Want to catch a bullet..

[jdsingleshot]

I want to examine a cast WW bullet that has been shot, but have not been able to stop one. I tried a fairly dense pile of cloth, but my .25-20 87 gr went right through and through a 2x6 I had behind the cloth.

I tried shooting into a sand pile, but all I could find was flakes of lead. The bullet seemed to have disintegrated.

How can I stop a bullet without destroying it?

[Winger Ed.]

Lining up jugs of water is a favorite.

[GhostHawk]

Or a 55 gallon barrel of water or rubber mulch should also work.

[hornetguy]

I wonder how far a rifle bullet, say, a .308 will travel through water. I've wondered a bunch of times about shooting at about 30 degrees into a swimming pool.... I just wouldn't want to blast a hole through the gunite side of my pool....

[Gewehr-Guy]

I think the best back stop is snow. Hard too find right now. In the winter I push up a huge pile of snow too use as a back stop, and can recover my bullets for study. I saw a U-Tube video where a man made a bullet catcher out of a PVC pipe, and filled it with some kind of material, like Dacron or pillow stuffing.

[BNE]

I think the best back stop is snow. Hard too find right now. In the winter I push up a huge pile of snow too use as a back stop, and can recover my bullets for study. I saw a U-Tube video where a man made a bullet catcher out of a PVC pipe, and filled it with some kind of material, like Dacron or pillow stuffing.

I’ve read on this forum about people doing this…. For those of us in the south, that’s never been an option!
BNE

[Alferd Packer]

Load the bullet over 3 to 5 grains pistol powder, bullseye or 7 grains unique and then shoot into newspapers bundled flat and tied.

[hornetguy]

off topic.... I have a coffee mug that says "Alferd Packer, serving his fellow man..." :-D
For those that have never been to Lake City.... googly is your friend.... :mrgreen:

[hornetguy]

speaking of googly.... I did that, and found that Mythbusters has studied a lot of different calibers fired into water.... apparently the slower, fatter rounds penetrated best, but that 6 to 8 feet will pretty much stop anything. Most higher velocity rounds require less than that.

[brasshog]

In the past I always used wet phone books but those seem to be getting hard to find these days

[Texas by God]

A gallon jug of frozen water will catch a handgun bullet unless it’s a magnum.
Line up two for your 25-20 just in case.


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[JSnover]

A barrel or a tub of water is the simplest way. I used a bucket filled with wet newspapers to recover .357 magnum jacketed bullets - let'em soak for a while so they get nice and pulpy.

[farmerjim]

1. Fire into the deep end of a swimming pool.
2. Get a 10 foot 4 inch pcv pipe and put a cap on it.
3. Stand it upright tied to a tree or something tall. (deer stand)
4. Fill it full of water.
5. Shoot into the water.
6. Dump water and retrieve bullet.

[Bigslug]

If you're trying to catch it without nose damage. . .

We have a forensic trap at work that consists of a steel tube, closed on one end, and capped with a segmented "screen" on the other which holds a cardboard disc through which you shoot.

The "official" catch medium is shredded Kevlar fluff. Basically, the exact same fibers you'd make body armor out of but no longer in woven sheets, and it's packed in to the consistency of a really firm pillow. The material balls up around the projectile, cushioning and braking it with an ever-increasing diameter. Duty caliber pistol rounds typically and predictably stop after about 18-20 inches of the stuff. The tube has several hatches on the side which you can open for easy access to extract your bullets or replace your cardboard. Finding the hard lump with anything .380 or bigger at the middle of it is pretty easy, but the .22's and .25's take a little more serious effort of pinching your way through smaller handfulls.

My guess is that Dacron would be a cheap and effective substitute.

Pro tip: until we learned how deep the rounds tended to penetrate, we added several additional cardboard baffles at intervals spaced through the fluff. If you have a hole in Baffle 3 but not Baffle 4, you have a lot less fluff to dig through to find your bullet.

Water filled milk jugs work pretty well if your bullet is designed to expand, but I've found that hard alloy solids tend to take A LOT of them to bring to a halt. The fluff has the advantage of being reusable and non-destructive to the slug.

[metricmonkeywrench]

This came up a bit ago, there was a feller around the turn of the century that did a bunch of testing on a bullets flight using fixed barrels. A key thing was to capture the bullet at the end of its flight for analysis. If memory is correct they used a wooden box about 2 ft square and 3-4ft long filled with packed oil saturated (but not dripping) sawdust and a fabric face.

