This is the off side rib cage of a 6X7 Bull Elk check out the size of the wound channel. A 300 Winn. Mag is for size comparison. This exit was made with a 440 grin Flat Point Hardcast @ 950 FPS fired from a 500 JRH

Jeez, that's a BF exit hole! How far did it travel after the hit?

Wow! I wonder if the bullet was cast to hard and it came apart never seen a solid do that.

For example: 460gr hard cast at 1650fps (impact)The entrance and exit looked exactly the same.

ptaylor,
Don't believe that there was any blowup the bullet went through and made a single entrance hole in the ground. I have shout roscks with these bulets out of the 500 @ 1375 and 1420 out of the 475 and they did not fragment.
What Caliber were you shooting at 1650,460 S&W ( 45 Cal.) The Larger frontal area makes alot of difference...
Also what animal did you shoot?More speed in these big bores in my experience is not the answer that manny believe it is..

475Guy, The bull was already down from a hit with the 180 TXS out of my 300 Winn. His head was up and he looked at me as I approached so I gave him one with the JRH.........

From the looks of it, the bullet hit the rib and caused the larger exit wound. I've seen hardcast bullets from a .357 mag make silver-dollar sized entrance /exit wounds on deer when hitting ribs.

The 500 and the 300 both hit ribs going in and coming out thie is the exit of the 300 winn

I should have been more clear; Elk with my Marlin 45-70. I've shot a bunch of criters with cast boolets and never seen much more than bullet diameter destruction. I wonder if/how design (i.e. shoulder shape, meplat size, etc.) correlates with wound channels or bone fragmentation?

quote:

Originally posted by ptaylor:
I wonder if/how design (i.e. shoulder shape, meplat size, etc.) correlates with wound channels or bone fragmentation?

I believe it to play a major role.......

Without knowing, I'd say you had your holes mixed up...dvnv

good stuff...
damn...now i want a 500l too

quote:

Originally posted by dvnv:
Without knowing, I'd say you had your holes mixed up...dvnv

No the holes are not mixed up...........

"No the holes are not mixed up........"

Then, without knowing, I'll take your word for it. I guess slow and fat through ribs can make a mess...what did the inside of the entrance rib look like? dvnv

quote:

Originally posted by dvnv:
"No the holes are not mixed up........"

Then, without knowing, I'll take your word for it. I guess slow and fat through ribs can make a mess...what did the inside of the entrance rib look like? dvnv

The entrance hole was much smaller 3/4" to 1" diamenter for the 500 revolver.... and about bullet diameter for the 300 Win.

Looks correct to me.
The 300 Mag going faster has enough velocity to "punch" through the rib.

The slower, but heavier, fatter hand gun bullet does not have enough power to "punch" through the rib. When it impacts, the dwell time on the rib bone is much longer, and in this case still powerful enough to cause structural failure of the rib, over a wider area, which cause more damage as the rib bone material is accelerated and becomes a "projectile" as well.

An easier way of understanding this is. If you shot a piece of steel with the 300 it would "punch" through. Likely the handgun would not.

Punch a hole in a piece of cardboard with a screwdriver point, then try it with the handle end, sorta the same principle.

You don't give any indication as to what type of projectile was launched out of the 300 WM. My first thought also is that the two exit holes are reversed, but you say "no". So be it. It is very atypical for a hard cast bullet to "shatter" and leave that big an exit hole. I have seen them completely bore through rib bones w/o expanding much above bore diameter, and the 300 round looks like an "X" bullet. If so, it wasn't the reason for the large hole, either.

Only other way this happens, to me, is that the hard cast tumbled while inside the elk, and hit the rib sideways. A possibility?

quote:

Originally posted by Doubless:
You don't give any indication as to what type of projectile was launched out of the 300 WM. My first thought also is that the two exit holes are reversed, but you say "no". So be it. It is very atypical for a hard cast bullet to "shatter" and leave that big an exit hole. I have seen them completely bore through rib bones w/o expanding much above bore diameter, and the 300 round looks like an "X" bullet. If so, it wasn't the reason for the large hole, either.

Only other way this happens, to me, is that the hard cast tumbled while inside the elk, and hit the rib sideways. A possibility?

The wound channel left by hard cast bullets is very dependent on the meplat size. To large of a meplat and they don't penetrate well and are not accurate to distance. Too small and the wound channel is not as large as it should be.
I have found that a meplat of between 73% to 78% to to be best and I believe that 78% is optimum. I killed a 50+ inch Moose in 1988 with a 475 Linsbaugh and notice that the wound channel was bigger than the wound channel left by a 338 winn with 250 grain partions.I realize that the effectivenes of these revolvers is difficult for many to accept.
As to the hard cast shattering I don't think so as it blew a nice sized hole in the ground after exiting and they do not shatter at 1400 fps,why would they shatter at only 950 fps.If a hard cast shaters then it is too hard with too much Linotype.......

As to it hiting the ribs sideways, I dought it.When bullets turn or tumble pentration is minimul. I have experienced bullets turning side ways and the performance is not good......

jwp
I agree.
I have recovered cast bullets from game, many even out of Linotype that were not deformed in any way.
I shot a wild pig one time, at about 40 yards, with a 4" 44 Mag, that was laying down facing away with a cast Keith Linotype bullet. The bullet struck about the middle of the pig, next to the spine and was recovered in the right side of the jaw in the teeth. The only marks on it were the rifling marks, and teeth marks on the nose.

As jwp says, shoot a few animals with big FP cast bullets and you might be suprised.