Federal 50 Caliber Muzzleloader Bullet Revisited
 

Last winter i tried to purchase more of these bullets, but they were out of stock at the store. I requested i be notified when they came in stock. Last week an email came, and some of these copper conicals were ordered. You can understand why i figure these bullets were made recently, and are not old stock. This morning a trip was made with jugs and stuff to see how these bullets would perform.











That front jug had a large opening, so it was filled with a mixture of jointer chips, sawdust, planer chips, and sand dust. Then water was added. It was quite heavy when finished. The 'trap' was 25 yard away from the rifle. The powder charge was 50g of Blackhorn. The bullets were clocked at 1140 fps with the chronograph set at the same 25 yard. The video of the capture can be seen HERE. Following are a few stills taken from the video.
















The bullet penetrated through the three jugs, 813 pages of the phone book, and was found on the ground by the phone book.












At home i realized the bullet had a piece of a milk jug in it's nose, so i removed it and photographed it again.

Not good.

I feel funny cross posting on two forums on the same thread.

Oops, forgot to show the unfired bullet.

So, what are your thoughts?

I have 3 packs of them , now i think they wouldn be good for any long range hunting since they apparently need more velocity in order to expand .

I think i would like to know the minimum velocity needed to expand and then i would keep my shots within the range that achieved at least that .
But thats just me

That was the question I asked federal when the bullet first came out. They didn't know.

Since they claim it's a 200 yd bullet. I asked how it did on the 200yd tests for expansion. He told me they only tested at 100yds. :bash:

That's what the bullet looks like after penetrating 4 milk jugs filled with water at 1335 fps.

Much better.

Looks like it was just under velocity for opening up. It opened a slight bit, just didn't have enough speed to completely "petal" out. Looks like it passes the penetration test with flying colors though!

Ya much better.

Suggestion, in your next expension test leave a gap of let say 2-3'' between each jug. The bellet will penetrate less and open more.