The lead ball and it's lethality to man.

[gmatov]

JohnKsa,

I would doubt that the Soviets, either, sent their trooops into the field with ammo that would tumble so, with the CG so far off to do so, that it could NOT be made to SHOOT accurately at ANY distance.

Where do you guys come up with this BS?

If it does not leave the muzzle accurately, there is no way that you can get it back on target to do all this stupid, I will repeat, stupid, damage you seem to insist it does. There IS no midflight correction.

If you don't hit your target, I don't care what kind of buzz saw round you got, you might cut limbs from the canopy, you will not kill nor incapacitate troops.

Accuracy is supreme.

Round ball is accurate, for us.

A "devastator" balll, as you seem to be describing, is ridiculous.

Cheers,

George

 

[355sigfan]

QUOTE
Actually, that is precisely what the plan was, when switching from a battle rifle caliber (.308) to a low impulse, high speed, small caliber cartridge (5.56mm). Wound, but not kill. But because 5.56mm tumbles, fragments, and also penetrates quite deep (fairly similar to a hunting softpoint, but with more delayed expansion), they achieved the opposite effect.
END QUOTE

Actually the 5.56 does not penetrate deep at all. in fact most softpoints and hollowpoints only penetrate about 9 to 15 inches depending on the load. Thats less than a lot of handgund rounds.
Pat

 

[gmatov]

"Spoon pointing", your giggybutt.
This makes an accurate round that goes all to hell when it hits an animal? Kills it twice?

They have played for years wit the plastic tipped bullets, found that the plastic compounds were too heat sensitive, would melt, point the bal in the wrong direction, back to the drawing board.

When they got to 3500 to 4000 FPS, they found that the exposed lead tipped bullet melted off, irregularly, made an inaccurate flight..

They made a copper jacket with the lead recessed into the taper at the nose, no lead to melt from friction from the air, and, guess what, they came up with a 1,000 yard bullet. The copper was symetrical with no little lumps of lead or slag on one side or the other. Flew true..

Who knew a couple grains less lead was the breakthrough?

Casters who have taken their cast balls apart, sliced them open, to see if they have any voids, learn how to make a round ball. Casters, who do the same, and roll and weigh their cast conicals, whether they be .217 or .460, want the best ball they can cast.

I don't know how you guys can say there are balls, as a matter of course, that are made to fly all over the place, but when they DO hit meat, just tear the hell out of it.

Cheers,

George

 

[RyanM]

Actually the 5.56 does not penetrate deep at all. in fact most softpoints and hollowpoints only penetrate about 9 to 15 inches depending on the load. Thats less than a lot of handgund rounds.

In testing, .223 military FMJ with cannelure loses about half its mass as fragments, and penetrates 13-14". That's pretty similar to .223 softpoints. A little better, actually.

http://www.firearmstactical.com/images/Wound Profiles/M193.jpg
http://www.firearmstactical.com/images/Wound Profiles/M855.jpg
http://www.firearmstactical.com/images/Wound Profiles/223 Remington 50gr JSP.jpg

-----------------------

"Spoon pointing", your giggybutt.
This makes an accurate round that goes all to hell when it hits an animal? Kills it twice?

All it does is tumble earlier than usual after hitting. Accuracy is unaffected. The base of a bullet matters more than the front, for accuracy. Works well, apparently. Making a bullet tumble isn't that different from expansion. Both increase the "frontal" area of the bullet, that actually hits flesh.

Actually, over in Scandanavia, 6.5mm is considered a perfectly adequate round for elk, as long as heavy bullets are used. And hunters there do just fine.

They have played for years wit the plastic tipped bullets, found that the plastic compounds were too heat sensitive, would melt, point the bal in the wrong direction, back to the drawing board.

Apparently you're a few years behind the curve, here. Plastic tipped bullets work fine.

I don't know how you guys can say there are balls, as a matter of course, that are made to fly all over the place, but when they DO hit meat, just tear the hell out of it.

Okay, you're obviously purposely misunderstanding every word I say, so I guess there's no point in explaining anything.