[BLAHUT]

I want to examine a cast WW bullet that has been shot, but have not been able to stop one. I tried a fairly dense pile of cloth, but my .25-20 87 gr went right through and through a 2x6 I had behind the cloth.

I tried shooting into a sand pile, but all I could find was flakes of lead. The bullet seemed to have disintegrated.

How can I stop a bullet without destroying it?

Shoot it in to snow..

[huntinlever]

Off-topic some, but I've always been curious about ballistic gelatin. DIY? How would this do as a bullet trap?

[Bigslug]

Off-topic some, but I've always been curious about ballistic gelatin. DIY? How would this do as a bullet trap?

Very expensive and perishable if not refrigerated. Good at stopping expanding handgun bullets in under two feet, but non-expanding solids, not so much. I had the opportunity to test the Lyman 358430 (195gr RN) in it during one of my early efforts at replicating the .38/200 load. At a mere 570 FPS, 18" of it was insufficient to the task.

[frkelly74]

I am currently in process of loading 45 ammo with bullets I recovered from a range that had deep snow cover all winter. Many full metal jacket bullets showed no damage other than rifling marks. They have been tumbled in my wet polisher and look like new factory ammo when done.

[ascast]

wet saw dust or oil soaked, fine dist NOT chainsaw but saw mill-bandsaw type size

[dtknowles]

I want to examine a cast WW bullet that has been shot, but have not been able to stop one. I tried a fairly dense pile of cloth, but my .25-20 87 gr went right through and through a 2x6 I had behind the cloth.

I tried shooting into a sand pile, but all I could find was flakes of lead. The bullet seemed to have disintegrated.

How can I stop a bullet without destroying it?

What are you wanting to see? I have recovered many bullets. Are you opposed to loading it down to a low velocity so it will be damaged less?
Water, newspaper, sand, wet or dry. I have used many bullet catchers, not really to save the bullets for examination but just to stop them. I do catch enough to return much lead to the casting pot.
Tim

[pworley1]

I use about 2 feet of packed rubber mulch to catch my pistol bullets for reuse. It even stops 480 Ruger.

[Texas by God]

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20230611/0d0258adfbc7b2e7a81cde89f746bb8f.jpg

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20230611/e54df07591e886f7269ecddf05aea9b3.jpg
This soda bottles bottom is thicker than a milk jug. The .218 Bee’s 55gr bullet at around 1500 fps expanded nicely.
The 90 gr XTP from a .380 got a little nose deformation.
Just set the jug in the sun for a few hours and the bullet will be in the jug.
I’ll use a milk jug tomorrow.


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[sloughfoot]

24 inches of wet denim will stop a 308 cast

[Mr Peabody]

Load the bullet over 3 to 5 grains pistol powder, bullseye or 7 grains unique and then shoot into newspapers bundled flat and tied.

That works great

[GregLaROCHE]

I’ve always thought the best way would be to shoot into a large swimming pool.

[farmbif]

back in the days of newspapers and telephone books wetting them down and shooting into them was pretty standard fare,

[waksupi]

I’ve always thought the best way would be to shoot into a large swimming pool.

I did that, and the neighbors didn't like it.

[dondiego]

I did that, and the neighbors didn't like it.

You have to get the kids out first!

[huntinlever]

Very expensive and perishable if not refrigerated. Good at stopping expanding handgun bullets in under two feet, but non-expanding solids, not so much. I had the opportunity to test the Lyman 358430 (195gr RN) in it during one of my early efforts at replicating the .38/200 load. At a mere 570 FPS, 18" of it was insufficient to the task.

Great info. Thanks. I imagine my new-found, OT'ed and quenched 94-3-3 at 1500 fps will, um, make a tunnel.

[WRideout]

If you're trying to catch it without nose damage. . .

We have a forensic trap at work that consists of a steel tube, closed on one end, and capped with a segmented "screen" on the other which holds a cardboard disc through which you shoot.

