How thick does a piece of metal need to be in order to stop a handgun bullet?

[carnaby]

Also, you just say "metal." If something soft and light, like aluminum, then you'll need significantly more material to stop a bullet.

 

[Lucky]

A can't even imagine having a steel plate on your chest and having it get shot. The energy spreading across would be enough to crack all your ribs I would think.

I kind of disagree. In a pistol the bullet accelerates in a short distance, most of the acceleration in the first couple inches. When hitting a fixed target it would decellerate immediately, but on a human there would be some give, just an inch or so but enough to be roughly equivalent for a thought experiment.

Professional boxers can provide far more energy in a punch than most handguns humans can fire, if you cound momentum. Ergo if a Mike Tyson punch doesn't break your ribs, neither would a .44 hitting a steel plate attached to your ribs.

And it makes sense, because if you can fire a bullet from a handgun that means the muzzle energy must be something you can control, and a steel plate weighs more than a pistol and has more surface area than a pistol grip. So any bullet would break the shooter's hands before it started breaking the target's ribs, through a plate.

 

[Axman]

Hey, if it's a .44 Magnum that plate would have to be as thick as the engine block in a truck!!!

 

[evan price]

I can say for certain that:

6.5x55 Swedish Mauser will go completely THROUGH & THROUGH a standard empty residential water heater.

.22LR will not penetrate through the door of a standard residential dishwasher with a sheetmetal plate behind the two layers of plastic and one thin aluminum sheet on top.

A 27" commercial-grade TV tube will bounce a lead soft nose .22LR if anything but straight on.

A 9mm will punch through a 27" commercial TV tube but not exit the back.
A .45 will also punch through the same TV tube but not exit the TV case.

.357 will go right through a 19" CRT monitor with enough force to also penetrate the outer skin of a residential water heater but not the tank.

12-ga birdshot will not penetrate through-and-through a standard HP printer.

.38-sp will not penetrate through a 60gig hard drive. Neither will 9mm or .45ACP.

.44MAG will go through a 40gig IDE hard drive with enough force to also go through the tower case and the power supply.

7.62x39 will penetrate standard highway guardrail.

8mm Mauser will penetrate nearly 12" into solid wood.

7.62x51 from a FAL will shoot LONGWISE 24" through a standard pine 2x4.

When people who collect junk and guns get bored it's easy to connect the two with a bullet.

 

[Sven]

Me wonders if Pax is part of this project:

http://www.modders-inc.com/ftopic-1227-days0-orderasc-0.html