Thread: A question for the doubters

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

If you consider that the EBRG/twoforfree/.243 is considered minimum for deer in much of Europe and that your heavy for calibre .223 loads are now not hell of a lot different to said .243 if given a 100-150 yard head start....to equal out velocity advantage of bigger case,it becomes a moot point. If .243 is enough then so must the .223

Many people consider the .243 inadequate or unreliable. Of course, it may be, as any cartridge may be, if used with poor bullets or outside the range where the bullet used will function. I would hope that this may change if we continue to look more objectively at projectile performance, mechanisms of wounding and results rather than hearsay.

Originally Posted by whanahuia

Right, I spent a bit of time doing further autopsy on the boar, for interest and relevance too this topic. Disregard it as you please.

I slightly stuffed up the autopsy as the cut I made with reciprocating saw turned out not to be the projectile entry but a tusk wound from another boar. This put my cut at an angle through the projectile path and made things a little unclear in photos.

First up is the recovered projectile. It is a 130gr speer Hotcore, Muzzle velocity was around 3150. Generic online energy calculator says muzzle energy of 2865 Ft/lbs. From accounts so far, its of similar construction technique too the 223 ones being discussed.
recovery weight is 48gr and it was recovered 75mm inside the far shoulder in muscle after passing through off side chest cavity ribs. Total penetration minimum approx. 405mm
Remember this is an angled shot so though skin ect might be 50mm, path through such was longer.



Exit through ribs, below spine.



The projectile hit and destroyed the shoulder knuckle before entering chest. Most of the permanent cavity was in this area. Between skin contact and rib cage was 210mm of skin, muscle and bone with ( i forgot to measure) approx 10mm of bone and meat etc on ribs before entry to chest cavity.



Finally the shield near point of projectile penetration.

Obviously warm on the coast at the moment !

The bullet had clearly lost enough speed that it was no longer expanding or fragmenting significantly exiting from the chest cavity.

Did you damage any of the major blood vessels or the nerve cluster around the heart? It looks like it would have been very close to the aortic cluster.

Clearly it worked.

Are you speculating that 'energy transfer' and the temporary cavity caused faster incapacitation or death than should be expected from the permanent damage - broken front shoulder/leg bones, substantial wound through lungs, and possible damage to major blood vessels/nervous system?


Incidentally I'd observe, anecdotally, that pigs seem to drop quite readily with that particular shot placement - I haven't had one run from it. I have seen small pigs run with shots behind the shoulder that don't hit the shoulder bones, even with large bullets 7mm, .30.

Originally Posted by gimp

It's genuine speculation, aside from the snark. Really interesting to examine why we get into these things. Aside from the fact that this thread literally asks for it.

Dont get me wrong. I have/am enjoyed this thread. But I agree, I was very close to bringing up that fact that we were specifically asked to comment. Because that aspect of your comment did annoy me. For example I havnt gone on the 223 killing deer thread with any opinion other than likes and contributing a few kills myself.

Originally Posted by gimp

Obviously warm on the coast at the moment !

The bullet had clearly lost enough speed that it was no longer expanding or fragmenting significantly exiting from the chest cavity.

Did you damage any of the major blood vessels or the nerve cluster around the heart? It looks like it would have been very close to the aortic cluster.

Clearly it worked.

Are you speculating that 'energy transfer' and the temporary cavity caused faster incapacitation or death than should be expected from the permanent damage - broken front shoulder/leg bones, substantial wound through lungs, and possible damage to major blood vessels/nervous system?


Incidentally I'd observe, anecdotally, that pigs seem to drop quite readily with that particular shot placement - I haven't had one run from it. I have seen small pigs run with shots behind the shoulder that don't hit the shoulder bones, even with large bullets 7mm, .30.

Yeah it surprised me too. I havnt seen any flys about yet . But it has been warm this week.

Earlier in the thread I mentioned I think most people shoot too far back. Its my experience that anything just forward of the leg bone and especially if it connects with the leg bone in that knuckle area drops pretty much anything very quick and immobilises them if they dont go down.
On a pig specific it doesn't take a shot too much further forward than this to connect with the dip in spine where it becomes neck.

Some of this is speculation for sure. Ill give you what I think. The overwhelming damage was in the shoulder. the actual wound in the lungs is not gigantic. But if you look closely you will see a ring of bruising in the lungs further out. Speculatively part of an energy wave? the contortion of lung material from the temporary cavity. I think yes, the energy transfer and damage too that very big bone caused faster, longer lasting incapacitation. I dont think it changes the speed of death. The Aorta and heart were intact as far as i could tell, but I have definitely hit near where all that enters the lungs. No matter what calibre, id be happy with that shot placement.
I think that if I shoot a smaller, lighter built animal with the same projectile, that I will see more damage in the chest cavity and far side of animal.
I am too tied to farm to get out and hunt much right now, but I do intend to shoot something from chamois too red hind size for this thread when i can, and I will autopsy and post results here regardless of what it shows.

Originally Posted by whanahuia

Yeah it surprised me too. I havnt seen any flys about yet . But it has been warm this week.