The "official" catch medium is shredded Kevlar fluff. Basically, the exact same fibers you'd make body armor out of but no longer in woven sheets, and it's packed in to the consistency of a really firm pillow. The material balls up around the projectile, cushioning and braking it with an ever-increasing diameter. Duty caliber pistol rounds typically and predictably stop after about 18-20 inches of the stuff. The tube has several hatches on the side which you can open for easy access to extract your bullets or replace your cardboard. Finding the hard lump with anything .380 or bigger at the middle of it is pretty easy, but the .22's and .25's take a little more serious effort of pinching your way through smaller handfulls.

My guess is that Dacron would be a cheap and effective substitute.

Pro tip: until we learned how deep the rounds tended to penetrate, we added several additional cardboard baffles at intervals spaced through the fluff. If you have a hole in Baffle 3 but not Baffle 4, you have a lot less fluff to dig through to find your bullet.

Water filled milk jugs work pretty well if your bullet is designed to expand, but I've found that hard alloy solids tend to take A LOT of them to bring to a halt. The fluff has the advantage of being reusable and non-destructive to the slug.

The firearms examiner at the crime lab where I used to work used a cotton box pretty much like the one describe above. Anything fibrous will tend to wrap around the boolit, and gain size and weight as it travels. A box 8" square by about 2' long will catch most anything. It's good enough to use for matching bullets taken as evidence.

Wayne

[MT Gianni]

Felix Robbins, one of the founding members of this board talked about putting a hole in a swimming pool. Obviously don't use max loads.

[William Yanda]

I’ve always thought the best way would be to shoot into a large swimming pool.

I believe that was Richard Lee's method. As I recall, he had his son retrieve them.

[Willbird]

I have used a 4 foot long steel tube packed full of polyfill, the pillow stuffing stuff. Got the idea by shooting through some old couch cushions and seeing that the fiber fill in them would ball up around a 22lr bullet. I caught the Lee 12 gauge airgun pellet looking slug this way, fired at full sped. . Also caught 158 grain bullet from 357 maximum 10" barrel too, full speed there too, remington factory ammo. I set a 1/2" steel plate on the back end of the tube because I was messing around inside a building inside city limits.

The ball of polyfill had wadded up about 3" dia by the time it thumped the steel plate. The 357 maximum bullet was too hot to hold after firing.

[charlie b]

I'd like to know if anyone has stopped a cast rifle bullet at over 2000fps without distorting the nose? (except for snow, I don't have that option :) ).

[a danl]

I think the best back stop is snow. Hard too find right now. In the winter I push up a huge pile of snow too use as a back stop, and can recover my bullets for study. I saw a U-Tube video where a man made a bullet catcher out of a PVC pipe, and filled it with some kind of material, like Dacron or pillow stuffing.

yes, snow works great, even with 45/70 only thing you'll nee a medal detector

[Willbird]

I'd like to know if anyone has stopped a cast rifle bullet at over 2000fps without distorting the nose? (except for snow, I don't have that option :) ).

I think the polyfill would do fine. My steel tube was 8" or so in diameter. It was just something I had on hand, it has 3/8" or so wall thickness.

[charlie b]

I've shot into 6ft of dacron stuffing and the bullets go out the back end. If I pack the stuff in tighter so I can recover the bullet, the nose is deformed.

PS this is for cast bullets.

[Alferd Packer]

I use a five gal bucket of sand.
Put a folded rag on top and shoot straight down into the bucket.
Dry sand will stop any load up to and including 30-06 .
Need. Rag to contain muzzle blast into sand.
Use dry sand, less mess.

[Cap'n Morgan]

Two methods for catching an unblemished boolit:

1) Stand in the middle of a swimming pool. Fire the gun at exactly an angle of (mumble, mumble) towards the earth's rotation and wait for the boolit to return.

2) Fire it into oil-soaked sawdust.

[Gtek]

What about downloading with a fast powder, let's say down ladder loads until one does not clear and finish driving it out with a well fit and protected rod.

[Texas by God]

I'd like to know if anyone has stopped a cast rifle bullet at over 2000fps without distorting the nose? (except for snow, I don't have that option :) ).

I’m still trying.
I can tell you that a one gallon jug of ice laying with the bottom facing me 100 yards away…..
Won’t stop a Lee C278-135RF going around 1900 fps from my 6.8 SPC.
Maybe two gallons will[emoji848]
If I had a walk in freezer I’d freeze a 5 gallon bucket.
Update; two one gallon jugs of ice placed end to end won’t stop th 6.8 bullet either!


