Razor blades and boolits

[Charlie Two Tracks]

When I was growing up, we used to hunt squirrels with our .22 rifles. We found out that if you put an "X" cut into the top of the boolit, it would knock a squirrel out of the tree a whole lot easier. Kind of like a hollow point but not. Has anyone ever heard of a guy doing this on a larger caliber boolit? The school of hard knocks has taught me to try to ask first.

[GRUMPA]

I think they call those dumb dumb bullets. I've heard of old timers from the war doing things like that on handgun rounds.

[bearcove]

Or dum dum

[10 ga]

Yeah, that's a dum-dum. I think the terminology goes back to the Brits on the Indian subcontinent or South Africa or Afghanistan..... Probably some o' the commonwealth guys will know where/what/when the term came about. 10

[462]

Dum Dum Arsenal during the days of the British Raj.

[Johnk454]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neville_Bertie-Clay

I flat point CB longs with a small file and it definitely helps terminal performance on varmints.

Never tried it with larger calibers.

[beex215]

ive seen it done in movies, but wouldnt this effect accuracy?

[Bret4207]

It depends on how you make the "X". The old timers like Ned Roberts put a slip of thin paper between the mould halves at the nose, said it worked. These days filing a simple flat nose on 22 ammo seems to make it kill far better than HP ammo. I wonder if the extra work of the paper, etc. outweighs the time spent in larger bores when a FP is so much easier.

[GRUMPA]

I don't know just the thought of that makes me wonder. You got speed and rotation to throw into the equation. Get something like that going to fast and the two halves I would think would want to come apart rather easily.

[Hardcast416taylor]

Unless it`s my CRS acting up again I do seem to remember that making for use cut bullets like the Dum Dum is illegal.Robert

[Shiloh]

Dum Dum Arsenal during the days of the British Raj.

My take as well.

I have read of folks cutting the tip of FMJ's with a bayonet. I also read that if you took off too much, the lead core would squirt out when fired.

Shiloh

[MtGun44]

"why wouldn't it affect accuracy?"

Because the front of the boolit/bullet has almost nothing to do with accuracy. The boolit
is steered from the back, at least until you get to serious long ranges.

Do this test. Grind the nose of a bullet in several different ways, whatever suits your fancy,
angled, straight across, long angle, etc. Shoot a group with these bullets that have the
noses modified at 100yds. Now take a flat based bullet and give it one good file stroke at
45 degrees on the rear corner and load it (mark it with felt tip) and fire in a group. You
will have one significant flier. This is why when you are casting, sort the boolits by the quality
of the rear corners more than anything else. If the nose is crummy but the rear corners are
good, it will shoot fine in a pistol and at least decent in a rifle.

Once you get to really long ranges the nose imbalance will have an effect, no doubt, but it
is much less than damage to the rear corners. Best possible groups, like benchrest will need
boolits/bullets that are perfect everywhere, of course.

Bill

[3006guns]

Being in possesion of a "dum dum" or any exposed lead pointed bullet IS illegal.....in warfare. I really don't think the squirrels care much.

On the other hand, shooting game with a FMJ is illegal in most states as far as I'm aware....no "stopping" or "shocking" power........goes through like an electric drill and the animal usually crawls away to die slowly.

[uscra112]

It was often written about during and just after WW2, when hunting ammo was impossible to come by. They'd take a full-patch .30-06 round and cut it with a hunting knife. Authoritative writers in the Rifleman thought it was hogwash, and advised against it.

There's a whole cottage industry, seen on the rimfire boards, of selling tools to modify the points of .22 rimfire rounds.

[elk hunter]

When I was growing up, we used to hunt squirrels with our .22 rifles. We found out that if you put an "X" cut into the top of the boolit, it would knock a squirrel out of the tree a whole lot easier. Kind of like a hollow point but not. Has anyone ever heard of a guy doing this on a larger caliber boolit? The school of hard knocks has taught me to try to ask first.

I have several ancient 50-70 rounds that have been cut as above and some that have the nose cut off flat, so somebody thought it would work a long time ago.

[Wayne Smith]

"why wouldn't it affect accuracy?"

Because the front of the boolit/bullet has almost nothing to do with accuracy. The boolit
is steered from the back, at least until you get to serious long ranges.

Do this test. Grind the nose of a bullet in several different ways, whatever suits your fancy,
angled, straight across, long angle, etc. Shoot a group with these bullets that have the
noses modified at 100yds. Now take a flat based bullet and give it one good file stroke at
45 degrees on the rear corner and load it (mark it with felt tip) and fire in a group. You
will have one significant flier. This is why when you are casting, sort the boolits by the quality
of the rear corners more than anything else. If the nose is crummy but the rear corners are
good, it will shoot fine in a pistol and at least decent in a rifle.

Once you get to really long ranges the nose imbalance will have an effect, no doubt, but it
is much less than damage to the rear corners. Best possible groups, like benchrest will need
boolits/bullets that are perfect everywhere, of course.

Bill

Or just read "The Bullet's Flight"!

The paper in the nose of the mold trick was in the Lyman Cast Handbook #3 I believe. I may be wrong, I've read so much over the years. I think I remember quite an article on the subject of modifying the nose of the cast boolit.

[colt 357]

Sound like the old timers deer slugs from cut shells

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3M46XVfVOU

[FLDad]

My grand-dad used to notch his with a penknife and kept grandma busy making squirrel gravy. Didn't work out so well with me behind the rifle, of course... Never did see him do it on anything larger than .22.

[1Shirt]

Have used thin alum foil in the nose of 45-70 blts inserted in the mold, and it works very well. Saw no difference in accuracy. Never tried it on game however.
1Shirt!

[303Guy]

Something wrong with that Wikipedia information on the 'Dum Dum'. The original Dum Dum Arsenal boolit was a 115gr round hollow nosed bullet, not a soft point or soft nosed bullet. I had one. Or at least I thought it was one. Wikipedia can be wrong and so could I. I would like to be sure and to be corrected if wrong.

The Dum Dum Arsenal was located in India, near Calcutta.