 

[JohnKSa]

I would doubt that the Soviets, either, sent their trooops into the field with ammo that would tumble so, with the CG so far off to do so, that it could NOT be made to SHOOT accurately at ANY distance.

Where do you guys come up with this BS?

1. Your doubts don't affect reality.

2. The fact that a bullet is unstable in a fluid medium has no bearing on its stability in air (and therefore its accuracy.)

3. Strong opinions without knowledge to back them up are like a meal composed exclusively of spices and condiments.

 

[4v50 Gary]

The original 55 grain 5.56 mm bullet fired from the original slow twist barrel (1-14") became unstable after it entered the target. We then changed the twist to 1-12".

I believe the Soviet round does the same thing. Nice stable flight path until it meets flesh. Then it's tumbles.

We however, have seen fit to make the 5.56 reach out further (to meet the NATO requirement of penetrating a helmet at 500 meters), lengthened it and increased its weight, put a faster twist on the barrel and thus it's like a hot poker. Goes through the bad guy, bad guy drops, bad guy gets up and keeps going. Read Black Hawk Down for what happened when the folks were struck with the 5.56 fired from an M-4 Carbine.

BTW guys, let's get back on topic with regards to the lead ball.

 

[gmatov]

Gary,

Don't blame the round for anyone getting up after getting hit in a nonvital spot. Or for the people being hit being in a frenzy. That always gives a little adrenaline kick. Full disclosure: I have not read "Blackhawk Down". It sounds like a Mack Bolan/Stoneyman takeoff.

To say that purposely deforming the nose of a bullet does not harm flight is ridiculous, and, yes, the early plastic points were easily melted off at hypersonic speeds. Hell, you can fry bacon in the plastics we have today, going 3000 FPS would not ablate them.

Regardless, we buy pure lead swaged balls for our BP pistols, because they are supposed to fly truer than a cast ball with mismatched mold halves (ask me how I know about that), and we send a ball downstream at the best velocity we can attain.

The round ball has put down at least as many men, and animals, as the pointed smokeless bullets have, and I think that they probably made a wound channel that was at least as destructive as our modern bullets.

I, for one, wouldn't like to be hit with one, and not because it would spray all them lead fragments around and kill me from lead poisoning, even if the surgeons stopped all the internal bleeding and repaired the structural and tissue damage.

I think you might just have a lesser chance of surviving the round. Hydrostatic shock, and all that, is fine for the Jack O'Connors to speak of. The Elmer Keith types say a big ball at as high a speed as you can attain will kill better, be it a squirrel or a Cape Buffalo. When the ball, as another poster here will verify, will pass the length of a wild boar, it is at least as good as today's 44 mag, and I don't say that lightly, I do own 2 44 Mags, love 'em, but the BP pistols are favourites, for now.

Cheers,

George

Edit: I have to address this:


2. The fact that a bullet is unstable in a fluid medium has no bearing on its stability in air (and therefore its accuracy.)

What in the heck does that mean? It will sail through the air like a harpoon, even with its nose bent out of shape, "spoon shaped", from a post above, hit a tack at 500 meters, then when it hits a piece of paper, or flesh, becomes a whirling dervish.

Them asses who use dial indicators to spin their bullets to accept or reject for long, nay, even 100 yard matches, are just that, asses, use any old blob of copper and lead, it will nail the 10 ring, but might tumble all over the place when it hits the paper. Why don't you go to a precision shooting site and tell them they are asses? They could put a lump of coal in their barrel, it only goes to hell after it hits the center of the 10 ring.

And, here, all along, I thought that was how the Wright Brothers finally got a plane off the ground. They found that if the wing was longer on the top than the bottom, the pressure differential would lift it. So a ball that is nonconcentric will do the same, fly toward the side that has the longest surface, whether it is spinning, from the rifling, or not.

Strong opinions? Your argument could use just a little beef, too. So far, seems to be strictly MSG.

 

[Duncaninfrance]

Children, Children !!!!!!!!

