There's surely something pleaseing about the shape of a moon rocket. Long, slender, pointy at one end and fire and smoke coming out the other. We kinda like the same "coolness" in our bullets. Somewhere it must be written "Bullets should look like Moon Rockets."

But sometimes in the dark of night, when I'm sure no one is watching me I wonder, "Does it REALLY matter?"

Consider the lowly wadcutter. As aerodynamic as a brick. Yes, I know it's designed for low velocity and short range...not moon rocket stuff. But when you look at the SHAPE of a semi wad cutter, you have to realize it's amazing the thing even shoots.

Wadcutters, semi-wadcutters, hollow base wadcutters...absolutely GOOFY shapes...but they all shoot!

What then is the REAL value of bullet shape? A dumb question, right? How many studies have there been done to prove this point that moon rocket shaped bullets retain velocity better and shoot further etc? Everyone knows this. Even me.

But does it REALLY MATTER that a moon rocket design bullet will make a semi-wadcutter or some such bullet look silly at 1,200 yards?

I looked thru my shooting notes under the topic of "Great 1,200 Yd Shots I Have Made" and the page was blank.

What's my point? Just this. The REAL world of shooting takes place in less than 300 yds. The vast majority of all things shot happens in 100 yds or less!

Not the domain of "moon rockets."

Back when I was building my own .224 jacketed bullets I made a lot of moon rockets. They shot good. Did their thing pretty well. Very ho-hum. Just ordinary bullets.

Then one day I started thinking about moon rockets and bullet shape and I started doing some crazy things with my jacketed bullets. Timidly I backed the point form dies out further and further. My bullets stopped looking like moon rockets.

But the only thing that was changing before my eyes was performance. I couldn't detect any noticible change in velocity or trajectory etc. What was changing was RESULTS. All of a sudden my little bullets didn't kill the varmits. They started blowing them in half!

I kept on at this mad science until I was making jacketed bullets for everything from my K Hornet up to my brother's Swift and these bullets LOOKED like jacketed wad cutters! There was precious little "point" on them...just a big yawning hole straight down to the lead core.

When these bullets hit, they were so explosive it sounded like someone out in the field had just clapped their hands. Critters didn't die...they were blown in half. And after each hit there was usually a cloud of FUR that slowly settled out of the air as if someone had busted open a feather pillow.

These bullets were horrible and if there were ever a Geneva Convention on hunting bullets I would have been a "war criminal."

I have no doubt in the theoretical world of 600, 1,000 yds etc. these bullets would look poor on paper. Hell, they weren't even very pretty to look at in your hand.

But Ho-Chee-Mama! What they did to critters.

In the REAL WORLD with REAL hunting ranges...I don't think bullet shape makes a hoot in hell...except to the critters.

I'd like to see bullet makers let their creative juices flow and start building bullets that looked more like nuclear bombs than moon rockets. I'd like to see more bullets built specifically for IMPACT PERFORMANCE instead of theoretical trajectories and retained velocities and other silliness that just really doesn't matter for squat in the real world most of us hunt in. I'm convinced it can be done. But maybe that's just the dark side of me talking.

Pecos
The most accurate bullet that my 243 had was the Speer 105 round nose plus it was the most effective bullet I've seen on deer.
Should I set up to swage bullets for my 30-06 it will be a round nose, weighing some where around 190 to 210. For now I'm exploring the same weights in cast bullets.
Jim

Arky - All the /06 I've ever owned loved Lyman #311299. Lyman #311291 at 170 grs is perhaps the most versatile of the .30 cal cast bullets and works good in everything from from 30/30 on up. #311440 is a UGLY bullet but just as good as 291.

Swaging bullets that heavy for your /06 is going to be promising you a lot of recoil in years to come. I wouldn't think you would have much use for anything that heavy where you live...but of course I'm not familiar with what you actually hunt.

Anyway, the ACTUAL WEIGHT you can form in a given jacket cup is naturally determined by the length of jacket cut and how much lead you actually put in the jacket to swage.

When I was building all my .224 bullets, the jacket cups I was using would hold enough lead to make almost a 50 gr bullet...but I actually formed some as light as 26 grains for my KHornet and got wicked results within 200 yds.

So you could PROBABLY take a jacket cup that would build a traditional 200gr soft point bullet...but then short the thing on how much lead you put in it and instead built hollow point bullets down as light as 180 grs...maybe even 165!

You can get pretty flexible by just backing things off and forming lighter HP bullets. Chances are they will shoot as good or better.

Another idea I had about swaging bullets but never fiddled with it much was casting TWO different hardness lead cores. Place the real hard core in the bottom of the cup, then drop in a butter soft lead core on top of that and form the bullet. Sort of a poor man's partition bullet???

Curious minds wanted to know if it were worth the trouble or would even work as good, I just never had the time to pursue this idea.

