Posted: 5/18/2005 12:25:01 PM EDT
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I was wondering if anyone has done a test using clay for overpenetration? I.e. Use 1 clay mound to simulate an average human adult, and stick a second "human" clay mound within the vicinity of the 1st clay mound. Then fire different bullets at it i.e. 9mm, does it overpenetrate? M193, does it fragment in the first target? Etc... If it has been done before, I apologize! |
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Clay is a poor tissue simulant. You would have to use ballistic gel. If you want an education on overpenetration, or almost anything terminal ballistics related, go to the Terminal Effects Forum at Tactical Forums. Use the excellent search feature and READ everything you can find there on the topic BEFORE you post anything. They do not suffer fools lightly. |
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Has anyone put two gel blocks within close proximity of one another and tested for overpenetration? 12" - 16" of penetration is cool, but how do you simulate overpenetration in a person? I.e. will the M193 bullet kill target 1 and kill target 2 as well? Or just fragment in target 1 as advertised, and not hit target 2.... etc... |
Since you mentioned The Box O' Truth, I will comment. As stated, clay makes a very poor simulation of "an average human adult" when testing bullet penetration. I used it as a "back-up" for testing Level IIIA armor, because that is what is recommended for that material. But it is not made for penetration tests. Read the excellent articles mentioned above or in the Ammo Oracle. www.ammo-oracle.com/ |
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Water is a cheap way to test expansion and penetration of bullets. It needs an adjustment factor since bullets penetrate about 1.8 times deeper into water than in gel or human tissue. You will also be unable to see some critical features captured in gel: Length of the neck, size of the temorary cavity, size of the permanent crush cavity, etc. If you want to just test overpenetration and do not have ballistic gel, you can use water. Fill 1 gallon zip-loc type plastic bags with water and place them (firmly contacting each other) in a straight line. Since the average human torso is about 9 or 10 inches thick, you will need to have about 18 inches of water filled bags to simulate the first "person." Place a second set of water-filled bags a few feet directly in line with the first set. Any overpenetrating rounds will, if the alignment works okay, be captured in the second set of water filled bags. You can measure how deeply they penetrated into the second set of bags and divide by 1.8 to see how far they would have penetrated into someone standing behind your intended target. |