I am not going to go into the where's or why's BUT there is such a thing as 'Reverse Swing' on a cricket ball which allows it to move in flight. It is dictated by the bowlers action and the smoothe/ rough side of the ball ( probably the same in baseball but that's a game for the clonies!!!!!!) and the passage of air accross it. So at speeds of up to 90 mph for a cricket ball there is some influence on it's trajectory through the air. It seems obvious that the same could be said for a round ball and it's shape.

Not sure if this is relevat but I enjoyed writing it anyway!!

Lighten up guys!
Duncan

 

[JohnKSa]

Your argument could use just a little beef

Do a google search with the following terms.

"5.45" tumble

Here are the results:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q="5.45"+tumble

I didn't say anything about anyone intentionally deforming a bullet's nose before firing it. I don't know anything about that procedure and so I didn't comment on that. My comments were specifically about the 5.45 Russian military round, and they are correct, as are my comments about the difference between stability in a flesh (fluid medium) vs stability in air.

Look, anyone can be misinformed, or uninformed on a particular topic--there's nothing wrong with that. But anyone with the internet at their fingertips should at least spend 5 or 10 minutes doing some searches before calling "BS".

 

[gmatov]

Duncan,

OT, but to reply to you, in our sissy game of "Rounders", which we consider our national pasttime of Baseball, we have a few of what are known as "knuckle ballers", pitchers who can "push" the ball, usually in the 50, 60, 70 MPH range. So slow, though it looks fast, that the batter swings and misses before it reaches the plate, or if he's patient and times it, the ball dances up, down, or sideways. HARD to hit.

No spin to the ball, place the stitches where you want them, and the ball follows the laws of aerodynamics, longer path for the airflow, lift the ball. or sink it, or swerve to one side or the other.

I've watched very little of Cricket, will have to watch more, see if I can get the gist of it. Another forum I used to visit regularly had a number of Brits, ask about Cricket, We don't care about Cricket, all WE watch is Footie.

I've been taking my granddaughter to all her Footie practices and games for the last 9 years. Since I'm American, I shouldn't say this, but I love the game. Practice starts in about 2 weeks for the Spring session.

She put in a rebound off the goalie for the first goal of the first game of the last season, as a forward, 3 minutes into the game last Fall session. One proud Grandpa there.

JohnKsa

"If you want to hurt bad guys, my understanding is that the Commie bullet is constructed in such a way as to be much less velocity dependant than the Yankee round. Something about hollow a cavity with a lead slug inside it that shifts on impact and initiates tumbling more readily."

One guy's "understanding" from a post 3 years old, and that becomes the basis for whirling dervish ball.

Never mind, Gary suggests we get back to BP and round ball or conicals. I think I'll go back there. This is a dead issue for me, henceforth. (Big word, huh?)

Cheers,

George

 

[JohnKSa]

One guy's "understanding" from a post 3 years old, and that becomes the basis for whirling dervish ball.

Not hardly.

I told you how to do the search. I posted the link for you so you wouldn't even have to navigate to google or type in the search terms.

After all that, it was apparently still too much work for you to read past the second hit in the results page.

The "3 year old THR thread" was only two of 12 hits specifically related to the 5.45 tumbling in flesh from the first 20 search hits.

This is a dead issue for me, henceforth.

That's mighty big of you...

You accuse me of trying to BS and when I show you that it's not only NOT BS, but it's easily confirmed on the web, you can't even scrape up the decency to just let it drop.

I never dreamed of or expected an apology or even an admission that you were wrong when you accused me of "coming up with BS", but I figured that you would at least just drop the topic when it became patently obvious that you didn't have a clue what you were talking about.

Nope--even that was beyond you. You have to post again pretending that this is all a misunderstanding generated by a 3 year old post on THR.

Since you like big words, here are some especially for you.

Suffice it to say that I'm underwhelmed by your pathetic attempt at magnanimity...

 

[Beartracker]

When I started this thread it was just to point out how deadly the round ball was/is and to show another's view on the subject, hence the Internet article I came across.
We were not discussing high powered rifles and ammo and that wasn't my intention or desire to do so nor was it intended to start any arguments over
who has the best military round. I myself have been in a few arguments on here and other sites but you learn when it's time to call it quits and move on instead name calling because someone doesn't agree with you.