Pecos
I think Dave Corbin speaks to the two alloy cores in one of his books.
My thought was to use the ballistic shape of the old Atlas ICBM, a spitzer going to a round nose, with no lead exposed, but not a FMJ. I think Corbin has some sort of plastic/nylon balls to put in the nose of the bullet to hold the space for final shaping, the Atlas ICBM nose cone.
The recoil, within reason, is not much of a factor for me. 50 rounds of 350 grain 45s ahead of 50 some odd grains of RL-7 on a Sunday afternoon, or 50 rounds of 300 grain 45 Colt rounds in the Rossi lever. Or 30 rounds of 300 grain 375 Whelen.
My buddy who shoots a 454 Casull, which I've shot this life time, won't have anything to do with my 375 Whelen. Of course he's 6'4" and 270 some odd so he gets to enjoy all of the recoil where I, at 6" and 180, get shoved around.
The long heavy 30 cast caliber bullets, to my thinking, should line up in the barrel better, hold their energy longer and have better terminal effect. I'm thinking a 190 grain at 2000 to 2200 out of a Winchester 1895 30-06 would be most effective out to 250 yards, which is about as far as I'd want to shoot iron sights.
Jim

Well, you got me there Arky. My old bullet making days were way before all the cute little nylon balls and points they stick in bullets nowadays.

I think you're ideas will produce a plenty serviceable bullet and I predict the deer and such won't approve or encourage you.

Certainly the old /06 is a grand platform to play with projects like this. It just likes to shoot!

Keep us posted on your quest. P45

Have you noticed that humans are always looking to try something better or at least different?

You're right when you say that most game is taken at close ranges. BUT, most seem to want something that will work at any range. Funny that they would think this way. Rather than buy what they need for a specific situation, they attempt to find a "one size fits all" remedy. It doesn't work with cars, carpenter's tools or lawn mowers, so why would it work with bullets?

There's spitzers, RNs, std, bonded or partitioned cores. Each has its own merits based on unique hunting scenarios. None of the above is best for all situations.

When you build a bullet, I believe that at least at first, you put something together based on your needs and the territory where you hunt (or target shoot).

I said, to Hell with weird moon rocket shapes and complicated designs. Return to the RN. In most rifles, this type has gone out of style. I say, who cares? They work.

Given where I and a lot of others hunt, it's all you need.

If you want to come up with the next big thing in bullets, be prepared to spend a fortune in equipment...and have a lot of it end up collecting dust when you try something that doesn't quite work.

Safe Shooting!
Steve Redgwell
303british.com

How many here have tried loading bullets backwards? I played with some commercial "hard cast" lead 30 carbine (bevel base, round nose) in my 30-06. They didn't feed, of course, and many of them couldn't find the 8" x 10" sheet of paper I'd hung out for them at 100 yards. After I put the target on a big piece of carboard at 50 yards, I was able to see all the bullet holes. No keyholes. The same bullets loaded properly were no good for driving tacks with (I didn't experiment or optimize much), but at least they all ended up in the same general area.

Maybe a heavier bullet or a jacketed bullet would do better backwards.

H. C.

Henry, I've heard of this but the only bullets I've ever actually loaded backwards was HBWC in 38 Special and I was afraid to load it very hot for fear of blowing out the center of the bullet and leaving a "sleeve" of lead somewhere down the barrel. As a result, I never gained much performance by this practice.

I don't think we really need to resort to loading bullets backwards. I think there should always be a "right side up." But that "right side" should allow the bullet to lead with it's best features forward for whatever situation it's called upon to perform.

I am amazed at how 150 gr RN bullets have vanished for the 270. Seems like this used to be almost the standard. Now I think there is only one bullet maker producing such a bullet.

Pecos,

So what you are saying is that it is you enjoyed watching that fur fly...?

I guess most bullet makers figure the moon rocket stuff is what sells, but I suppose if one of them were to put a pitch together about splitting critters in half it could gain some interest.

You are so right about real world hunting shots, my 1200 yd page is empty too.

Ive recently decided to make my two 300 savages my dedicated cast bullet rifles, even though a moa 165 grain @ 2600 fs isnt all bad either. A couple hundred 180 grn RN's and a can of unique or something similar should make for some interesting playin around. Who knows, maybe someday Ill even take a stab at an Elk with them......backwards...

Oh yea, someone else had a similar idea to your poor mans partition bullet, they called theirs the Grand Slam..

[ 11-10-2003, 04:31: Message edited by: Wstrnhuntr ]

Pecos
I'd like to tinker with making a round nosed plastic tipped bullet. Sort like the ballistic tipped spitzers on the market now. There would be, what effectively is a hollow point behind that plastic tip. Winchester had the Silvertips and Remington had the Bronzepoints that performed in a similar manner. The plastic tip would be compressed into the jacket, leaving the edge of the jacket to be acted upon by the target. The idea being the wide mouth of a round nose would make a super large hollow point.
Another idea that just came to me would be to make what is effectively a FMJ, core open at the base of the bullet. The nose of the bullet would have a plastic ball in it or maybe just air. The idea being that the core would slide inside of the jacket at impact. This would destabilize the bullet????
Another idea would to score the jacket at the nose end to insure rupture at impact allowing the core to separate from the jacket.
Ahh the thoughts conjured on a cool winters evening.
Jim

Arky - I like your idea. Should make a FINE bullet. Go for it.