Earlier in the thread I mentioned I think most people shoot too far back. Its my experience that anything just forward of the leg bone and especially if it connects with the leg bone in that knuckle area drops pretty much anything very quick and immobilises them if they dont go down.
On a pig specific it doesn't take a shot too much further forward than this to connect with the dip in spine where it becomes neck.

Some of this is speculation for sure. Ill give you what I think. The overwhelming damage was in the shoulder. the actual wound in the lungs is not gigantic. But if you look closely you will see a ring of bruising in the lungs further out. Speculatively part of an energy wave? the contortion of lung material from the temporary cavity. I think yes, the energy transfer and damage too that very big bone caused faster, longer lasting incapacitation. I dont think it changes the speed of death.
I think that if I shoot a smaller, lighter built animal with the same projectile, that I will see more damage in the chest cavity and far side of animal.
I am too tied to farm to get out and hunt much right now, but I do intend to shoot something from chamois too red hind size for this thread and I will autopsy and post results here regardless of what it shows.

I'm counter-intuitively freezing to death in Northland for 6 weeks. snapper fishing rather than hunting for now. the weather up here is terrible.

The halo of visible bruising/damage in the lungs is the "zone of extravasation" caused by the temporary elastic deformation of lung tissue in the temporary cavity, yes. That's identified in the medical wound ballistics literature. It appears that it doesn't contribute to incapacitation or death, the clinical studies seem to indicate that it may actually recover from the injury (if not fatal) depending on distance from permanent cavity and other unknown factors. It does dissipate a lot of transferred energy just through jiggling tissue around. Looks like the bullet caused a pretty significant temporary cavity still, but you can see that it didn't really result in a terribly large permanent cavity - the lung tissue is elastic and rebounds without significant trauma.

I would agree that you'd expect to see a larger permanent wound in the lungs of a smaller animal with the same shot placement - the bullet would be travelling faster when it reached the lungs when not encountering as thick/hard of an intermediate medium, and therefore would perform better - fragment more. Of course, you see the opposite with the "behind the shoulder placement", where there isn't sufficient intermediate medium to initiate good expansion/fragmentation before encountering lungs, and bullets of any size or speed often don't result in particularly rapid death, unless you use a Vmax (the 60gr from .223 works well here)

I expect we'll be seeing a lot more autopsy photos and analysis of bullet performance/cause of death in future, from many readers!

I hope so. Its something ive all ways done, and it can at times be surprising. occasionally you will go gosh, i was lucky to get that animal!

So This is what I would ask. Given that my projectile was a third heavier when it started, and ended up appx half the weight of yours.

Do you think your projectile would have killed that boar on the same shot as well?

Because I have my doubts, and If I was using your choice, I would have knelt and gone for a head shot.

Originally Posted by whanahuia

I hope so. Its something ive all ways done, and it can at times be surprising. occasionally you will go gosh, i was lucky to get that animal!

So This is what I would ask. Given that my projectile was a third heavier when it started, and ended up appx half the weight of yours.

Do you think your projectile would have killed that boar on the same shot as well?

Because I have my doubts, and If I was using your choice, I would have knelt and gone for a head shot.

The Hammer as above would have.

Originally Posted by whanahuia

I hope so. Its something ive all ways done, and it can at times be surprising. occasionally you will go gosh, i was lucky to get that animal!

So This is what I would ask. Given that my projectile was a third heavier when it started, and ended up appx half the weight of yours.

Do you think your projectile would have killed that boar on the same shot as well?

Because I have my doubts, and If I was using your choice, I would have knelt and gone for a head shot.

I would have taken that shot with confidence with an 80ELDM. I would expect it to work well. We may end up differing in that opinion. Unfortunately answering the question requires speculation until we find a good sample size of experimental boars to test.

I haven't seen any results in the animals I have shot that would lead me to lack confidence in that shot. The 80s have penetrated well and broken big bones on everything. The biggest pig I have shot with them was probably about 40-50kg and the bullet penetrated fully through both shoulders hitting some bones and was under the skin on the far side.

Fair enough. Its hard to argue with such adamance.

Im genuine in saying if I see another boar similar, Ill give you a yell. Id also request though that if somewhere you do get a similar shot, Id like to see or hear the results no matter what the outcome.

I cant help but remain skeptical.

I shot fat as boar,close to 140lb with my .223 using a 50 grn Barnes. Slipped in crease and boke offside legknuckle. He was still on feet when I walked up to him 150ish yards away but was very sick and wouldn't have lasted much longer. I really rate the mono projectiles at closer range on solid animals...

https://youtube.com/shorts/0cZjrx3nw...N6PciY_bImQ5L-
I've been doing some research of my own.

Originally Posted by 7mmwsm

https://youtube.com/shorts/0cZjrx3nw...N6PciY_bImQ5L-
I've been doing some research of my own.

Lucky we aren't allowed AR15's (mostly), I guess.

What on earth were you looking at to be led there?

Originally Posted by Ross Nolan

Lucky we aren't allowed AR15's (mostly), I guess.

What on earth were you looking at to be led there?

Just popped up in those short clips that lead on to the next one.
Some weird shit appears at times.

Originally Posted by gimp

This is a major advantage of light recoiling cartridges. You can see the impact and know when & where you have hit your deer.

I wouldn't call the 6.5prc high recoiling, it just knocked the deer down so quick I thought it had taken off, optics had barely moved.