peckerwood
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- PalePony, Yukon
The M43 cartridge tends to wound people in war cause it doesn't have enough "meat" to travel through in order to tumble more and thusly increase it's damage. The 7.62x39mm in a soft point or hollow point expands quite well for bear defence and it's damage cone is about 28"-36" in length...
The problem with the cartridge in warfare however is that human bodies are usually around 12" in thickness...so the cartridge basically hasn't even reached it's highest damage potential point by the time it leaves the human body cavity. This is why militaries now tend towards lighter projectiles that are moving much faster, so that when they hit they will tumble and then fragment into a bunch of little pieces like how the 223 does...this means lighter ammo that is more efficient for the target being hunted, in this case humans.
The M43 is a relic of the world's 30 calibre phase in fighting rifles dating back to the 303, 30-40krag, 30-03, 30-06, 308win and thusly the 7.62x39mm. Notice now that the russians use the M74 5.45x39mm instead of the M43 :wink:
p.s. The Semiavtomat Karabin Siminov(SKS) was a Russsian design made back in 1942 and then adopted in 1943 called the M43...some of the historian types on this board can fill in and/or correct me. The Chinese adopted it for their use as well but then armed their soldiers with the AK47 later on to keep in line with their Russian ally.