Western, these sordid tales of when I was building my evil bullets are from that time when I walked with "the Dark Side" of the force. Back then, I did not measure bullets by how "pretty" they were but by the cone of "blood spray and body parts" out the back of the animal.

But that was before the golden age of video and computer games. I am able to vent my frustrations by less violent means toady.

Arkypete, your bullet was invented by the Brits and put into service somewhere around 1910. The .303 Mk II had a 174 grain FMJ spitzer with the nose of the jacket filled with paper to destabilize it. Later versions had an aluminium insert. To make the bullet tumble quickly on impact, you want the nose light and the weight in the back. Same idea the Russians are still using in their 5.5mm bullet, and the NATO folks are implementing with the steel "penetrator" in the 5.56mm rounds.

NotRicochet
I'm glad you reinforced my opinion of
th Brits, that they are a group of pretty smart guys. I'm glad they could join me in this idea.
Jim

I had a thought on a .358 bullet. Use .308 jackets to make a .308 full wadcutter. Say about 130 gr. Place that in the .358 jacket and seat. Figure by estimation and trial and error the size of core for the front half of the .358 bullet and swage that in. Finish the tip with a nose punch like a Veral Smith WLN. Big meplat! You could adjust the size of the front core or the .308 rear core to adjust performance. You could bond cores too. I had noticed too the effect of a deer shot with pointed and with rn bullets. The .308 was used on several deer, but with the pointed bullets they sometimes went farther before they stopped. The RN bullets seemed to anchor the deer in fewer steps. Where I hunt this is an important factor. Flat or round noses seem to keep my deer in the same property. I'm hoping to do a test on pigs in late winter. I'm going to try protected point, round nose, and spitzer bullets in the .358 WCF. When the finances come available I will try the .308 and .358 swaging dies. Right now I only have .224 and .429 dies. Good shootin' Packy

Packrat - Your ideas for bullet construction sound crazy. I like that! Thinking outside the conventional box is how we are going to dream up something wild.

But I would point out to one and all that the easiest form of bullet to swage is a HOLLOW POINT. We can knock ourselves out trying to dream up wonderful inserts for bullets, when all we need do is build hollow points.

I experimented a lot with opening and closing the point in my HP bullets and I found the following.

1. Had very little effect on accuracy.
2. Had tremendous effect on explosive properties of the bullet!

It was almost like some sort of "Dial the Destruction" knob on the bullets. The more vicious you want them to be, just back off the form die and open up that hollow point. I have no doubt this effortless method could be used to create a .358 diameter bullet that would virtually cut a deer in half.

Keep it SIMPLE is my motto.

Packy and Pecos
I'm thinking about getting Corbin to make a set of dies for me in 308 caliber. What I'd like to have is 180 to 210 grain bullet with the first 1/2 inch of bullet shank being .308 the rest being .301, bore riding like those found on cast bullets. I'd like the nose to be a round nose hollow point closed tightly, like the nose of Match Kings, with a hollow cavity under the jacket material.
I'm guessing that the jacket will require re-swaging so that the nose portion of the jacket is thicker and the mouth of the jacket is scalloped or trimmed so the jacket folds together uniformly.
The idea is there will be less resistance as the bullet travels up the barrel due to the bore riding nose. The hollow pointed round nose would have more dramatic terminal effects.
Should be interesting to play with this spring.
Jim

I've been away for a time so...better late than never.

Pecos, you shoulda tried a bit more juice on your upside-down WC. +P from a .38 snubbie will chop a 4' barracuda in half every time! Also, a few months back Seyfried did an article on two alloy bullets and had favorable results. Soft on top of hard to mimic the Partition, the other way around if you need to obturate the bullet. Key to this is HOT. At or close to 800*F for the soft part. Personally, I like paper patch. You would not believe what a big chunk of dead soft lead at 1500-1600 fps will do when it hits something. And I don't worry about leading either.

I see the eternal discussion about FPE/Taylor KO, etc, etc, until I'm ready to gag, and here of all places a bit of sanity!(note that "bit" is a vague term ) Everyone uses more bullet than they need except those that don't. Well, all I know is that terminal performance counts, shot placement counts, the rest is nothing but a path you take to get there. Probably 99% of the big game killed in the USA this season by boat tail bullets will be shot at less than 150 yards. 99% will be killed by more gun than is needed. JMO

After 20 years with a 30-30 I'm convinced that it's more gun than deer require because of the mess it makes of the insides. Have the same opinion about buckshot for the same reasons, and the only thing in common is the front of the bullet is round. I deviate from this with PD loads in a .38 SPCL. See fish story above.

Elsewhere there is a post asking about the Ultimate Bullet, and requirements for same. My theory is KISS for nearly all circumstances. Exceptions would be long range or other unusual circumstances such as Buff that want to step on you or maybe other DG. It does not take Neutronium to kill wildlife. It does require a more streamlined shape than a WC to reach much beyond 100 yards though.

End of rant.