- Naturally I read all these ancient writings before they stack onto the book shelves and gain a few ideas (before then forgetting them):
STOPPING POWER: It seems that this question has exercised minds 'for ever'. One early standard was the figure of fifty-eight foot-pounds, which was reckoned by early military ballisticians to be capable of delivering a disabling wound from a .49 inch standard shrapnel ball weighing some 167 grains delivered at 400 feet per second.
Multiple "Experts" have over the years applied themselves to pseudo-scientific formulas that might be applied as a means to confirm their own beliefs .. by combining weight, velocity, and bullet frontal area, sometimes mixed complete with various fallacious 'factors' to give a formula.
We all generally feel that bigger, heavier, & faster contribute to increased chances of an effective hit .. but the exact relationships are in question - Are they linear, exponential, logarithmic, square or - are they even proportional at all - as 'street records' seem to suggest that smaller calibers are recorded as often performing well beyond expectation - and their bigger relations.
Further - there are so many other unrecorded external factors & variations that affect the result of a shot as to make even the actual recorded outcomes confused and at best only indicative.
The next consideration is the obvious limit on the size and power of any practical and portable firearm. It is not possible to just keep-on physically increasing the mass, the caliber, or the velocity "ad infinitum" - but recently advances in technology are managing to increase the FRONTAL AREA by bullet expansion or "mushrooming" on impact.
- There is another way to increase the frontal area of impact .. Multiple projectiles.
I have worked-up duplex loads in three different handgun cartridges and they have worked well in my sporting applications. 10 mm Auto, 357 Magnum, and 327 Federal Magnum. These Duplex loads immediately DOUBLE the frontal area of each shot fired - and at practical handgun ranges the individual projectiles separate to a controlled degree.
Links to my earlier stories:
https://flicense.blogspot.co.nz/2017/02/hand-loading-for-327-magnum-part3.html
https://flicense.blogspot.co.nz/2014/03/10mm-glock20-duplex-load-two-bullets.html
- What reminded me of this topic was a story 'DOUBLE BULLETS' by V R Gaertner that I've just read in the 1978 Gun Digest. This author was making his double bullet loads by cutting bought bullets in half with a hacksaw or a band-saw before stacking the pairs for inserting into the case! He reports good results bisecting jacketed .357 and .44 bullets and experiencing reduced felt recoil.
In his eight page article Gaertner used a simple wooden jig to clamp four jacketed hollow point bullets securely before feeding them sideways through the band saw.. and he thought that he might be effectively increasing the stopping power for defensive application.
I wonder how much of his reduced felt recoil was down to the reduced weight of the duplex load over the original bullet's mass .. as the saw blade's cut would remove the weight of the 'swarf' shavings.
______________________
http://www.gundigeststore.com/gun-digest-32nd-edition-1978-digital-download-z9444
Here are some representative frontal areas in square inches:
32 Caliber (.312") = 0.076 sq. inch.
9mm, 38 Special & 357 Magnum (.356") = 0.1 sq. inch.
44 Magnum (.429") = 0.14 sq. inch.
45 ACP (.45") = 0.16 sq. inch.
.50 S&W Magnum (.500") = 0.20 sq. inch.
Marty K.
After researching & writing 1,036 blogs I've got something NEW to try .. I've signed-up to Patreon. - In over five years I've not made one cent from this .. NOW you can send me a wee support $ - starting from $1. to get all this stuff from New Zealand - over a year that's nearly the price of one Shooting magazine. - Am I worth it?
https://www.patreon.com/posts/24075745
No comments:
Post a Comment