Expansion testing suggestions

[Will]

I’m fixing to dive into making some hollow point pistol rounds to test for expansion. I really don’t want to mess with ballistics gel although that may be the best option.

What media have you found to give reliable results. I have been saving 1 gallon juice jugs and thought about filling them with wet paper.

Also could just tape magazines together and soak them.

Eventually I would also like to test flat point bullets out of hunting caliber rifles. I know a few of you are using the rubber mulch as a bullet catcher but wasn’t sure how that would apply to real world expansion.

 

[Brad]

As an extreme test sand works. If it holds together in sand it will hold together in anything.
For expansion almost anything wet. The wetter the better. If you have heavy clay soil a box full of that soil saturated well would work.

 

[Ian]

Simulating tissue is best done with wet-pack. Newsprint in particular.

 

[Will]

Ian out of curiosity how do you plan to test the new lead free alloy for expansion?

Brad I may look into sand. Our soil here is hard clay. When bullets hit my backstop they pretty much get destroyed.

 

[Ian]

First my oiled sawdust trap. If they don't fly apart in that I'll use wet-pack. I'll be testing HP handgun bullets and both solid and cup-point rifle bullets if the initial testing is promising enough.

 

[Outpost75]

I use water filled milk jugs. Doesn't need to be clear water. I have a pond next to my range and use pond water. Jugs flatten more easily to take to the recycle center after having been perforated.

 

[Reloader762]

How to make Wet Pack Media

http://www.frfrogspad.com/wetpak.htm

 

[Winelover]

I just use sand................ since that's what my backyard range has for a backstop.



That alloy is three parts pure to one part lino.

 

[abj]

My system uses one similar to "outpost 75". The difference is I use one 20 ounce water bottle and behind that I fold up several cheap fleece blankets for about 30 or so layers. Behind the first folded blanket I insert a piece of cardboard to measure expansion as it travels through the blankets. With my test on 38 special, 20:1 is king. Cup or shallow hollow points are needed for above 860 fps. and deep points for anything below. I had perfect mushrooms as low as 830 shot at 7 yds. The blankets had very small effect on the final size as measured by the cardboard inserts. My water bottles were the walmart, very thin plastic. I did use some thicker ones and the thicker plastic did have the effect of a larger final size.
I am in no way attesting to the use of these in real world events, I just wanted to test the different alloys with a minimum amount of water and a recovery media that had the smallest amount of influence on final size.
I will say this, if I were to hunt with a soft alloy in a handgun I would consider 16:1 over 20:1. My rifle alloy I used in 35 Remington is 2.5 Tin and 4 antimony at about 1800. Out of 7 whitetails taken I have only recovered two bullets, one was a perfect mushroom at 201 grains start and 199.8 recovered. The second was 201 start and 188 grains recovered. All the others the exit holes were a mim of .5 inch and a max of .8 inch. I have not tested the rifle rounds like I did the 38's and probably will not based on the success in the field. That Lee 200 fn is accurate and deadly.
As a side note, I did harvest a small buck at 100 yds with a 300 fn 45-70 @ around 1350 mv. Entrance and exit were exactly the same, no expansion noted. Alloy was the same as the 35 Remington. I am not sure what speed it takes for that alloy to start expanding.(not that it needs to).
Please keep us posted on your experiments.
Tony

 

[Ian]

How to make Wet Pack Media

http://www.frfrogspad.com/wetpak.htm

This is exactly the method I use and the source info for that method, thank you for posting it. After reading Veral Smith's small treatise on the virtues of wet-pack testing of bullet performance I went searching for a standardized technique and this is it. Veral has downed more game than I'll ever do in three lifetimes and has the experience to correlate actual results with his detailed wet-pack testing results, so I take his word for these matters.

 

[Bret4207]

You can also use a known good expanding bullet and just do a side by side comparison. IOW, take factory load "A" shoot it into whatever is handy, be it sand, wet new print, jugs, etc, and they try your home made stuff. Give's you something to compare too.

FWIW- some years back I did a bunch of testing on a horse carcass. One thing I discovered is that even the factory stuff doesn't expand the same across the test media's variations. Shots in major muscle give different results than the gut, and bone just screws everything up. Same results on cattle carcasses. It becomes a game of, "Huh, why'd it do that?" and you sort of have to guess your way though coming up with a theory.

 

[Outpost75]

I use a known good .38 Special +P service load as a sanity check. Good example is 135-grain Speer Gold Dot. Factory +P loads give about 830-850 fps from a true 2-inch, depending upon cylinder gap. Handloaded down to standard pressure using 4.1 grains of Bullseye and firing from a 2" S&W K-frame with cylinder gap of 0.005-0.006" velocity is just under 800 fps. Expansion in water jugs at that velocity is normal and penetration slightly enhanced from the faster +P load.

But fire that same 4.1 Bullseye load in a 1-7/8" S&W J-frame with larger factory cylinder gap of 0.008" and velocity drops about 40 fps and below about 750 fps the 135 Gold Dot does not expand. You lose about 10 fps for each 1/8" reduction in barrel length below 4 inches and for each 0.001" increase in cylinder gap. Not hard and fast, as powder types vary, but a good approximation which agrees with my testing experience using fast-burners like Bullseye.

 

[Rally]

Contained snow works quite well, but needs to be changed every day. If the sun hits it, the snow settles inside of the container and gets harder. World of difference shooting into fresh powder, compared to a snow bank the snow plow has created. Fresh light snow deforms the bullets very little and doesn't take that much to slow them down. A hard packed snow bank is much harder and does more damage to the bullet, also requires more digging to recover the bullets. Ideally, a bullet backstop and a container, say 30" square, with no top, about 6' long would work well. A snow making machine and a shaker would give near perfect, repeatable conditions. If the backstop/catcher was covered from the sunlight, the snow would last much longer.

 

[Ian]

Fiver was going to mail me some snow last spring to do some testing but we figured it would turn to steam by the time it got to Texas in April.

 

[Will]

I’ll be doing some casting next week to get ready for this. Plan to start with the MP 359640 in 38 and 357. Then move on to 9mm.

 

[Rally]

What are you using for an alloy Will?

 

[Will]

My plan is to start using a 50/50 mix of COWW and Pure Lead with a little tin added. Then adjust the velocity as needed. If this fails I will have to order for different mix. I have piles of wheel weights.

May also try using caulking in the hp cavity to see if it helps with expansion.

To be honest this will all be a learning experience for me. I do t really know what to expect.

 

[Will]

Well I loaded up some test subjects tonight. First test will be with the 359-640 with the small hp pin. These were cast from 3 parts WW 1 part pure lead with 3oz of tin added to a 20lb pot.
These are 357 mags loaded with 13.5gr of AA#9 and will be fired in my 4” 686. The lineup will be bare hp, hp cavity filled with hot glue, and hp cavity filled with clear gorilla glue.
I will be stuffing 1 gallon jugs with wet magazines and paper (newspapers are tough to come by).
Here’s some pics of the ammo and test firearm.

https://imgur.com/RBw9p2D

https://imgur.com/qqWjZAW

https://imgur.com/JYIgkmL

https://imgur.com/gj9LLjT

 

[S Mac]

At what range Will?

 

[Will]

Probably just start at 7 yards. This initial testing is mainly to give me some idea of how velocity/alloy combinations react.