Hydrostatic shock, what's your opinion?

[OKIE2]

this is a little off subject but here is a mistry for you I shot a doe running broad
side to me with a 30 m1 carbine at about 70 yards.
I shot at her 2 times when we dressed it the only one hole we found in the skin was through the upper hind leg never hit the other leg and she took a nose dive the very second she was shot. Was dead when I walked up to her.

 

[MontanaRifleman]

this is a little off subject but here is a mistry for you I shot a doe running broad
side to me with a 30 m1 carbine at about 70 yards.
I shot at her 2 times when we dressed it the only one hole we found in the skin was through the upper hind leg never hit the other leg and she took a nose dive the very second she was shot. Was dead when I walked up to her.

Just a far reaching speculation here, but the deer may have had elevated blood pressure from fright and/or running which may have caused an overpressure in the brain via the blood vessels from the shock of the bullet. Or... maybe the deer had the equivillent of a heart attack from the shock and trauma fo the bullet.

Bottom line is in order to have death, the brain must cease to function and something must cause that.

 

[J E Custom]

Having killed several hundred deer sized animals with a bow and more than that with a rifle ,pistol,
muzzle loader ETC I will say there is a big difference in the effects of a rifle
kill compared to a bow kill.

If you shoot a dear that is at rest and not excited (NO Adrenalin) some times they won't
even move and just drop dead in a few seconds. if they are alerted they always run. there
is no damaged tissue around the wound and blood loss is heavy (Inside or out).

If you shoot a deer with a rifle and he is at rest he may not run at all but is normally knocked
out by the impact and expires while down.If he is alerted he may run even though he is
fatally wounded because of the Adrenalin.If shot in the guts with ether bow or gun they
will rarely go down immediately because the area can absorb a lot of energy without impacting
the more vital organs that are protected by the diaphragm.

There is now doubt that blood loss and lack of oxygen are the main causes of death after any
shot, bow or gun .But the shock of the impact and shock wave caused by the bullet shuts down
the central nervous system and causes the game to black out temporarily until it dies due
blood loss and trauma. As we all know some times an animal will wake up and run off if not
mortally wounded.

So I think it contributes to the overall effect of a gun shot on game and if trauma is enough
to cause excessive blood loss it can kill even though no vital organs are hit or affected.

J E CUSTOM

 

[MSLRHunter]

I have experienced both situations many times from deer hit in the same spot with the same bullet. As has been mentioned here before, I think that the "mood" of the deer when shot plays in to this, I have had more deer drop that were calm than were on edge. Also, I compare the shock theory to a boxer getting knocked out by a good punch. The amount of energy that an animal absorbs when struck by a rifle bullet is huge, sometimes this knocks them out, sometimes it doesn't.

 

[sp6x6]

MontanaRifleman:
I'm aware the normal way of dispatching game is to disrupt te bloodflow and oxygen supply to the brain. I'm wondering if it would be reliably faster to shoot an extremely fast bullet to cause massive shock and temporary wound channel trauma to kill the animal. Like aiming for the neck-spine junction and even if you miss a bit the shock will kill the game. Will test this shot next time I hunt deer.

I woulnt try it on purpose, I SHOT a bull bedded at 70 yrds. w/340 WM 6" BELOW ear. It got up went uphill for 1/2 mile before I gotem. Said never again in the neck, shot muley in neck, by mistake 80 yrd 325 wsm 2 mile to catch.

 

[sp6x6]

Ditto with JE Customs thought, SHOT A 340 FOR 20 yrs. seen alot of animals, just drop end of story. IN highschool I was out with this trapper checking the line, he had a wolverine, walks up and shot it in the head with his 22 pistol, when we get back and skin it, the 22 bullet is slightly bent and laying right on top the skull, never even cracked the skull?

 

[statjunk]

I have limited experience but I've noticed something over time. I think a dead right there might have something to do with a given bullets velocity at impact. I've noticed a distinct difference in an animals reaction to a shot depending on how far the critter is from the rifle. Longer shots, for me at least, result in DRT. Shorter shots result in some running.

I shoot a 300 WM.

It's hard to debate the shock factor when you shoot a deer in the ribs and the entire rack of ribs is purple. I've opened up deer before and struggled to find any intact vital organs. I'm shooting Speer SP BT 180gr.

Tom

 

[D.Camilleri]

I would like to add one more thing that hasn't been mentioned yet, fight stopper rounds, you know the big boys, 458's 460's, even 416's, there is a reason that they have a reputation for stopping big animals in life threatening situations, because they do it on a regular basis.

On the same note, medium bore rounds have similar effects on medium sized big game and sometimes even on larger sized big game that smaller rounds can't compete with. My prefference is a .338 bullet driven at high velocity. I have never experienced an animal big or small that went any distance when properly hit in the chest cavity and I have also witnessed several elk that were incapacitated at distances over 500 yards from less than perfect shots, allowing the follow up shot to be made. These are observations that were never apparent to me when I used smaller calibers such as 30-06 and 7mm mag. If I could make every shot a perfect shot exactly where I wanted the bullet to hit, I could probably kill everything with a 22-250 and good bullets. Until you experience a shot on an elk with a 30-06 and the elk runs up hill and out of sight with no hope of being recovered it makes you realize that the hydraulic energy of larger rounds has a definate relationship to marginal shots at long range.

