Bullet Impact Question

[OldLincoln]

I have too much time on my hands and somehow followed a rabbit trail to an FBI document "Handgun Wounding Factors and Effectiveness." It's informative and full of references but when I read the following I'm shaking my head. Sounds official but can it be correct?

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Goddard amply proves the fallacy of "knock-down power" by calculating the heights (and resultant velocities) from which a one pound weight and a ten pound weight must be dropped to equal the momentum of 9mm and .45ACP projectiles at muzzle velocities, respectively. The results are revealing.

In order to equal the impact of a 9mm bullet at its muzzle velocity, a one pound weight must be dropped from a height of 5.96 feet, achieving a velocity of 19.6 fps. To equal the impact of a .45ACP bullet, the one pound weight needs a velocity of 27.1 fps and must be dropped from a height of 11.4 feet.

A ten pound weight equals the impact of a 9mm bullet when dropped from a height of 0.72 inches (velocity attained is 1.96 fps), and equals the impact of a .45 when dropped from 1.37 inches (achieving a velocity of 2.71 fps).30

30. Goddard, Stanley: "Some Issues for Consideration in Choosing Between 9mm and .45ACP Handguns", Battelle Labs, Ballistic Sciences, Ordnance Systems and Technology Section, Columbus, OH, presented to the FBI Academy, 2/16/88, pages 3-4.
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If I understand what is stated, a .45 will have twice the impact of a 9mm.

His following paragraph states what everybody says yet I include it to state he isn't telling everybody to trash your 9's and get a .45. Based on that we would be carrying 8" barreled .44mags (at least those of you who can lift and point one).
=======================
A bullet simply cannot knock a man down. If it had the energy to do so, then equal energy would be applied against the shooter and he too would be knocked down. This is simple physics, and has been known for hundreds of years.

The amount of energy deposited in the body by a bullet is approximately equivalent to being hit with a baseball. Tissue damage is the only physical link to incapacitation within the desired time frame, i.e., instantaneously.
=========================

So your thoughts please. Does a .45 have twice the impact of a 9mm?

PS: He also states the Newton equal reaction thing that recoil = impact. If a round is to physically knock a man off his feet, it would knock the shooter off his.

[TheTman]

What about that .600 Nitro express? It was knocking the shooters back quite a bit, If something was gonna send you a$$ over elbows that would be the one to do it. Of course you better hope your first shot was a good one because follow up shots look they they are going to take awhile. I've wondered what that S&W .500 magnum hitting with 3/4 a ton of force would do to a guy.

On your question about the .45 having twice the power of a 9mm, I think you can look at ballistics and see that a .45 with 400 FPE is going to hit harder than a 9 loaded to 200 FPE, but now they have 9mm +P's loaded to over 400 FPE, so I think it depends on the powder behind them. The 45 has a bit more width to spread that force around to a bigger area than a 9, so you may "stagger" a guy more with a .45 than a 9mm. I think it all depends on how many FPE you are delivering on target, and how the bullet performs. A FMJ isn't going to transfer as much of that power as good HP design. That's my 2 cents. Probably overcharging you at that.

[TominCA]

I read all of the Ballistics and "stopping power stuff" and its a lot of fun to sit in front of the fireplace on a rainy night and read about gel tests and expansion and depth of penetration, etc.

But I have some doubts form my experience hunting. I use a 270 and when shooting wild boar a lot of them - hit real well, could have easily gotten a shot off at me if they were armed, before they passed on. Obviously its not a "test" of any sort but it does make me think that these handguns are a convenient weapon - but not necessarily a very good one!

[OldLincoln]

Even in the article he stated all except spinal cord of brain splatter gives them 10-15 seconds to return fire. That is, he says, if they are really angry, afraid or high on adrenalin or drugs. Gee, suppose if you took one through the heart and it was spurting blood everywhere (or just stopped) you just might be angry, afraid or high on adrenalin? Of course he espoused the one stop shot as a myth like others.

I guess my questions come into play about .45 having so much energy that doesn't show up in gel tests. My 147gn 9mm +P has more penetration than my .45. I'm getting more disalusioned about gel/water jug/ etc. testing the more I read. I really do understand that a 1/2" hole 14" deep is more than a 3/8" hole 15" deep in gel which is often ignored in published gel testing.

I also believe I'm carrying the right stuff, at least for me, based on my reading. It just struck me odd that a .45 has twice the energy as a 9mm. Like really odd.

