I had a Detective come back to my office to ask me a technical question......I guess since I'm considered the 'Department Gun Nut' he figured I could give him an answer like this off the top of my head.

The case is an assault case involving the suspect throwing, by hand, live shotgun rounds at the victim. Victim is upset and believes the round could hit with enough force, on the primer of course, to ignite the round and cause 'Serious Bodily Injury'.

Question as posed by the Detective: How many 'Pounds Per Square Inch' would it take to ignite your average shotgun shell primer???

I told the Det. that it is possible but all the stars/moon/sun, etc. would have to aligned just so for this to occur.......possible but unlikely.

[ 12-09-2003, 06:38: Message edited by: TXPO ]

Wes,

If it hit the victim directly on his pointy head it still would not "go off".

The cartridge depends on being in the chamber & barrel in order to generate the pressure on ignition that will launch the payload. Ignition in open air won't generate enough velocity for the pieces to penetrate even a cardboard box (NRA tried cooking rounds off and reported the results).

I know a consulting forensic scientist who would tell your detective that for $.

jim

Jim is right-on with this and if you'd like to prove this to yourself ......it isn't something for amateurs to try ...... but I've seen it work on more than one occassion. You need a Model 12 Winchester, a shotgun shell of appropriate gauge and a Stetson hat (any hat really)...here's what you do....(1) load the chamber with the one shell and put the safety on (keep your finger away from the trigger just in case)...(2) with the shell in the chamber and safety still on, REMOVE THE BARREL AND FORARM ASSEMBLY leaving the shell sticking out of the receiver but still firmly held in place......(3) point the gun at the ground and cover the exposed shell with the Stetson (crown down)....(4) take off the safety and pull the trigger......after the crowd jumps at the noise, turn the Stetson over and dump out the shot and wad into your hand....put the Stetson on and walk away from the amazed crowd....NO HOLES!

As always a disclaimer-----try this at your own risk!

I wouldnt want a primer to go off next to my skin much less the whole shotgun shell....the shot may not be DANGEROUS compared to its normal use, but there will be an explosion and the pieces of the shell will seperate... they may go in any direction, and it may not be enough to cause serious injury, but in my mind, it certainly could cause SOME injury.....now i dont know whats the odds of the shell actually going off would be...seems small, but it could hit the edge of a belt, or a tooth....or anything sharp and hard.

years ago without much knowledge in the area of ballistic, i found an old 45 acp round in an abandoned house...I put it in the crotch of a tree and shot the primer with my bb gun.....it went off, and the bullet struck the tree in front of it....dont know what happened to the case....I wouldnt have wanted to be that tree!!!!!!!!! it was significant enough to me, even at that green age......bob

I understand that the projectile won't develope much if any 'real' velocity if the round is not 'contained' and I explained this to him. I was just asked how many 'pounds per square inch' it would take to ignite the primer itself.....basically....how damn hard must the primer be hit for it to go off, provided of course it hit something hard and 'pointy' .

I know and the Detective knows that it is a BS deal....but he is just covering his bases.

Thanks for the replys so far!

[ 12-08-2003, 22:06: Message edited by: TXPO ]

When I was 11 or 12 years old,the neighbor kid brought a 12ga.shell to use as a BB gun target.

We laid it on top of a fence post and took turns shooting at it.The distance we were shooting may have 8-10 feet from the shell.We knocked it off the post several times,before the neaghbor kid hit the primer.

The neighbor kid finally hit the primer and the shell exploded.The primer was propelled toward the kid and penetrated the skin just outside the left eye socket and slid along the skull about1/2".

We did not realize that the primer cup had penetrated as the wound bled very little and there was no knot.

Three days later a lump the size of an egg raised
up on the side of his head .He had surgery to remove the primer cup and I got a royal a$$ beating for being involved.

WC

The mod. 12 example is really not a good illustration because the most important component in this scenario, the primer, is blocked from flying elsewhere.

In my opinion, the shell will never create enough pressure for the powder to burn quickly. It'll be a fizzle. The primer, when detonated, is a different story. It will go flying whichever direction it is pointing at the time, and quite fast. It would not be constrained, and will become a projectile that could, during harvest moon with the correct planetary alignments, if you haven't been "good" lately, injure someone severely.

