Questions about the irrelevance of energy (ft-lbs)

My right pointer finger is getting calloused from scrolling quickly past so many of these TL;DR posts.
When I saw your post, I thought 'Me too'.

And then I remembered the ignore function. Nearly 10 years of hanging out here and never felt the need to use it.

Just did so ... refreshed the thread ... it's so clean I feel like a miracle just happened. I recommend trying it - it's reversible, but you might be amazed at how it changes the reading experience ...
 
I feel like this is probably the wrong thread to post this idea in given that it's so heated here. BUT, in the interest of getting something moving towards progress in our knowledge of terminal ballistics. Take a look at this first draft of a "DagOtto Standard for the Lab Testing of Hunting Bullet Performance."

What do you think? Valid and worthwhile or waste of time?

Edits?

Am I missing any key metrics?

Are the test impact velocities in the right range for 95% of hunting conditions? Or do I need to slide them as bullets get lighter and faster? Don't want to do more than 4 if I can help it, but do I need to add?

Is 2 shots at each velocity for a total of 8 shots with each bullet enough to be representative of given bullets performance?

I'm assuming you can only use each gel block once, correct?

First bullets I'd love to see tested would be something like the Hornady .223 53 grain Vmax and something like the Barnes .338 265 grain LRX. Just to establish the approximate "bookends" of affective hunting performance.

My basic goal is to be able compare and communicate the terminal ballistic performance in a fair and clear manner. As you will read in the attached,, I'd like to distill test performance into a simple metric that bullet companies and Rokslide folks can easily communicate. Something like WS06/P04 (short for Wound Size 06 out of 10 / Penetration 04 out of 10.

We have this for External Ballistics (BC), it's about time we develop this for Terminal Ballistics.

Appreciate thoughts and comments.
DO

Dag, haven’t had the chance to read it all yet, but I will say that you are going to need about 30 samples for it to be statistically significant. So, if you want to test a bullet at 4 different impact velocities, you would need at least 120 shots for it to be truly meaningful.

This is why it is difficult for the “average Joe” to do this kind of testing.
 
Don't forget the SD... It's not like 2 bullets of completely different designs can have the same SD numbers but have completely different wounding characteristics. Or that twist rates have an affect upon how wounds propagate from radial forces.

Jay
radial forces? you mean energy is being transferred? how much energy? over what distance? what was the standard impact velocity?
 
You continue to ignore the fact that the reason why we can use math for in-flight ballistics is due to constants such as BC and atmospheric conditions. You state that the air is a variable, however how air effects flight is constant at a given temperature and humidity (things that can be measured)

Those constants are not applicable once the bullet impacts an animal. Also, you continued to be married to “energy transfer” when it has already been stated numerous times that IT DOESN’T MATTER!

All of your posts just provide proof that 1) you didn’t actually read any of the studies mentioned and 2) you don’t have a good grasp of physics.

So, yes, you had an idea, but it wasn’t a good one and you refuse to listen to those who understand why it isn’t a good idea.
I'm ok with that.

However, which view of the fbi data set do you prefer?

Is one of those views more comparative than the other and quicker because some of the possible equations are finished? Be nice if all at same impact velocity but fbi doesn't seem to care about anything but what comes out of the box and what it does at the muzzle. Did you need to break out a calculator to take in the one view? Also, is one of those views making you ask some questions around anomalies and why they may exist? Ie; why did the one bullet shed so much more of it's starting sd? Something that could potentially lead to development that fills gaps or improves consistency across calibers of a given bullet family?

If you don't see these things or have analytical mind that doesn't turn off or don't have the 'ask too many questions' attributes due to that then yeah...most everything off the shelf at cabelas's will give you a shade of death. We don't, and haven't, actually needed to get this nerdy on the subject. We did have to get this carried away in inflight once rangefinders came along and we 'could' see the potential and pushed and pushed to where we are now.