[JFootin]

What we need is exploding bullets in our 9s! Then, we can forget the hand cannons! :crazy: :w00t: :59:

[OldLincoln]

They're illegal in CA.... sigh....

[jlottmc]

Fill the tip of a hollowpoint with some quicksilver and wax over the top to keep it in. The results will impress you until you look at the lack of depth. Oh yea, that is also highly friggin ILLEGAL, so don't get caught.

[JFootin]

What we need is exploding bullets in our 9s! Then, we can forget the hand cannons! :crazy: :w00t: :59:

To follow up, I did a thread about Mag Safe ammo (http://kahrtalk.com/showthread.php?t=7607), and in an actual test of SD ammo, their .380 round actually brought down the Alpine Mountain Sheep FASTER than any other round in the test, including 9mm, 40s&w, 45scp and 357 magnum hollow point rounds. Their ammo isn't just shot pellets, it is a mixture of larger #2 or #3 size pellets and large rectangular pieces of metal suspended in a patented epoxy resin that is designed to easily break apart at impact, yet tough enough to launch at twice the speed of normal bullets. All this at less than 1/2 the felt recoil, yet sufficient to dependably cycle the gun.

So, frangible (exploding) ammo, even in smaller calibers, is worth consideration. They have the added benefit of no ricochets, nor penetration through walls with lethal force. They are very expensive. But, once you have confirmed their reliability in your carry weapon, the expense would cease because they would be your carry load, not your range load.

[OldLincoln]

Of course it bounces off of a leather "bad boy" jacket.

[JFootin]

Of course it bounces off of a leather "bad boy" jacket.

No, it doesn't. Here is a statement from their FAQ page:

No, heavy clothing will Not defeat MagSafe Ammo. We test MagSafe by shooting through intermediate barriers: up to 12 layers of Levi material; many layers of T-shirt material; through leather cowboy boots, clipboards, cigarette packs, wallets, credit cards, tennis shoes and anything else an attacker might be wearing. You can't wear enough clothing to stop a MagSafe round.

[wyntrout]

You're forgetting foot-pounds per square inch... what that means... imagine an ice pick held over or touching your stomach and you dropped a pillow from a height of one foot onto the handle of the ice pick. It might penetrate a bit, but if you increased the diameter of the object struck to a 1/2" diameter dowel of the same length with a rounded end, there would be no discomfort. It's like the lady with spike heels walking on soft wooden or vinyl floor and leaving depressions vs. a lady in pumps with a broader heel surface that spreads the weight and leaves no marks.

I've seen gel testing where a hollow-point .223 penetrates less than some of the defensive handgun ammo being tested, BUT, IMAGINE the force imparted to the the area penetrated! I think the history of one-shot stops leaves no doubt that almost 100% of the C.O.M. hits with the AR15 or M16 were one-shot man-stoppers.

Any over-penetration is energy not imparted to the target, but you need enough to reach vital organs with less than optimum angles... oblique or downward shots that have to pass through lots of tissue or extremities... OR barriers.

Here's some testing on that:

http://www.kiesler.com/videodetail.aspx?id=1534
and more videos:

http://www.kiesler.com/Home/VideoLibrary/tabid/151/Default.aspx

Wynn:)

PS: I started this a few hours ago but my buddy stopped by and I just found the links I was searching for... maybe a little late.:rolleyes:

[JFootin]

Now, you're comparing handgun ammo to AR15 and M16 ammo—apples to watermelons. The test I cited compares apples to apples. What we are talking about is incapacitation time. The test cited by Mag Safe was conducted without their knowledge. Here is their report.

MAGSAFE SWEPT THE STRASBOURG TESTS
The now -famous Strasbourg Tests put MagSafe on the map. To Summarize what nearly everyone already knows, over 600 live French Alpine goats (their bodies are very much like humans) were shot under controlled conditions: no anesthetic, same shot placement form animal to animal, and with blood pressure and heart rate monitors to determine the Incapacitation Time (measure of how long it took a goat to cease functioning after the single shot was delivered).

MagSafe Ammo worked - better than anything else. Tests were done without MagSafe's knowledge, so some versions tested were the lowest powered. For example, two types of .380 ACP are offered; the .380 Defender, a 60-grainer at 1,360 fps in a Colt Mustang; and the .380 MAX (designed for a big city's undercover drug agents) with a 52-grain slug sizzling along at 1,620 fps in the Mustang.