My biggest biggest pet peeve on the subject of round balls is how some people really believe that these guns that fired the round balls were just a joke and that there ability to kill was so poor. Some even believe that the muskets and revolvers of the day never had enough power to do much damage.
If we look at the ballistics and the results of test conducted by people like Mike Cumpston and Keith along with several others it's easy to see just how accurate and lethal these guns and the round ball could be.

 

[RyanM]

Okay, back on topic, round balls that've been fired from cap and ball revolvers are actually fairly close in frontal shape to expanded hollowpoints. Even closer, after impact at close range. Rather blunt, not very aerodynamic. So a .44 caliber roundball is fairly similar to, say, a 9mm hollowpoint that underexpands.

http://www.firearmstactical.com/test_data/9mm/win9-147ssxt-g26.htm

Similar weight, similar velocity, similar recovered diameter (after hitting tissue, not dirt or solid steel), similar penetration.

 

[gmatov]

John,

Sorry, I guess I shuld have pulled excerpts from all the rest of the links in that google.

If you will read a few of them, you will see that most of those that say the bullet, ALL bullets, including round ball (which do not "yaw" per se, as they are round, but will not always follow a straight line), will yaw whan they hit flesh, not because they are designed with a "spoon" on one side, but because flesh is not homogeneous. There is solid muscle, space between muscle groups, fat, tendons and ligaments, bone.

When the bullet hits tissue of different densities, it tends to go the way of least resistance, toward the softer tissue.

Most of the links your search led to also said that those "whirling dervishes" would tumble 1 to 3 times and come to rest after rather shallow penetration, ie., a bullet that does not tumble on impact will make a deep wound channel, those that do, don't.

This is not just the Russian round. The last buck I got with a 7mm-08, I shot running at about a 45 degree angle, through the ribs heart and lungs, no exit wound, my butcher found the bullet in the paunch near the hindquarters.

Oh, yes, I liked the one that said the US Gov designed the cannelure on the 223 to secretely design a "weak spot" that will cause the bullet to "snap in half" and "spray bits of lead" all through the wound. And, here, everybody thought that was to make a crimp groove to prevent the ball from sliding back into the case. Boy, was that sneaky of them mad scientists.

It did not tumble, it hit bone and ricocheted, changed direction while it had plenty of momentum left and went near the length of the body.

A round ball can do the same thing, it hits something hard enough to divert it without stopping it, a glancing blow, will change direction and come out of that tissue at a completely different angle from which it went in.

Some of the links from that google were papers written 25 years ago. I've read a couple dozen, bookmarked half a dozen, bookmarked the search itself, as I want to read more.

Quite a few are anectdotal, links to Q and A's on forums. Those are hardly what you could call the Gospel.

I said I was leaving the subject as Gary said we should be back to BP. Can we return to BP now?

Cheers,

George

 

[RyanM]

No one but you said these rounds would be "whirling dervishes."

http://www.firearmstactical.com/images/Wound Profiles/AK-74 545x39.jpg

That's what the AK-74 round does. Tumbles once, tumbles again, and goes off on a curved path because of the deformed lead core.

http://www.firearmstactical.com/images/Wound Profiles/AK-47 762x39mm.jpg

As you can see, the original AK-47 round tumbles much later, because it is more stable, because it has no airspace.

http://www.firearmstactical.com/images/Wound Profiles/M80.jpg

M80 military ball is also a late tumbler, because there is no airspace.

http://www.firearmstactical.com/images/Wound Profiles/M193.jpg
http://www.firearmstactical.com/images/Wound Profiles/M855.jpg

Both types of M-16 ammo tumble early, because they're long for the caliber, and thus unstable in denser media.

All those tests were done in calibrated 10% ballistic gelatin, which is quite homogenous.

