RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

it does continue, but only for frontal hits on bone. Chap

RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

Here is John Nosler's search and the search continues today!
Chap

RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

It does, Terminal Ballistics article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terminal_ballistics

Chap
Selecting bullets for terminal performance
The standard medium for testing bullets for performance on tissue is ballistic gelatin. Tests have shown that properly prepared and calibrated 10% (by mass) gelatin at 4 degrees Celsius correlates very closely to observed performance in the muscle tissue of living, anesthetised swine. Performance is generally graded with two factors, the maximum depth of penetration and the size of the cavity formed in the gelatin by the bullet impact. The size of the cavity represents the distance which tissue is thrown radially outward due to "splash." The penetration represents how far into the tissue the bullet will ultimately penetrate.
Unfortunately, gelatin is a poor medium for evaluating actual effectiveness. The observed "tissue splash," usually referred to as "temporary cavitation," is not an indication of terminal performance in an animal, as gelatin has a much lower elastic limit than most living tissues; a force which tears a gelatin block in half may result in nothing more than slight bruising if applied to living flesh.
Penetration figures may not be accurate. Many testers do not calibrate their gelatin. The standard calibration is 85 mm of penetration when shot by a standard .177 caliber steel bb traveling at 180 m/s (590 ft/s). Uncalibrated gelatin may show a variance of up to + or - 50% from calibrated gelatin. Further, animals' skin resists penetration much more than the muscle tissue which gelatin simulates. Human skin tissue on the torso resists penetration as much as 50 mm (2 in) of muscle, and horses' skin is the equivalent of approximately 200 mm (7.9 in).
For a quick incapacitation, a hit to a vital, blood-bearing organ or the central nervous system is needed, so a bullet that will penetrate to the depth required for such a hit should be chosen. When hunting groundhogs, for example, a bullet that expands quickly to form a large cavity with minimum penetration would be the best choice. When hunting deer, a bullet which penetrates deeper is required; this can be accomplished by either limiting expansion (2 times the original width is often regarded as ideal), or by using a more powerful cartridge. For hunting bear, yet more penetration is required. The pattern is, of course, that the larger the animal, the deeper its vital organs will be located, and therefore a firearm, cartridge, and bullet type should be chosen that will be able to reach the vital organs and kill humanely.
For dangerous game especially, deep penetration depth is critical; the reason for this is that the shooter cannot always choose their shots. If a hunter finds himself staring at a deer's hindquarters, it is very unlikely that he or she will choose to fire at that deer anyway, in the hopes that their bullet will be able to reach a vital organ through several layers of muscle and gut. The better choice in that scenario would be to wait until the deer decides to turn around. A lion, however, may decide to charge at a person other than the shooter, presenting a much less than optimal shooting angle.
To hit the vital organs on a large game animal requires penetrating the thick fat and muscle tissue surrounding the chest cavity, and quite often bone as well. A hard, nondeforming bullet is often chosen, though many modern rifle calibers are quite capable of killing 1,000 lb (450 kg) elk and similar-sized animals with a deforming bullet; even the venerable .30-06 is up to the task, with a powerful enough load. Elephant hunters normally attempt to shoot for the brain, which is much smaller than the size of the elephant's head, and so must be targeted quite precisely, and require a firearm and bullet capable of punching through a foot (300 mm) or more of tough, albeit hollow, bone and reaching the brain.

RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

Still looking....Interesting maybe these bullets are more magic than others:

http://www.barnesbullets.com/information/product-news/publication-mentions/breaking-out-of-the-mold/




still looking....
Chap

RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

excellent post and links Chap! Shed some light on things.
Doug

RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

Chap I think you're missing falcon's point.

His point is that most bullets available today will do just fine if the hunter does their part. No bullet, not even beer-can-exit-hole Barnes Expanders, will turn a poor shot into a bang-flop.

The Shockwaves you don't like have about an 80%+ bang-flop rate in my hands, and none make it more than a few yards.

While I don't shoot Barnes currently I have friends who do and their experience is not drastically different, most deer go down quickly and a few go a little further.