The Defender has 247 ft-lbs of energy, while the MAX load has 303 ft-lbs. The Defender's lower velocity hampered stopping power, resulting in a Average Incapacitation Time (AIT) of 7.12 seconds. That's the average time for five different goats, each shot once with the MagSafe 60-grain Defender.

However - and this is where things get interesting - there wasn't a jacketed hollowpoint bullet in ANY caliber which dropped the goats faster than MagSafe's weakest .380 load!

MagSafe's .380 beat every .45 ACP slug, every 10mm, every 9mm (including police-only ammo), every .40 caliber - no matter who made it - Cor-Bon, Remington, Glaser and HydraShok.

In fact, MagSafe's lowest-powered .380 ACP load had an AIT faster than the best manstopper of all time - Remington's .357 Magnum 125-grain JHP!

Average Incapacitation Times for all other MagSafe's calibers were in the 4-second range, and MagSafe topped the tests in every caliber but .357 Magnum (a prototype Quik-Shot beat by a fraction of a second), and .38 Special, where Glaser won by .04 seconds. Had the .38 Special tests been done in a 2-inch barrel, MagSafe would have topped that test, too.
That is pretty convincing to me.

[CJB]

"A bullet simply cannot knock a man down. If it had the energy to do so, then equal energy would be applied against the shooter and he too would be knocked down. This is simple physics, and has been known for hundreds of years."

That, my friends, is a total and blatant falsehood, and that falsehood has been known for hundreds of years (or at least a hundred that I know of).

Two principles apply:
a. The conservation of momentum, whereby the bullet momentum and the firearms momentum are equal.

b. The expression of energy which is 1/2mv^2 (one half the mass times the velocity squared).

Lets say a 45 caliber bullet leaves the muzzle at 850 feet per second and weighs 230 grains. Lets also say that the combined weight of the 45 caliber 1911's slide and barrel and half its spring weight (because only half is moving) weight 16 ounces.
Frame weight does not apply since the aforementioned parts are held to the frame by spring tension, which is negligible in the math, and because the bullet has left the barrel by the time the slide unlocks from it.

Lets do the math. Bullet momentum is 850fps x 230g or 195,500 foot-grain seconds. Slide momentum is exactly the same: 195,500 foot-grain seconds. Divide by 7000 to achieve 27.92 foot-pound seconds of momentum.

Continuing, the bullets ENERGY is based on the square of the velocity. Our slide will be moving at only 27.92 feet per second, which is 195,500 foot-grain seconds divided by the 7000 grains of slide weight (16 ounces=1lb=7000grains).

Do the math, factoring for the acceleration of gravity at 32fps.... and we see kinetic energy of about 12 ft/lbs for the slide and 369ft/lbs for the bullet. That is simply because energy is based on the square of the velocity.

Taken another way.... to totally debunk the quote above, if the energy was the same in both directions, who would get hurt more, the shootee or the shooter?

Thank you for your indulgence.

[CJB]

I should go on to say, in the case of the long arm, held firmly against the shoulder, the weight of the shooter also becomes as if it were added weight for the firearm, further reducing the recoil velocity proportionally to the added weight, and therefore the recoil energy is reduced inversely (with application of the square of the velocity loss etc etc).

[JFootin]

Wow! Impressive math skills! I have forgotten most of the Algebra and all of the Calculus that I learned in school. Never used it, so I lost it.

Are you an engineer? Or an architect?

[OldLincoln]

I don't know enough to dispute any of this, that's why I asked the original question. I do remember the thing about the common statements about Newton and his opposite and equal reaction. Was he talking about momentum or energy? According to CJB who I suspect knows a bit more than I, it must be momentum.

I never "got" this stuff in school so though I understand what is said, I often don't understand the reasoning. If I lift a 100lb barbell (not lately!) from a bench I can say I exerted 100lbs of force on it and therefore 100lbs on me. That I get just by having doe it. The weight went up and my shoulders were pressed down. If I push 100lbs against a large boulder the energy may be applied even though it doesn't move but my shoulders still get the 100lbs against them. The mass is large, the velocity is zero but energy applied. I'm getting a headache.

[JFootin]

Me too! LOL!

