I've been reading FROM OUT OF NOWHERE and there is mention of explosive bullets used by both German and Russian snipers. Can anyone please enlighten me on what these things were and how they worked? What was used to make these projectiles explode?
thanks in advance
rob

quote:

Originally posted by robz:
I've been reading FROM OUT OF NOWHERE and there is mention of explosive bullets used by both German and Russian snipers. Can anyone please enlighten me on what these things were and how they worked? What was used to make these projectiles explode?
thanks in advance
rob

Semantics, possibly?

Unless the projectile had an explosive charge in it that some how detonated on impact I’m not sure what the book you are reading is referring to. Not sure I would want to carry a bunch of anything like that around in my pocket!

Any frangible type bullet fired at high velocity into certain types of material may have an explosive “effect“ on the target, but the bullet itself doesn’t truly “explode.â€

Certainly with modern military ammo (1960's and later, Rick's comment is pretty much on the money.


It MAY be, though, that explosive rifle-caliber ammo WAS frequently available earlier. In books of the period, a fair number of authors refer in particular to German suprlus ammo which was available BUT not recommended as it DID have a small charge of explosive in the bullet. I have read such a report within just the past few days, which also gave a detailed description of how to identify that ammo. Will see if I can easily locate it again. If so, I'll post the identifying info here.

[Still, it is possible those authors were mistaken. I know The Rifle Book by Jack O'Connor, 1950, though current with the layman's thinking of the day, has more urban myth in it and just plain technical errors (by current thinking anyway), than just about any other book by a knowledgeable rifleman that I have seen.]

Further to above post - found brief identifying description of German 7.9mm explosive bullets (8x57mm Mauser)...

"contact-explosive bullet, dangerous within 50-yard radius of its point of strike, identified by having no crimping cannelure, and by a black laquer coating from its boat-tailed base to within one-half inch of its copper colored tip..."

This was salvaged (battlefield captured) WWII surplus ammo being referred to.

The Germans loaded explosive 7.9mm bullets for use in aircraft machine guns. They were charged with PETN, and had no fuze. Impact with metal parts of the plane was supposed to set off the PETN, which is somewhat percussion sensitive.

There were reports of these cartridges being found in captured Germans' rifles, but that may have been due to late-wartime problems in logistics.

Boy, how comfortable would you be firing a shoulder fired weapon with bullets that might explode either in the magazine or the barrel from some impact or friction?????? No thanks!

I would love to see a rifle sized exploding bullet that had a larger danger radius than a hand grenade or rifle grenade, and was up there with a 60mm mortar!!

Fifty yard radius?.......I don’t think so. I would be surprised if it would be fifty feet, let alone fifty yards.

quote:

Originally posted by Ricochet:
The Germans loaded explosive 7.9mm bullets for use in aircraft machine guns. They were charged with PETN, and had no fuze. Impact with metal parts of the plane was supposed to set off the PETN, which is somewhat percussion sensitive.

There were reports of these cartridges being found in captured Germans' rifles, but that may have been due to late-wartime problems in logistics.

A bullet containing Pentaerythritol Tetranitate (PETN) “might†(and I emphasize MIGHT) explode from impact at high velocity if it struck a very hard surface like steel or rock, but there is NO WAY it would do so by hitting a human being.

I could probably whip you to death with some PrimaCord before either of us had to worry about it blowing up from the impact.

quote:

contact-explosive bullet, dangerous within 50-yard radius of its point of strike, identified by having no crimping cannelure, and by a black laquer coating from its boat-tailed base to within one-half inch of its copper colored tip..."

One hell of a .32 cal. bullet! Most HAND GRENADES are stretching things to have a radius of danger of 50 yards!!

So, IF your target appeared at less than 50 yards, you could not fire for fear of blowing YOURSELF up, eh.

Mooooooo!

This sounds all too similar to the old “tumbling†M16 bullets that supposedly started going end over end after leaving the barrel.

Can you imagine having a few MG’s firing these 50 yard radius killer bullets? Two or three guys could hold off a division coming at them.

I don't know about a bullet exploding like a grenade.....

However, I did see something on either the Discovery, or History Channel or Modern Developments or something like that on cable...that was talking about Russian 5.56 x 39 ( whatever the AK 74 uses)... that their ammo did not meet the Geneva Convention... but that they had bullets that were had a hollow cavity, and I believe it was mercury or something in filled into the hollow cavity... something that was to make the bullet expand way out of proportion to the 22 caliber size.....

It was referred to as an exploding bullet....