As far as the primer going off, it would be fairly easy to analyze what it would take. Load a dummy shotgun shell with a live primer, and put it inside a pipe. Put a "firing pin" on the bottom of pipe. Drop the dummy from successively higher elevations, until the primer pops. At that point, you can calculate the energy in the shotshell that made the primer go.

That said, throwing a shotshell, which weighs about 1.5 oz, would easily be able to detonate a primer. JMO, Dutch.

About 2500 psi.
Ray

I don`t know exactly how many foot pounds it would take but, for argument they are "sensitive to impact" by design.
However, I would guess the odds of a shotshell hitting a protuding object when thrown and setting the primer off, to be close to the same odds as the shell expelling its charge with enough force and in the proper direction to hit and seriously injure the person it was thrown at "IF" the first event occured.

Looking at this, it sounds like the detective or other person is trying to turn a simple assault into an assault with a deadly weapon or explosive device.

There is NO WAY that a shotgun shell with a primer in it can go off by striking a soft tissued person. You could keep throwing it harder and harder until the person has a .735 diameter hole in him, but it will be from the shell passing through butt first. The soft tissue will always yield.

You can make all sorts of stuff do off by throwing it at certain things, but that doesn't include the shotgun shell/person scenario.

I love these questions--and answers.

Wildcat--Great story. You deserved that royal a$$beating! Reminds me of my kid brother who shot the TV with the Crosman 760 Powermaster!! Talk about a$$beatings!

This just goes to show you. Guns don't kill people, ammunition kills people.

In the search for knowledge,I just now detonated a 12ga.Winchester shell 1 OZ.quail and dove load no.8 shot.

I set a PRESTO FRY DADDY in the bottom of a 30 gal. cardboard drum.I stood the shell on it's base in the FRY DADDY,plugged in the extension cord,and came into the house to await the detonation.

About 6-7 minutes later I heard a muffled pop and went out to check the results.The shell had separated at the top of the brass.Both pieces were still in the FRY DADDY.The crimp did not open,the shot charge was intact.The primer did not exit the case head.The volume was reminiscent
of the noise produced by a small firecracker.

I think the heat from the FRY DADDY may have weakened the plastic,so tomorrow I will try a paper shell.

WC

Anybody ever read "Hatchers Notebook"?

I would find a bolt action shotgun and use progressively weaker (not shorter) firing pin springs until I found the threshold for detonation. I would think that the power rating of that spring would be a clue as to how much force would be needed, provided the shell struck a sharp object. A torque wrench set for that power rating could be used to illustrate it.

Had a buddy who back in high school days tried to pry the primer out of a shotgun shell. It went off and left a nice little hole in his leg. Didn't require medical attention but did bleed a bit.

Thanks for everyone's input! I received a suggestion from a fellow forum member (Thanks Jim!!!) and wrote the CCI Expert/Tech guys and received the following answer:

Investigator Webber: Primers are tested for sensitivity by dropping a steel ball (1.9 lb.) on them from different heights, the "no fire" distance is 3" and the all fire distance is 12". A shotshell, thrown, would most probably have enough force to detonate, within a reasonable distance and a reasonably strong person to give it some velocity. It would have to hit on the primer to get the above results and since the primer is recessed (.003-.005") it would need to strike a protrusion of some sort to detonate.

What then? Most probably the shot-charge stays static and the brass on the hull becomes the projectile because it is lighter than the shot charge. The chance of that causing "serious bodily injury" is pretty remote, bruise, cut, eye put-out, all possible. Find the fellow willing to throw the shotshells and give me a ball bat.......it won't be long and I'll introduce you to someone with "serious bodily injury".

Shoot Straight!
Coy Getman
CCI/SPEER Tech. Service Coordinator
800-627-3640 ext. #5351
Fax: (208) 799-3589

MarkWhite,...actually the Detective and I are calling 'Bullshit' on the validity to the victim/complainant's argument. Believe it or not, there are a few level headed cops still around!

Wildcat Crazy.....(maybe you should just change your name to 'Crazy' )You kinda took this to the extreme but basically came up with the same conclusion as I would with that experiment.

Again, Thanks for all your comments.