[TheTman]

How many of those alpine goats were high on meth or really pissed off? :D

[TheTman]

To take it to extremes, you could have a bb hit you at 500,000 FPS, or an anvil dropped on you from 10 feet. Both are gonna be lethal if they hit the right spot. Most bullets are based on one theory or the other light and fast (380, 9mm, 357) vs. big n slow, (45, 44 special, 38 special) Then you have some that compromise like large grain .40 calibers, and lighter bullets in the .45 and .44 special, 147 gr bullets in the 9mm, 38 special +p with light bullets. Two of the most widely recognized lethal handgun cartridges, the .357 magnum with 125 gr hp bullet, and the 230 gr .45 hp bullet, are on opposite ends of the scale yet they are supposed to be the 2 best manstoppers. The common denominator is they both yield around or over 400 FPE (muzzle). I tend to look for SD ammo that has the most FPE with a reliable hp bullet. Too much FPE on a hardball bullet is liable to pass right through your target and do unintended damage. There's 2 more cents worth. I'm not sure you're getting your money's worth. :)

[Mr. S]

Now, you're comparing handgun ammo to AR15 and M16 ammo—apples to watermelons. The test I cited compares apples to apples. What we are talking about is incapacitation time. The test cited by Mag Safe was conducted without their knowledge. Here is their report.

MAGSAFE SWEPT THE STRASBOURG TESTS
The now -famous Strasbourg Tests put MagSafe on the map. To Summarize what nearly everyone already knows, over 600 live French Alpine goats (their bodies are very much like humans) were shot under controlled conditions: no anesthetic, same shot placement form animal to animal, and with blood pressure and heart rate monitors to determine the Incapacitation Time (measure of how long it took a goat to cease functioning after the single shot was delivered).

MagSafe Ammo worked - better than anything else. Tests were done without MagSafe's knowledge, so some versions tested were the lowest powered. For example, two types of .380 ACP are offered; the .380 Defender, a 60-grainer at 1,360 fps in a Colt Mustang; and the .380 MAX (designed for a big city's undercover drug agents) with a 52-grain slug sizzling along at 1,620 fps in the Mustang.

The Defender has 247 ft-lbs of energy, while the MAX load has 303 ft-lbs. The Defender's lower velocity hampered stopping power, resulting in a Average Incapacitation Time (AIT) of 7.12 seconds. That's the average time for five different goats, each shot once with the MagSafe 60-grain Defender.

However - and this is where things get interesting - there wasn't a jacketed hollowpoint bullet in ANY caliber which dropped the goats faster than MagSafe's weakest .380 load!

MagSafe's .380 beat every .45 ACP slug, every 10mm, every 9mm (including police-only ammo), every .40 caliber - no matter who made it - Cor-Bon, Remington, Glaser and HydraShok.

In fact, MagSafe's lowest-powered .380 ACP load had an AIT faster than the best manstopper of all time - Remington's .357 Magnum 125-grain JHP!

Average Incapacitation Times for all other MagSafe's calibers were in the 4-second range, and MagSafe topped the tests in every caliber but .357 Magnum (a prototype Quik-Shot beat by a fraction of a second), and .38 Special, where Glaser won by .04 seconds. Had the .38 Special tests been done in a 2-inch barrel, MagSafe would have topped that test, too.
That is pretty convincing to me.


What is convincing to you?
Reading a manufacturers webpage. :rolleyes:

In that case you should read this one
http://www.extremeshockusa.com/cgistore/store.cgi?page=/new/welcome.html&setup=1&cart_id=


Here are a couple of questions asked on another forum about magsafe,read the response and read the screenname of the person who responded.

http://glocktalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1355010&highlight=magsafe

http://glocktalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1315727

BTW Nice thread drift!

[OldLincoln]

Wow, you're right! The test is invalid. Next time make them smoke crack and see if they drop with one shot. Just kidding! :)

I did find it odd however to read they thought of them as similar to humans. I thought wild boar might be closer than skinny little goats. Any of you hunters ready to face a ticked off crackhead wild boar charging at you and stand your ground with a .380 loaded with a single round of frangible ammo? You'll tell your group to be steady now only to discover you're alone!

[JFootin]

My responses in red....


What is convincing to you?
Reading a manufacturers webpage. :rolleyes:

In that case you should read this one
http://www.extremeshockusa.com/cgistore/store.cgi?page=/new/welcome.html&setup=1&cart_id=

Well, I'm not talking about Extreme Shock, am I? I am talking about a well known ammo available all over the place, at leading retailers.