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[Walter Laich]

off topic.... I have a coffee mug that says "Alferd Packer, serving his fellow man..." :-D
For those that have never been to Lake City.... googly is your friend.... :mrgreen:

the judge at his trial: “Stand up, you voracious, man-eating son of a [gun] , stand up! There was seven democrats in Hinsdale County and you up and ate five of them"

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

I think the best back stop is snow. Hard too find right now. In the winter I push up a huge pile of snow too use as a back stop, and can recover my bullets for study. I saw a U-Tube video where a man made a bullet catcher out of a PVC pipe, and filled it with some kind of material, like Dacron or pillow stuffing.

Yep SNOW!

The first time I noticed this, was after a big snow storm in my area. The local club had a concealed carry class that weekend and no one plowed the snow for the pistol pit. The instructor setup an DIY target in front of a big snow drift. In the Spring, I noticed hundreds of projectiles just beyond the DIY target area. easy pickin's, and what a nice way to gather range scrap. All the jacketed bullets I picked up looked good enough to reload.

[dondiego]

When I was younger and broke, I reloaded bullets recovered from a snow bank. They worked fine.

[higgins]

Years ago a fellow turned up at the club I belonged to at the time to try to catch bullets in a flimsy plastic garbage can about half filled with water. The first shot with some variety of big bore revolver split the thin barbage can and gave him a bath. I don't know if he caught the bullet. A metal tank or drum as suggested above would probably work since some ballistic labs seen on as seen on TV true-crime shows use a rectanbular tank to catch bullets for testing. Tilting the drum on its side as much as possible might make a better catch tank , or if you happen to have access to a watering trough that's deep enough that might work too.

[Walstr]

I want to examine a cast WW bullet that has been shot, but have not been able to stop one. I tried a fairly dense pile of cloth, but my .25-20 87 gr went right through and through a 2x6 I had behind the cloth.

I tried shooting into a sand pile, but all I could find was flakes of lead. The bullet seemed to have disintegrated.

How can I stop a bullet without destroying it?

HI: What Gtek said. I use a squib load to make sure it does not leave the barrel! Then stuff a rag into the chamber & use a suitable diameter rod to gingerly tap it back whence it came. Now you save it in an empty pill jar to ID it for future reference.

So you say, what if it still has enough energy to "leave"? I've done it in my bsmt., shooting into a bucket of rags; so no deformation. Also, when it "gets stuck" there is no sound! Me thinks 3gr-4gr of anything will do fine. Let us know?!?

Wally
P.S. Most of the responses above guarantee deformation, so not what you asked for?

[35remington]

In the 25-20 use 1 to 1.5 grains Bullseye and catch in wet phone books or newsprint. Easier and less deforming than pounding a stuck bullet with a rod. Put the muzzle near the paper to minimize yaw before the bullet strikes.

If you can tolerate slight nose deformation just shoot it at 1100 fps with 2.5 grains Bullseye or similar with wheelweight equivalent. I do this at fifty yards to reduce impact velocity somewhat.

I have a great pile of recovered 25-20 bullets, so I ain’t guessing about this. Revealed are extent of gas cutting with various loadings and amendments, base integrity, etc.

At 1100 fps speeds you will need a couple of feet of wet paper to stop a 90 grain cast bullet. More than a softpoint high powered rifle like 30-30 requires, incidentally.

[Hanzy4200]

Not as far as most people think. 2.5-3.5 feet usually. Shooting dowward into a full 55 gallon drum works best, and wont rupture your test tank. Usually

[steve urquell]

I have a big trash bin I sometimes fill up with water and shoot down into to catch bullets. I think it's 4ft deep or so. Cover with cardboard or bags unless you want a bath in garbage can water. I do climb a ladder so my legs are above it. I don't want anything coming out the side into me.
https://i.imgur.com/72jIkJn.jpg

[Tonto]

I have a 2x2x4’ box of rubber mulch to capture cast bullets, the front face holds the target. When sorting thru the mulch many recovered bullets look pretty good unless they hit another in the mulch. Nothing has gotten totally thru including 308 fmj.

[Wm Cook]

I’v always used a bunch of folded up bath towels in a cardboard box about 12x12x24” and a light load of bullets eye. Used it this week on a 308 and about 2.6g - 2.8g was caught nicely. Be very careful that it leaves the barrel. Bill C

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