No biggie if you need or want that level of nerdy but yet you may use it for long range shooting, hunting and competition and figure 'meh, 1800 fps impact rule' is good enough for me.

And man, for a long time I also said energy is irrelevant, even early in this thread, and it still is largely because it's not really put into effective measurable and comparative ways. As long as it goes deep enough and wounds enough stuff...we're happy.

At the same time we've concluded that it's all about the bullet for inflight and all about the bullet for terminal. We've also concluded that the bullet does 'work' so that energy does matter. At least that's what I think we've established in this thread and answered the OP ask...haven't we? lol But here we have people who still say it doesn't, so which is it?

I'd like to see in numbers why things I've seen and used have done what they've done in a comparative way to look at other options that may look better or for a new goal in hunting. Why my 22-24" barrel .270's (wsm/win) with 140 ab's led to mostly 100 yard recoveries and my wimpy grendels with 16" barrels with 123 gr eldm drt pretty much everything we point it at. In objective way, by numbers, which could explain that to anyone who wishes to hunt. We do not have this level of sophistication yet in terminal ballistics, calculators to support it.

In inflight we also choose the distances over the atmospherics inputs and bc/velocity input. Why wouldn't a terminal model also allow us to look at the workload over the travel? and varying impact velocities? So we can see which options would perform better at whatever distances we wish to hunt for where we thin on elk potentials but can still handle deer penetrations? Just spitballing possibilities that we may run in a future calculator. Right off the muzzle fbi stuff is literally just crawling compared to the sprinting we do in inflight. New bullets come out and we say well it's on a m on the box so should be good and we get right out there and start smashing animals on subjective warm and fuzzies. It's all we've ever done. Whatever objectivity we've put into it, a basic number here and there is crawling phase, the rest is knife work observation and how far it ran type stuff lol.

Not trying to argue with you. We all know what works for our own personal warm and fuzzies and most of us have tried multiple formulas to see what we like. Wouldn't it be nice to choose the way we do for inflight? Run calculators over and over comparing cartridges, calibers, bc's, distances we want to go, recoil levels etc.? Do you not run scenarios and comparisons before you buy the next gun or barrel and all that goes with it? Sure you do, we all do. In terminal we just choose a construction type and hope for the best lol. Ta da! Gtg lol....yet inside of 48" gel through standards I'm saying we're leaving lots on the table.

So at 800 yards(insert impact velocity here) I want 15" and at least 55 ft/lbs/inch...for this type of game target and shade of death I prefer. Which bullets will work the best here? Run the calculator.

On wait...we need to learn to walk first before we can run. No such capability. ;)
 
I feel like this is probably the wrong thread to post this idea in given that it's so heated here. BUT, in the interest of getting something moving towards progress in our knowledge of terminal ballistics. Take a look at this first draft of a "DagOtto Standard for the Lab Testing of Hunting Bullet Performance."

What do you think? Valid and worthwhile or waste of time?

Edits?

Am I missing any key metrics?

Are the test impact velocities in the right range for 95% of hunting conditions? Or do I need to slide them as bullets get lighter and faster? Don't want to do more than 4 if I can help it, but do I need to add?

Is 2 shots at each velocity for a total of 8 shots with each bullet enough to be representative of given bullets performance?

I'm assuming you can only use each gel block once, correct?

First bullets I'd love to see tested would be something like the Hornady .223 53 grain Vmax and something like the Barnes .338 265 grain LRX. Just to establish the approximate "bookends" of affective hunting performance.

My basic goal is to be able compare and communicate the terminal ballistic performance in a fair and clear manner. As you will read in the attached,, I'd like to distill test performance into a simple metric that bullet companies and Rokslide folks can easily communicate. Something like WS06/P04 (short for Wound Size 06 out of 10 / Penetration 04 out of 10.

We have this for External Ballistics (BC), it's about time we develop this for Terminal Ballistics.

Appreciate thoughts and comments.
DO
I'm all for it, anything to make more objective, your out of 10 ratings work, basic ratios/numbers/percentages and comparable to all when done by same standards.