You are really fuzzy on some very simple laws of physics. A pointy bullet has the center of mass behind the center of the bullet. Therefore, the bullet will attempt to rotate to a base-forward orientation. If there is no rifling spin, or the spin is insufficient, it will do this in air. Water, flesh, and other dense media require an inordinately high spin rate to stabilize them. What is stable in air is not always stable in water. Destabilization happen in water, oil, dirt, flesh, or anything else significantly denser than air, not because of inhomogenous composition.

It's like a badminton birdie. The ball part is heavier than the back part, so it travels ball first. If you throw a birdie backwards, it will tumble once or twice, then reach a stable heavy-part-forward orientation. Same thing with bullets in a dense fluid medium. In air, the bullet's spin is sufficient to keep it from tumbling.

A spoon-pointed bullet will tumble even earlier than one with an airspace. Then it will flop once or twice and finish going backwards. It may "corkscrew" for the first inch or two, because of the spin. It will not significantly change the bullet's flight in air, at ranges up to about 200 yards, because the rifling spin is enough to stabilize it. H&K was also developing spoon-pointed bullets for their G11 project, but switched to standard ones after activists said that the result of a spoon-pointed bullet impact was just as bad as a hunting softpoint.

http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot19.htm
If you still need more pictures, here's a test that demonstrates that FMJ rounds will definitely tumble in water, which is also quite homogenous. M-16 rounds tumbled (though the so-called M-193 ball he was using has no cannelure, so it didn't fragment), 8mm ball tumbled so much it was deflected out of the top of the box, and .30-06 armor piercing ammo tumbled enough that it was stopped by only 7 jugs of water.

Water is not the same thing as air. Go try breathing some water if you still don't believe that (you don't seem to).

 

[Duncaninfrance]

You know, I do wish that George and Ryan would stop beating about the bush and say what they mean instead of being so vague lol!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Duncan ( In a silly mood!! )

 

[Low Key]

oops! thought I was about to post in the blackpowder shooting forum...

cheers Duncan,

 

[Owen]

Beartracker is obviously insane if he thinks an ounce of supersonic lead, formed into a sphere could hurt anyone! I mean a round ball, c'mon!

If round balls were so dangerous we wouldn't let our kids use them for sports. Why I bet a basketbal woul be a WMD!

 

[Beartracker]

OK Owen, Now you done it!!!! I'll meet you at high noon on main street of Dodge right in front of the Long branch Saloon. The winner gets miss Kitty and the loser gets a free trip to boot hill

 

[Owen]

i'm warning you, my gun shoots scissors and bumblebees!

 

[Beartracker]

Mine just shoots hot lead from a Remington .44 in the right hand and hot lead from a Colt .36 in the left. If the right one don't get ya, the left one will!
One thing about all the lead that they were shooting in the Civil war and the wild west, they sure had to make sure the caps fired and the powder was dry.
Otherwise the size of the lead ball and how well it performed didn't mean a thing.

 

[JohnKSa]

My biggest biggest pet peeve on the subject of round balls is how some people really believe that these guns that fired the round balls were just a joke and that there ability to kill was so poor

I posted something about hunting with an Old Army on a hunting forum and got mostly negative results...

Given Keith's opinions on ball ammo, I would have thought more people would have at least tried it and had some good experiences.

On the other hand, I guess it shouldn't be a surprise that many people make up their minds on a topic without worrying about the facts.

 

[Low Key]

I'm starting to see a lot of people around here that won't hunt with it unless it's the newest 5000 Magnum Ultra Express. They really need those for the big long hundred yard shot you might get in these tight woods around here!

 

[Beartracker]

Low Key has it pegged. Over the years I have hunted Deer, Moose , Bear, Elk and many smaller critters with gun and bow. At one time or another I have owned or shot everything from the .44 mag to the .22 and the 7 mm mag. to the .410 shotgun. I'm here to tell you one thing....The Remington .44 with 40g of powder and a round ball or conical will drop a Deer size critter stone cold dead. Been there and done that several times.
I have found that when you have hunters snickering at the .44 C&B Revolvers it's because they have never even fired one or when they did it was loaded with 10-15g of powder. Load one up with 40g of 3f and a 200g. conical and they will become a believer