Here are a couple of questions asked on another forum about magsafe,read the response and read the screenname of the person who responded.

http://glocktalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1355010&highlight=magsafe

http://glocktalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1315727

Some comments worth noting. But Mag Safe says that THEIR ammo DOES penetrate drywall. It won't just fly right through two walls and kill the person in the second room over like a .45 would.

BTW Nice thread drift!

Yeah, I know. Sorry OldLincoln.

[JFootin]

My response in red...


Wow, you're right! The test is invalid. Next time make them smoke crack and see if they drop with one shot. Just kidding! :)

They had heart rate monitors on them, so they knew when their hearts stopped. When that happens, no amount of drugs are going to keep you from being DEAD RIGHT THERE!

I did find it odd however to read they thought of them as similar to humans. I thought wild boar might be closer than skinny little goats.

Those were bigger goats than we see here on people's farms. Human sized goats.

Any of you hunters ready to face a ticked off crackhead wild boar charging at you and stand your ground with a .380 loaded with a single round of frangible ammo? You'll tell your group to be steady now only to discover you're alone!

I'd want a serious hand cannon if I'm going to be facing something like this...:eek:

http://i1230.photobucket.com/albums/ee486/John_England/MonsterPig.jpg

[OldLincoln]

Sooo weeee Pig!

[earle8888]

Re: 600 Nitro and other British doubles for Africa......
They were called "Sporting Rifles"

The reason being........ You facve a charging elephant......You shoulder your Sporting Rifle.....Fire............ When the smoke clears...(Cordite you know old boy)...The first one up is a sport..

[wyntrout]

That blown-up hog sure gets around. It's a Photoshop "classic".

I'm with Mas about the sheet rock walls. A direct hit to the wall from a Glaser is going to still have a lot of energy on the other side, because the sheet rock won't hold it back.

I've always thought about making a hollowpoint out of silver, filling the cavity with holy water, and plugging the cavity with a piece of wooden cross... sealed with wax to prevent leakage. This round would offer "lethality" to vampires AND werewolves, as well as incapacitate zombies with head shots. Of course, you still need heart shots to the first two.

Wynn:)

[TominCA]

My kid and I built a little wall (1/2 inch sheetrock either side of 2, 3.5" studs. We set it up and put a phone book 3.5" behind it. The goal was to see what Extreme Shock "Air Freedom" ammo would do after going through one wall - we were not interested in the wound, just what happens if one gets away in a gunfight in a drywall house.

We used 38 special, 9mm and 45 acp - in each case the Air Freedom really broke up in the "wall" and then penetrated the dry phonebook 3.5" behind it about 3/4 inch. You could see the bullet was pretty much fully desintigrated at 3.5 inches from the wall. It would still be dangerous - but it would never make it through another wall.

We then fired them directly into the phone books and got about 3" of penetration with a lot of destruction. The 45ACP only went 2.5 " and some Winchester 185g HP went 2.5" also as a comparison. Thr 9mm went 3" and the 9mm +p corbon went 3.5"

We also fired the Extreme Shock "Fang Face" which is designed to penetrate barriers but will fragment in flesh. It held together very well thrugh drywall and also through 3/4" particle board and went on to penetrate the phone books about 3" or so depending upon the caliber. Some of the bullets broke apart and caused a lot of damage in the paper. How would it work on a BG? I don't know but if it had enough velocity to desitigrate in the "soft parts" they would be in serious trouble! If not, it acts just like a solid - it held together much better than the Air Freedom. Like it was supposed to.

There is a third copper powder bullet they advertised as being a good round for snubbies and also safer in a home environment with sheetrock walls. This was terrible -it went through the sheetrock like a solid and then I shot it edgewise through a 3.5" 2X4!!! It went right through and kept on going (from an S&W .38 cal Chief's Special 2") I would never use this for home defense.

All in all I would use Air Freedom for home defense because it really does break up in walls and it seems to hold together a little better in phone books. Makes some nasty holes! The Fang Face looked okay and probably would do good in a stret fight. The copper "snubby" was the worst of both worlds.

We had seen some pigs shot on the internet with this stuff - so when we were boar hunting we took the Extreme Shock ammo along for finishing off any wounded animals. The pigs all died quiclkly with rifle shots so we had to shoot phone books.

[JFootin]

Very informative. Thanks!

[Mr. S]

http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot23.htm

[wyntrout]

Thanks, Mr. S. Very informative, as well.

Wynn:)