

[45 2.1]

Thanks Much George. I'll put them to good use.

[uscra112]

I've read those Ness articles, and longed to play with the concept myself. As I remember, they had best success with the boolit cast very hard, with a lot of antimony in it.

Keep us posted!

[thehouseproduct]

Group buy discussion started.
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?p=1370312

[a.squibload]

Here is a link to a free photo host which will allow you to past pretty good sized documents. Then you need only post a link to the posted document.

http://www.putfile.com/loggedin


FYI you can also use Gmail (Google), it's free and gives you 1024MB of storage
on Picasaweb.com. I have a bunch of photos there and it still says I'm using 0%.

[HangFireW8]

It helps to realize that in the 1920's and 30's, fragmentation of the bullet nose was considered "perfect" hunting performance. The fragments were expected to add more wide-ranging damage than the bullet alone.

Factory jacketed rifle j-word hollow point performance was, back then, awful, and the writers knew it. They were manufactured with a heavy jacket forward, and had two modes of performance, either failing to expand altogether, or just closing up at the nose and becoming a virtual FMJ. They were also roundly condemned for being a greater ricochet risk than soft point j-words.

As usual, boolit casters moved in to to fill the void, many paying machinists to add hollow points to existing designs, the more well-heeled paying for custom molds.