Yeah it's not really needed or necessary as anything off the shelf offers a shade of death and for most people that's 'good nuff' lol. But some of us nerds really aren't satisfied with that when we can go light years beyond that with inflight swimming. We're in a very small minority it seems. ;)
 
When I saw your post, I thought 'Me too'.

And then I remembered the ignore function. Nearly 10 years of hanging out here and never felt the need to use it.

Just did so ... refreshed the thread ... it's so clean I feel like a miracle just happened. I recommend trying it - it's reversible, but you might be amazed at how it changes the reading experience ...

yep, breath of fresh air
 
Really? You've been arguing and regurgitating the same ridiculous rhetoric about being in diapers for like the last 10 pages because members don't find your equation of lbs/in useful for predicting terminal performance. Stop it.
lmao, did you expect to see anything further in this thread that was worth reading? there's an easy way to stop torturing yourself, stop reading it

how many ridiculous rhetoric threads came along about inflight ballistics shortly after the rangefinders came along? and are we happy with where things of come? the cartridges, the bullet choices etc.? didn't take us too long to where shooting beyond 400 yards was common among the herd but you could still measure that hurdle in decades
 
I know it, he's trying to get someone to come up with the equation. He'll never understand until it's mathematically proven.
haha, I understand it more than most, I'm not looking for the objectivity required for me, but for ALL lol...ya know...the gun counter crowd, the fudds, etc. and shorten all these ridiculous threads we see year in and year out

and I'm no engineer, but I can ramp up and down across a spectrum of languages to speak to given audience
 
Dag, haven’t had the chance to read it all yet, but I will say that you are going to need about 30 samples for it to be statistically significant. So, if you want to test a bullet at 4 different impact velocities, you would need at least 120 shots for it to be truly meaningful.

This is why it is difficult for the “average Joe” to do this kind of testing.
How do you come up with 30 samples to confirm? Is this the industry standard?
 
How do you come up with 30 samples to confirm? Is this the industry standard?

The industry standard (FBI) is 5 shots through each of 6 substrates (1 bare gel, 5 of different intermediate barriers). And despite what is being ignorantly stated by another- there is a lot of testing at like impact speeds, and throughout the impact range- all the way down to minimum required for upset- hence minimum required velocity for upset/expansion is known.

The 5 barriers aren’t needed for hunting- bare gel or heavy clothing for one; and plywood for “shoulder” shots. So 10 or so test shots per impact velocity range, per bullet. High, medium, and low velocity impacts are needed- though technically it is quite easy to extrapolate between with high and low.

So per bullet for hunting, you need a minimum of 20 tests shots, and really 30 test shots to have a high confidence factor of expected bullet behavior. While not insurmountable, it is a lot of work, that takes specific technical knowledge to conduct- it must be properly calibrated 10% organic ballistic gelatin, and the person measuring the wounds must have specific knowledge of how to do so. That’s one reason why companies aren’t sharing the data- almost all have it in some way.

Having said all that, there is an effort already started to bring that information and testing to the hunting world.
 
Dag, haven’t had the chance to read it all yet, but I will say that you are going to need about 30 samples for it to be statistically significant. So, if you want to test a bullet at 4 different impact velocities, you would need at least 120 shots for it to be truly meaningful.

This is why it is difficult for the “average Joe” to do this kind of testing.
I was worried someone would say that :)

While I can envision each bullet being shot into gel 8 or maybe even 12 times, I'm pretty certain that 30x4 for 120 times into 120 new gel blocks is not cost attainable.

For the record, I've not been able to find any data that suggests that bullet companies or even military bullet testing includes this kind of robust data set.. The Hornady TAP document shows single shots with only one velocity tested.

Does anybody on Rokslide have direct knowledge of Ballisticians who perform ballistic gel testing who we could contact for details? I know the guys at Bison Ballistics have an awesome bullet database and have done in-house gel testing. I'll send an email.
 
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