And if I am wrong on some of this.. in my defense, it was a year or two ago I saw this, and It was late at night.. when I had insomnia.. so if I messed up something here.. sorry about that...

cheers
seafire

quote:

Originally posted by seafire/B17G:
I don't know about a bullet exploding like a grenade.....

However, I did see something on either the Discovery, or History Channel or Modern Developments or something like that on cable...that was talking about Russian 5.56 x 39 ( whatever the AK 74 uses)... that their ammo did not meet the Geneva Convention... but that they had bullets that were had a hollow cavity, and I believe it was mercury or something in filled into the hollow cavity... something that was to make the bullet expand way out of proportion to the 22 caliber size.....

It was referred to as an exploding bullet....

And if I am wrong on some of this.. in my defense, it was a year or two ago I saw this, and It was late at night.. when I had insomnia.. so if I messed up something here.. sorry about that...

cheers
seafire

Another example of semantics. Bullets that have an “explosive effect†and bullets that truly explode are different animals.

Makes you sort of wonder about a set of conventions where it’s okay to vaporize someone with a bomb but its not okay to shoot them with a certain type of bullet. I think I’ll take my chances with the expanding bullet, thank you!

quote:

Originally posted by El Deguello:

quote:

contact-explosive bullet, dangerous within 50-yard radius of its point of strike, identified by having no crimping cannelure, and by a black laquer coating from its boat-tailed base to within one-half inch of its copper colored tip..."

One hell of a .32 cal. bullet! Most HAND GRENADES are stretching things to have a radius of danger of 50 yards!!

So, IF your target appeared at less than 50 yards, you could not fire for fear of blowing YOURSELF up, eh.

Mooooooo!

Hi, El D -

You'll notice that was all in quotation marks. It was the report of a person of the era who had reason to have encountered battle-field gathered surplus ammo, in a classifying and documenting role. I suspect the "dangerous within 50 yards" comment has in mind a piece of flying jacket. Even then it would likely have to hit someone directly in the eye to do any real damage, if it could even fly that far.

Still, that comment was probably in the same league with the old warnings found printed on boxes of .22 rimfire ammo...words to the effect of "dangerous within 1 mile". That is, exaggerated on purpose for safety reasons.

None-the-less, exploding ammo WAS made, found, and its existance recorded. And, it is not a semantic interpretation.

As to how effective it was, having none, I don't know, and quite frankly don't care. The point simply is that it did exist and so the author of the book in question is not automatically completely out of touch, as many authors are. He MIGHT have made it up, but then, he might have known something that some others today might not.

quote:

Originally posted by robz:
I've been reading FROM OUT OF NOWHERE and there is mention of explosive bullets used by both German and Russian snipers. Can anyone please enlighten me on what these things were and how they worked? What was used to make these projectiles explode?
thanks in advance
rob

I have seen (in real) 7.62x54R red tipped ammuniton, loaded in chain, designed for light machinegunfire on low flying targets, not for using in rifles !!! Filled with hexogene, I can't remember exact number, but belive something like 0.37 grams or so.

Jiri

Militaries of the world are famous for coming up with all kinds of gizmos that sound good on paper but don’t actually work real well in the real world.

I have no doubt that “exploding†bullets for shoulder fired weapons have been made. As Alberta Canuck has pointed out, some have been found so obviously they were around and being used by someone somewhere. Whether or not they actually worked is another topic.

German Snipers in WW2 on the eastern front were authorised and issued explosive tip rounds after experiencing thier use against german forces by russian snipers and they were required to turn them in when reassigned to a different front.

7.92mm B. Patr. explosive incendiary round
.4 gm charge of phosphorus which gave a small cloud of blue/white smoke visible up to 2k's away

It also had a base fuse and detonator comprised of .45 gm lead styphnate, barium peroxide and calcium silicide.

originally intended as a spotter round, it was later used as an incendiary round.

7.92mm Patr. P.m.K. High explosive incendiary
.4gm charge of phosphorus the bullet had in earlier versions a history of premature activiation when temperatures exceeded 45 degree's celcius.

7.92mm Patr. S.m.K. Leutchtspur Tracer, some versions had a self destruct element built in, basically a compound of lead azide and PETN and tetracene destroyed the bullet after 2 km, it was not always reliableand fragments were scattered so widely that it was a threat to personnel and property.

Then there is special purpose patterns, that little is known about and do crop up from time to time.

If you recall, John Hinkley shot President Reagan with supposed “exploding†bullets. The Devastator bullets he used had an aluminum sealed tip containing Lead Azide that was supposed to explode on impact. Obviously, they didn’t, even when striking Jim Brady’s skull.

