@OmSigDAVID,
OmSigDAVID wrote:Thank u, Oralloy.
I wonder if u can shed any light on the functionality of this slug.
I 've heard this 2 ways:
it has been alleged that on impact within the target,
the .223 slug tumbles, thereby producing a much greater wound cavity
than .223 woud suggest.
Any rifle bullet that does not expand, is going to flip around, as the laws of physics make it want to pass through flesh with the pointy end trailing.
With M-16 bullets, there is a weakness in the bullets, so if they are traveling sideways through flesh at a high enough velocity, they instantly shatter, violently carving out a large internal cavity.
And of course, they always end up traveling sideways midway through their flip from front to back.
You always need high velocity for it to work though, so 20-inch barrels are best.
Here is the wound profile of the Vietnam-era M-16 bullet:
And the wound profile of the modern version:
The Special Forces though, use a different round, as they tend to use guns that have much shorter barrels. The above bullets would never work well from a short barrel.
They use a bullet that expands in the manner of a normal hunting bullet. It also uses faster-burning powder so as to work well with the shorter barrels.
The profile I posted on the previous page was for a normal hunting bullet, but since it has the same energy and expansion characteristics as the one the Special Forces use, the wound profile is a good match.
OmSigDAVID wrote:On the other hand,
I 've heard that there were complaints that this was too similar
to dum dum bullets, such that a complaint to NATO
resulted in changing its functioning to avoid the tumbling
thereby not to resemble dum dum bullets
and just leaving what is in effect a .22 caliber bullet hitting the target.
I notice that there is no mention of tumbling
in the diagram.
Have u heard anything about this,
to either confirm or deny it ??
There were such complaints. Anti-war types are never happy.
However, NATO responded by ignoring the complaints and not changing anything.
I believe Switzerland developed armor-piercing bullets for their .223 rifles, which due to their armor-piecing construction do not shatter when they flip from front to back. Then they marketed it as "a more lawful bullet" in order to placate their local anti-war types, who otherwise would have thrown a tantrum over the idea of upgrading to AP ammo. But that was just marketing (sort of the way Obama is placating the left by characterizing a huge buildup of all-new unmanned stealth bombers and Mach-6 hypersonic cruise missiles, as a big cut in military spending).
The diagram I first posted doesn't show tumbling because the Special Forces were using a bullet that expands in the manner of a normal hunting bullet.
The diagrams above don't go out of their way to depict the half-tumble, but if you notice they don't show the big expansion until they've penetrated a ways, that is due to the fact that they haven't yet flipped around sideways when they first penetrate.
