Over-penetration a concern when hunting ?

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RobSmith

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Shooting my friend's 30-06 last saturday got me thinking. Is over-penetration a concern in a hunting environment ? It seems like to me like a pass-through hit results in a few undesirable effects, much of the energy of the projectile is "wasted" if a bullet passes through a target, it also limits the expansion potential of the projectile, as well as pose a bit of a hazard since the bullet is likely to keep on flying a good long while after passing thru the target, be deflected in a direction that can't be predicted etc... Granted the animal is dead anyway, which is the goal, but still, food for thought.

I'm not a hunter so I don't really know, but what are your thoughts on the matter ?
 
Ideally you would like to dig a fully expanded bullet with a good percentage of the wieght intact out of the hide on the far side of your "dead right thier" animal :wink:
 
Not s much over penetration, but underexpansion is undesireable.

Blowing out the otherside is okay as long as the bullet delivers good expansion at the smae time.
Hoever, on another site last year i saw some pics of two bullets at close range (accubonds, I think) that did not penetrate but were expanded BIG TIME! This could be because of the fact that the two deer were shot at very close range from a very powerful rifle.
Thig is hoever, that both deer did the "BANG -FLOP BOOGIE" so I don't think the bullets failed at all.
As Rch Matcholz said to me ten years ago "Let's see now, hooves in the air, antlers on the ground, What's your problem., son?" :D

If they drop, I'm happy, and with my bullet of choice, they drop!
Cat
 
ya cat underexpansion is no ####ing good. Think full metal jackets designed to wound not kill.

The bush is nuts thick where I'm at I want good expansion plus prefer exit for lots of blood and never much need to track anyway :wink:
 
"Dumping all it's energy inside the animal" Or "Using most of it's energy to end up in the mountain behind the animal" is well...A theory. :wink:

Take a X bullet that fully expands for example. It has expanded as much as it is going to. It doens't "overexpand" or blow up.

But it leaves a long, tubular wound channel consistently through the vitals.

I don't care if it still has energy enough to lodge in a tree behind the animal, it has done it's job, and if your shot placement was correct, you will be sharpeing your knife soon. :wink:

I like 2 holes, so I have a better chance of seieng a blood trail, if I need to.

However, blood pressure is blood pressure. So one hole will probbaly bleed as much as 2, but with 2 there is more chance of having blood appear on leaves, tree trunks etc, since you increase the 'blood spilling route' by 50%. :mrgreen:
 
Gatehouse said:
I like 2 holes, so I have a better chance of seieng a blood trail, if I need to.

However, blood pressure is blood pressure. So one hole will probbaly bleed as much as 2, but with 2 there is more chance of having blood appear on leaves, tree trunks etc, since you increase the 'blood spilling route' by 50%. :mrgreen:
Click to expand...

I like your thinking but the batteries in your calculator must be week, because somewhere you lost 50% of your 'blood spilling route' ! :wink:
 
Hornhunter said:
Gatehouse said:
I like 2 holes, so I have a better chance of seieng a blood trail, if I need to.

However, blood pressure is blood pressure. So one hole will probbaly bleed as much as 2, but with 2 there is more chance of having blood appear on leaves, tree trunks etc, since you increase the 'blood spilling route' by 50%. :mrgreen:
Click to expand...

I like your thinking but the batteries in your calculator must be week, because somewhere you lost 50% of your 'blood spilling route' ! :wink:
Click to expand...

Okay, with 2 hole syhou DOUBLE your blood spilling route..

How's that? :D
 
Short answer - over penetration isn't a problem in and of itself.

There's a lot of ways to create a wound channel. And it's the wound channel that kills, period. It doesn't matter if you create it with a shear force like a broad head arrow, or momentum like a big solid just passing thru and leaving a massive hole, or with kinetic energy by pushing tissue away from the bullet as it passes and creating a 'wave', or all three for that matter.

Pick a bullet that is a good match to the calibre and velocities you're shooting at, and don't think about it any more :)
 
joe-nwt said:
Or some people think two holes bleed better than one.
Click to expand...
I'd rather have a bullet coming out the other side, besides, the second hole is usually bigger than the first :idea:


SC.....................
 
That over penetration is preferable, if you have to take a bad angle shot.
But i can certainly see the safety factor of a load that doesn't penetrate when hunting in areas where civilization isn't far from you. Bullets frequently change direction inside an animal.
I like the idea of two holes for tracking, but Like Salty, I find that with two holes, they usually don't require much tracking. Non expanding bullets work, but placement is a bit more critical, unless you use a larger caliber.
 
just 1 big hole does the job in trailing them Gatehouse :lol: :lol:

moose12.jpg
 
I would love to recover some bullets from downed animals, but ALL of my big game shots have been pass throughs. Perhaps this is due to the fact that I have always done the old lungs/heart shot, and let's face it, there is not much in this area to seriously stop a bullet. All have been (knock on wood) one shot kills.

Perhas it's also due to the fact that I use heavy weight bullets for most all game. Add to the fact that most of my shots have been at relativly close range (less than 50 yards).

I don't think there is too much danger from pass through bullets in a hunting environment, since most bullets will end up lodged in a tree not too far from exiting the animal.
 
I like the pass through bullet.I shot a whitetail last year and it took off like I never
touched it.When I walked to where the Deer was standing there was blood and lungs all over the place.I found the Deer dead about 100 ft.away.If the bullet did not pass through I would think that I had missed.I would have found this animal anyway but what if no blood and guts and the Deer managed to travel a lot farther?
No pass through no blood and guts on the other side and not always much
from the entry wound.
 
I am a big fan of a big hole on the far side. I just killed three mulie's and finished a black bear last week with a 00 wsm and Barnes 168 gr TSX's at about 3100. I was very surprised by how big the exit hole was in all cases. I had heard stories about Barnes bullets pencilling, not with these.
 
Really bigred?

They've been solid performers for us, but we've only used them in 30 and 7mm cartridges.

Just out of curiosity, do you remember the specifics of the bullets that failed?
 
Never found them... through and through's at close range... I have seen it with 180 grain bullets twice from a 300WM and 30-06, and numerous times with Partition Slugs :shock:
Deer hit in the good stuff and running for miles is not my idea of a good peforming bullet or slug. I use accubonds in my 300WM and Remington Core-Locked Ultras in my Slug gun now... more consistent performance. JMO :wink:
 
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