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View Full Version : Penetration vs. Expansion tests today



DanWalker
03-30-2008, 01:19 AM
Hi guys,
I managed to sneak away from the rig today and do some experimenting.
I tested some soft alloy boolits against some ACWW boolits.
If you look at the pics, you'll see 4 bullet holes in the book.
The top and bottom holes are from the 320 grain mould that the hammer boolit mould was copied from. Both boolits were cast from an alloy of 9 parts pure lead, and one part WW's.
The load was 18 grains of 2400 and the range was 10 yards. I wasn't sure of my sight settings for this load and didn't want to miss.
The bottom hole in the thick book is an entrance wound produced after the boolit fiirst penetrated a 1" thick water soaked book, and a full one gallon water jug. I was trying to simulate a boradside shot on a medium game animal. The top hole was made by the same boolit, but it was fired directly into the book.
The center hole was made by a 255 grain keith SWC from our Group buy a while back. it was pushed by 18 grains of 2400 also, and cast of ACWW's.
The hole to the left of center was made by a 200 gr hornady xtp fired from my 44 bulldog.
All loads exited and no boolits were recovered. This is what i wanted. i wanted to examine the wound channels and view the exits. I've never had a hunting load stay in an animal, so I find it rather pointless to stack up the medium to catch them. The third picture shows the exits.
I'd say I got some expansion on the 320's..... Note the reverse dimpling of the entrance wound on the top entrance hole. That's evidence of the hydraulic effect I've described with this boolit.

DanWalker
04-06-2008, 11:46 PM
Here's round two.
This time the hammer boolits were cast from pure lead and fired from the 16" bbl of my win 94 trapper.
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e179/crowshooter223/STUFF4001.jpg

The range was 35 yards and the velocity was around 1500 fps.
The load was 18.5 grains of 2400 under both a 320 grain hammer boolit cast from pure lead, and a 255 grain keith swc cast from ACWW's.
This is the entrance hole which shows pronounced hydraulic effect from the wide flat meplat of this boolit.
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e179/crowshooter223/STUFF4002.jpg
This is the exit hole. I'd say some expansion took place!
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e179/crowshooter223/STUFF4003.jpg
This is the eixt after the boolit penetrated the first phone book, went through a gallon jug of water, then passed through this 6" thick catalog.
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e179/crowshooter223/STUFF4004.jpg
This next image is a side by side comparison of the entrance wounds made by the 320 hammer bollit (on the left) and the 255 keith swc(on the right)
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e179/crowshooter223/STUFF4006.jpg
Here are the exits.
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e179/crowshooter223/STUFF4005.jpg
Here's a couple pics of a recovered hammer boolit,alongside an unfired example. It was found lying on the ground after passing through the media and impacting the packed earth wall behind them.
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e179/crowshooter223/STUFF4007.jpg
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e179/crowshooter223/STUFF4008.jpg
All in all I have to say I'm quite pleased with these results.
I had ZERO leading in the bore of the rifle after 15 shots today, and accuracy was outstanding.
I'm not trying to bash hard cast boolits, or tear down anyone's castles. I just wanted to see for myself what was possible.

IcerUSA
04-07-2008, 01:02 AM
Nice report . Thank you for sharing it.

Keith