There's a price to pay for gaping wide bullets, and that is under-penetration. It's simple physics -- as the frontal area of the bullet increases, it takes more energy to drive it through a given length of tissue. I have exactly 2 Shockwaves that were recovered from deer; my Barnes buddy has a few more of the Expanders. He's a good shot so the deer didn't go anywhere but the exit rate was lower as one would expect. My only personal experience with Barnes is out of a 12-gauge, I shot them one year and had a massive bullet failure and so did a buddy so I switched to Federals.

I think they're good bullets, but on deer-sized game I think the differences between bullets are massively over-hyped...

RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

I agree the hunter has to do his part and there are no magic bullets for gut shots. I was just giving some of the other readers new to this forum (Falcon isn't new) some things to read up on (see the above post from dalberg). I know Falcon knowshis stuff on bullets. I also agree with your frontal areas assessment, in fact Sam Fadala, who is the author of the Hornady MLer Manual is a huge "large meplat fan", as are many other well known folks, they tend to come from the "traditional side of the house", rather than the Toby Brides Long Range MLing side of the house.

I think most bullets will kill deer no problem, your right it is all about shot placement. Good shot placement ensures a quick kill. However good shot placement in the field in hunting situation is not always possible because of movement of the deer, no rest, etc. That is when bullet construction pays for itself, because if you hit bone then you get penetration into the vitals. So for "bow shots", I would agree massively over hyped. For raking shots, bullet construction is paramont and very very important, and that is where the hype makes a difference.
Best Wishes,
Chap

RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

Thanks.

That is exactly my point. The Hornady XTP and SST bullets do a really good job on deer sized game
if you do your job. Many of thosewhodid not do their job do not recognize that fact that they did not do their job. So theycontinue to search for that magic bullet.

The Nosler story is a short one. He coped a Germandesigned bullet that had then been in use for 50 years. :D

RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

Back in Oct one of my buddies was ML hunting on my place, he shot a nice 8pt at a range of 30 yards, because of the smoke he couldnt see the buck run off after the shot. He was using a 240XTP over a charge of 90gr of RS, he looked for the deer, but couldnt find any blood or the deer. Later that morning he came and got me to help him look. I found a few drops of blood so we set out tracking, it was him, me and our two sons looking now. We follow a light blood trail for about 300 yards and I do mean light, sometimes the buck wouldnt bleed for a 10 to 20 yard stretch. Never did the blood trail open up. We finally ran out of blood, wespread 50 yards apart and started driving thru the thick brush that this buck had went into.We done this until 5pm, but never found his buck. He swears he shotthe buck right behind the shoulder, maybe he did I dont really know, but i kinda have my doubts about that. I have never shot the XTP's, but I have helped track about a 10 deer thathave been shot with them. Somewe found some we didnt, but i noticed thatsome we found the bullets had fragmented and the deer had ran a long distances.Most didnt hit the deer where they thought they had, some were hit right in the shoulder and the bullet had fragmented, some thought they hit the shoulder when they had actually hit the gut. Up till the last few years I have always used the big heavy bullets like the 430gr super slugs and the 370gr TC maxi and I have had no problems with these bullets, but the range seemed to be limited. Lately I have been wanting to increase my range so i dropped weight and changed bullets. I started out with the 250gr PB over 110gr of pryodex p out of my Optmia elite,I shot 2 does in Ohio in 07, one at a range of 18 yards, one at 75 yards, both bullets performed perfectly. I have since switched to the 250 SW bonded, because of the reports of fragmention from the PB bullets.I shot a 8pt at 50 yards this year with it, over the same pwd and it performed perfectly. I do know that if you push a light bullet to fast fragmention is the result. I have handloaded rifle shells for 24 years and past experience has taught me that. There are a lot of folks on here with way more muzzleloading bullet experience than I have, I read all that they write and take it in.There are so many conflicting reports on bullets, bullets work great for this person and not for the next. It makes it really difficult to decide what bullet to use. I am gonna try some different bullets in the off season to see how they shoot, but as far hunting goes I am gonna stick to the bonded SW until something happens to that changes my mind.
Good luck
Greg

RE: When does a bullet fragment?
 

I have only shot 1 deer with an XTP, but I cut my teeth with the older HTP design. I killed a lot of deer with it, my experience was the front mushed up and the base drove the bullet through with no remarkable damage (85gr pyrodex). Often little blood. I have better luck with SW, they open further.