{"id":14744,"date":"2018-01-05T20:55:07","date_gmt":"2018-01-05T20:55:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/empty-cases.com\/blog\/?p=14744"},"modified":"2018-01-05T20:55:07","modified_gmt":"2018-01-05T20:55:07","slug":"a-little-bit-of-ballistics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/empty-cases.com\/blog\/a-little-bit-of-ballistics\/","title":{"rendered":"A Little Bit of Ballistics"},"content":{"rendered":"

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It\u2019s cold here in the hills. Temperatures have been in the single digits and the wind has been blowing hard. I have a variety of projects I need to be working on but they all involve shooting, and, well, I\u2019m holding out for better days.<\/p>\n

This has provided me with some down time and I\u2019ve been looking around on the Internet a good bit. Enough to remind me how little most shooters know about terminal ballistics. If you visit most any shooting forum you will uncover enough misinformation to make you think you\u2019re on the MSNBC website.<\/p>\n

In no time at all you\u2019ll learn that you need a 338 Winchester Magnum to kill any whitetail deer north of Pennsylvania, that the 30-30 is so old<\/em> it will only kill yearling deer \u2013 and then only with good hits, and that any cartridge created before 1965 was only introduced to get folks to buy more guns.<\/p>\n

I went back through my archives and notes and found some video and information where I conducted a bunch of terminal ballistics testing at the Barnes Bullets laboratory a few years back. I learned a lot of stuff during those experiments and validated some of my opinions.<\/p>\n

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One opinion I\u2019ve held for sometime deals with comparing the terminal performance of various cartridges. Looking at recovered bullets is the way this is most commonly done. It\u2019s the easy way, but it’s also the way that provides the least information, at least when it comes to information about how the bullet damaged tissue.\u00a0The best way I\u2019ve found to compare terminal performance is to look inside the dead deer, or whatever animal you\u2019re trying to recover a bullet from. That\u2019s where you find the real story. It\u2019s also where you realize that by looking inside a dead animal, you cannot tell which cartridge killed it.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an example of Internet ballistics wisdom. Some argue that the 30-06 is superior to the 308 Winchester in every way. Did you know that the 180-grain, 308 Winchester, RNSP CoreLokt bullet will expand wider and penetrate deeper than a 180-grain, 30-06, PSP CoreLokt? Probably not. Most assume the 30-06 will outperform the 308 because it has a slightly higher muzzle velocity. Regardless of these technicalities, I\u2019ll guarantee if you look inside two deer \u2013 one shot with each load \u2013 you would have no better than a 50% chance of guessing which one killed which deer.<\/p>\n

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Yes, the middle bullet is obviously a Barnes. But, can you tell which of these bullets created the most internal damage, or was fired from a 30-30 by looking at this photo?<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Below you\u2019ll see a list of terminal performance information most often discussed for three loads, all shooting a 150 grain, .30 caliber projectile. The loads were a 150-grain CoreLokt fired from a 30-30 Winchester, a 150-grain CoreLokt fired from a 308 Winchester, and a 150-grain Barnes TTSX fired from a 308 Winchester. Can you match the data with the cartridge?<\/p>\n

Load \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Penetration \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Expansion\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Recovered Weight<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a019 inches \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 0.54 inch\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 105 grains<\/li>\n
  2. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a023 inches \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a00.53 inch\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 124 grains<\/li>\n
  3. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a030 inches \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a00.49 inch\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 149 grains<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Maybe a better way is to watch the video of the bullets impacting the 10% ordnance gelatin. These videos were shot during the testing I referenced. Now, I\u2019ll tell you up front, the videos might be a bit misleading because of where the bullet stuck the gelatin block in relation to the side of the block the camera was positioned on. I’ll also tell you that its – in most cases – as difficult to guess your wife’s weight to her satisfaction as it is to match gel blocks like these to dead critters.<\/p>\n