With a fragmenting bullet and high velocity those little pieces can go a long way in any direction even with a perfect boiler room shot. I am aware that shot placement is most important.

flounder33

Actually the petals can not go very far at all, especially in meat. The petals weigh so little they can not retain enough energy to travel in meat, However in liquid they are able move a given distance.

This fall I shot a buck in the neck just above the bone with a .458/275 grain Lehigh. Of course the animal went right down so I thought it was a great shot. One of the things that I wanted to know was what the bullet did - how it performed.

The bullet did exit of course, but I really wanted to know what the petals did in that short distance or if they even came off.

At home in the garage, I skinned the animal and was able to find 2 petals just about to come out of the meat under the skin and above the wound channel. If you look closely at the exit wound and just above the wound (at about 3:00 o'clock), you will see a red slit where one petal almost made it out to the skin. I then took to my local butcher and let him know I was in search of petals. He cut into and around the channel - he found two more petals directly below the wound channel both of them lodged up against the near bone. Both had traveled about an inch but did not have enough energy to drive into the bone. The other 2 petals were never found they muct have exited still intact with the bullet. The shot I made did not provide enough fluid for the petals come off clean and because they were in muscle meat tissue they did not travel very far at all. The theory is the petals will work the best in a fluid atmospher. If I could have mode the shot behing the shoulder as I would have liked... the petals would have come off in the chamber and perforated the vitals, and the bullet body would have continued on through the animal.

My shot proved to me that even though somebody has labeled it a fragmenting bullets - the fragments really only work well in fluid. In muscle tissue they do not move that far at all - matter of inches if that.

This picture shows the blood pool from the high neck wound. It bled out far better than I thought it should with such a short wound channel...



Here you can see the exit wound and how high above the shoulders it was.



You just do not have to worry about the petals moving to far in the meat if they get to the meat... Now if you gut shot one or chest cavity one - expect either a huge stinky mess in one cavity or dark red jellow in the other as it destroys heart and lung tissue.

Thanks Pete, good illustration.

I agree 100%. I also think the Lehigh design also aids in a bad shot. Of course not something you want to promote.