Expansive bullet yesterday and today

No matter how good a weapon, the lion's share of his fighting qualities is the characteristics of the patron. A bad bullet of a successful shot can not be done. And the topic of this article will be an expansive bullet - a real record holder for a striking action.

A bit of history

The achievements of chemists led to the creation of smokeless gunpowders, which allowed weapons designers to move to a new level, creating state-funded rifles firing unitary cartridges. The caliber of hand weapons has decreased by a factor of times, and the accuracy and range of combat have also improved at times. In order to improve the ballistic properties of the bullet, it was placed in a metal shell. And then discontented people appeared. For the first time, English soldiers spoke of the insufficient killer force of new bullets during the expedition to Chitral (Pakistan). Using the Li-Metford rifles of 1889, they noticed that the bullets of the "Li-Spide" cartridge (7.71 mm) do not have an immediate stopping effect on the enemy. They had something to compare, because they were shot from old muskets with 20-30 grams of lead, and the wound from the lead ball looked incomparably more terrible than the "hole" from the English bullet. The exit was quickly found, and right on the spot. The bullets of the "Li-Spide" patron began to be simply nailed. The "notched" bullet, when it hit the body, was opened, greatly increasing the wound channel, more than covering the requirements for the lethal force. So there was the first expansive bullet. The sawing of the Englishmen was put on stream in the workshops of the town of Doom-Doom located next to Calcutta. Hence the name "bullet doom-doom".

The modern expansive bullet

Since the end of the nineteenth century, many variants of such a bullet have been invented. Conditionally they are divided into deformed, semi-destructive and completely destroyed.

Deformed, which, incidentally, refers to the above described "bullet doom-doom", when hit the target crumpled and increase in diameter. This is achieved either by a complete absence of the shell, or only by a part of it. Semi-destructible and collapsing bullets have transverse folds of the shell or funnel-shaped depressions. Such bullets are torn apart when they hit the body, and their action is comparable to a fragmentation projectile. Of course, the expansive bullet does not have an ideal ballistic form, and therefore is effective only at comparatively short distances. In order to eliminate this drawback, modern bullets use plastic inserts, which give it the necessary streamlining, and at the time of hit do not interfere with "unfolding". In addition, the so-called bullets with a shifted center of gravity, about which many legends are composed, have spread. Meanwhile, the principle of their action is very simple: due to the center of gravity displaced to the butt, these bullets tend to overturn when they hit the obstacle, which is why their high damaging effect is achieved. True, they have unsatisfactory accuracy (at great distances) and poorly penetrate defense.

Scope of application

The ability to stop an attacker instantly with an ricochet or rupture knocked out is most in demand in law enforcement agencies. It was there that the most expansive bullets were most widely spread. The 45th caliber with such a "hotel" is capable of dumping anyone from one shot. In addition, they are actively used in hunting for a large beast. And recently there were even expansive bullets for pneumatics, which make it possible to effectively use such systems for hunting.