Testing Bullet Integrity
By Glen Wunderlich
Charter Member Professional Outdoor Media Association (POMA)
Ethical deer hunters demand accuracy from their firearms and ammunition and go to great lengths to get it. Many hours spent at the range in search of perfection can be a satisfying experience, as groups shrink to an acceptable size. Because perfection is never really achieved, a certain amount of “good-enough” logic must be applied to come to any conclusion.
We may purchase ammo based on what others have said about it, or in some instances by merely appearances. Today’s tipped bullets may be one such example, much like glitzy fishing lures designed to catch the eye of the buyers. However, there is another aspect of ethics in play here beyond accuracy: bullet integrity. And, it is this component in a cartridge that is often ignored.
Ammunition manufacturers make claims about their designs and differences touting their products’ unique ability to retain weight, to penetrate sufficiently, and to expand upon impact – most desirable features for several reasons. Because most of Michigan’s hunters are looking to put meat on the table, it doesn’t make much sense to destroy much of it with bullets that are more suited for varmint hunting. For that very reason, I have tested various ammunition to get past the advertisers’ hype and what I’ve discovered recently was eye-opening.
The trick is to fire bullets into something that will hold them, allowing the shooter to extract and examine them. While ballistic gel is commonly used for this purpose, it is expensive and somewhat cumbersome to reuse it. I’m not against it for any other reason than my innate cheapness, so I repurpose wet newsprint/magazines tied in bundles instead. Although not necessarily scientific, I get a reasonable facsimile of performance when comparisons are made weighing and measuring recovered bullets.
Here is an account of my latest experiment, which drives home the point of bullet integrity. I had inherited some old-school Remington bronze point ammunition in .300 Winchester Magnum and was amazed to see that it would pass through a 5/8-inch thick steel plate at 250 yards.
It had become time to see how the ammo performed in my test, as described. For comparison, another handload with Nosler’s time-tested Partition bullets would be the competitor. Both were shot through a chronograph with the bronze point speeding along at 3008 feet-per-second (fps) and the Partition bullet at 2850 fps directly into the bundles.
Peeling back layers of paper we searched for the Remington bronze point and found an enormous wound channel – about the size of a golf ball. At the end of the line was a small fragment of the 180-grain bullet – not even worth measuring or weighing, because most of it had disintegrated into parts unknown. And, because of what it did to steel, I assumed it would be the toughest of the pair and remain relatively intact. So much for assumptions.
The Nosler Partition bullet, fired under the same conditions, was retrieved in a perfect mushroom shape twice its original diameter and largely intact with recovered weight at 150 grains or 83 percent of its original weight. Plus, the mushrooming effect produced a wound channel over twice its original diameter.
Recovered Nosler Partition Bullets
Penetration of the two offerings was similar, so the question is which bullet would a hunter prefer? Of course, there will be different answers based on a hunter’s objective when heading afield. But, without such a test, we’d never know if a particular bullet fits our needs.
Someday the ammo supply will be such that smart hunters would be wise to purchase different samples in an effort to unwrap the mystery of their projectiles. The experiment is easy, inexpensive, fun, and practical with the possibility of opening some eyes.