The trouble with any attempt to make exploding ammunition for small arms is the physical limitation on the amount of explosive needed to do any significant damage above that which would be done by a regular hollow point or any other type of frangible bullet fired at high velocity. Bottom line is that the effort just ain’t worth the result.

Not until you get up the the size of a .50 cal is there enough room to put sufficient explosive in there to do any real damage...and I seriously doubt that anyone hit with a .50 caliber is going to notice whether the bullet exploded or not.

I got the info on the PETN-filled, no-fuze bullets from the U.S. Army wound ballistics studies linked in "Reloading" and several other fora above.

There was an entire study on “exploding†bullets done by a combination of the medical community and some firearms/explosive experts back when President Reagan was shot. The medical people wanted to know the dangers to patients and doctors of removing “exploding†bullets from patients who had been shot with them but where the bullets had failed to explode.

Their findings were that “normal†sized small arms ammuntion posed an insignificant danger due to the extremely small amount of explosive present, and the difficulty in initiating detonation through operating procedures.

If you do a Google search on Exploding Bullets you can probably find it.

In The German Sniper by Peter Senich there are interviews of WWII German and Russian snipers and they speak of using “spotter†rounds to mark targets and to force enemy troops to leave an area by starting fires. They say that the rounds released “flame and a good puff of smoke†on impact. No mention of “exploding†bullets designed for better wounding/killing.

Hello;
One of my reference books refers to B.Patr. or Beobachtungsgeschoss Patronen, an observation bullet containing a smoke producer and explosive, said to be used in peace time only for checking ranges. Early versions had a chrome plated projectile, while later the entire projectile was colored black, except the tip. These things were sensive to shock and dropping, the packaging being marked so. I owned a couple at one time and while I was warned to handle them carefully, I never felt at ease with them, even though I kept them wrapped in cotton batting.
Grizz

I know that the crews on 106 recoiless rifles were VERY careful with storage and handling of the “spotter†rounds for the .50 cal mounted on their guns. Not the kind of stuff I would want to carry around in my pocket or pack, or load up in a magazine.

Those .50 Spotter cartridges are the only application IMR 7383 powder was used for. It's really cheap at Hi-Tech, and I use it in cartridges like the .22-250 and .30-06. Because it has a lower bulk density than other IMR powders and a burning rate (for my lot) similar to 4350, it won't give top velocities (or pressures), but gives very consistent results with a noncompressed full case load with medium weight bullets in cartridges of this class.

I sure would like to have some of this stuff analyzed, or to find the original DuPont specifications for it, to find out what the deterrent coating is. It makes a strong smell of ammonia gas on firing, and burns sootily. The ammonia is from the surface coating, as it's present in the muzzle exhaust gas but not in the chamber or bore after firing (the last gas being produced by the core of the powder grains burning, the first stuff produced having already gone down the bore behind the bullet.) I've wondered if they somehow applied nitroguanidine as the coating, perhaps to inhibit muzzle flash? It's certainly not the usual dinitrotoluene.

Hey, I just watched a copy of the Chuck Norris Movie " Lone Wolf McQuade" last night....

In the beginning he is shown shooting at some Chevy Blazer that some Mexican bandits have parked.. and he shoots the front end with a bullet from a 308 and the entire truck explodes like it was hit with an RPG.....

Exploding bullets sounds more like Hollywood... or in this case, Since this was another one of those Golden/Globis productions... should we say, sounds more like Tel Aviv/Hollywood....

cheers
seafire

I know this is a bit late, but I saw the show Seafire/b17G is talking about and what the russian round with the air cavity in the tip produced was a huge wound channel because the bullet tumbled after penatrating a couple of inches in a humam.This bullet was developed for use in the AK74.

That principle goes back at least to the WWI era British .303 Mk IV round, that had the nose filled with light material, either paper or aluminium, to make it destabilize faster on entering tissue.

quote:

Originally posted by seafire/B17G:
Hey, I just watched a copy of the Chuck Norris Movie " Lone Wolf McQuade" last night....

In the beginning he is shown shooting at some Chevy Blazer that some Mexican bandits have parked.. and he shoots the front end with a bullet from a 308 and the entire truck explodes like it was hit with an RPG.....

Exploding bullets sounds more like Hollywood... or in this case, Since this was another one of those Golden/Globis productions... should we say, sounds more like Tel Aviv/Hollywood....

cheers
seafire

Oh come on now - Chuckie wouldn't tell a lie.

I mean it happens all the time - have seen it many times in movies.