I was hunting elk one year with a friend in the timber, I cow called in a bull and my friend got off the first shot at about 150 yards with a 180 grain bullet out of a 300 win, the bull didn't act like it was hit,
and I followed with a shot out of my 338 ultra with a 210 gr barnes, the bull collapsed instantly. Upon getting to the elk, our shots were within 3 inches of each other. My thought is the massive amount of shock generated by the bigger round or possibly the hemorage effect, but it sure looked impressive.

 

[bigngreen]

My wifes uncle shoot a 416 with Barnes bullets and every elk he shoots requires tracking, they are dead on there feet but never drop. He loves the big guys, 416 and a 458. The wound looks good but I think it is not dropping a big slam of energy, just a slow drop through the entire length of the wound.

What make the larger cals so effective, does the larger bullet cause more shock, cavitation or a faster, larger pressure loss?

What would the difference be between a high velocity fragmenting bullet and a large low velocity controlled expantion bullet. The high velocity imparting 100% of it's energy into the core of the animal and the low velocity emparting energy compleatly through the animal but still retaining some after exiting the animal.
Not picking any fight just some question on my mind, I have to be at work but not expected to do anything my mind is wandering.

 

[D.Camilleri]

My wifes uncle shoot a 416 with Barnes bullets and every elk he shoots requires tracking, they are dead on there feet but never drop. He loves the big guys, 416 and a 458. The wound looks good but I think it is not dropping a big slam of energy, just a slow drop through the entire length of the wound.

What make the larger cals so effective, does the larger bullet cause more shock, cavitation or a faster, larger pressure loss?

What would the difference be between a high velocity fragmenting bullet and a large low velocity controlled expantion bullet. The high velocity imparting 100% of it's energy into the core of the animal and the low velocity emparting energy compleatly through the animal but still retaining some after exiting the animal.
Not picking any fight just some question on my mind, I have to be at work but not expected to do anything my mind is wandering.

It is hard to say why the performance of your wifes uncle's 416 is the way it is on elk without knowing more details, but when you look at professional guides like Jim Shockey that carry a 416 as his backup rifle when guiding things like grizzly, it makes you wonder if it isn't because of personal experiences that are favorable. Big bullets like a 416 that penetrate too quickly and exit, might not be the best bullet for the type of game being hunted. On the other hand when a compromise between a solid and an expanding bullet is needed on large dangerous game, the bullet might perform better. My personal experience is with medium calibers at high velocity and they have proven themselves as devasting on game. I am over 95% DRT with both my 338 ultra and my 300 ultra and that is more than I can say with any of the multiple animals I have harvested with both a 30-06 and 7mm mag.

 

[bigngreen]

The only gun I have had a very high percentage of DRT shots on elk was a 47-70 loaded with 300gr hollow points loaded to the max out of a bolt action. These are all normal hunting distaces but it slams elk but on deer I have not been able to one shot kill even one. On deer it acts like an arrow but on elk it opens up to the size of a silver dollar, two completely different wound channels for the same bullet. It is actually kinda fun to shoot elk with cause of there reaction to the hit but it does not have the range to get out in the sage brush very far.
I really like the looks of the 338RUM, I'm ordering a new barrel and it is hard to stay on the current project and not bail to a 338 barrel. The promise of 300gr Bergers could really add something to it also. I want to go all the way and get a 338AM, if I can wait that long.

 

[Natty Bumpo]

Any opinions on whether a roundnose or flatnose bullet hits harder and puts critters down any faster than a same caliber, pointy bullet?

 

[D.Camilleri]

I can honestly say I have no idea on round nose or flat nose bullets because I have never shot them out of a rifle, due to all of my rifles being set up for longer range shots. Most lever actions use flat nose bullets and a lot of dangerous game rounds use a round nose solid probably due to the round nose making a bigger wound channel with a solid. I have used flat nosed bullets in some of my pistols like my 454 and they make impressive wound channels. One thing that I think is true, is that large bullets at a high velocity have a much different effect than large bullets at lower velocity as far as shock. With all of the big bore pistols out there right now, I still don't think you will see many DRT shots on charging grizzlies unless the shot takes out the central nervous system, ie spine, but a large diameter properly constructed bullet with enough weight will definately penetrate deep enough on a big bear to cause massive wound channels, but I don't think the kill will be from hydraulic shock on a handgun the way it could be with a rifle.

 

[Ridge Runner]

Though I'm not an engineer, who can explain how, why and all that, Living in wv with an abundance of whitetails, liberal bag limits, and doing work with local farmers culling deer on crop damage permits I have shot alot of deer, in about every place imaginable, with alot of different firearms. Here is my beliefs on hydraulic compression of flesh. It works, there is no denying it.

Years ago when we would deer hunt and normal shots at our smallish whitetails came at 100-200 yards, the weapon of choice was the 243 win. loaded with 75-80 gr hp's. behind the shoulder shots ended in a death sprint from 60-100 yards till the animal just bled out and expired. Now on average shoot the same sized deer with the same rifle except switch POI to center of the shoulder, and most of the time that deer won't even move, at the report of the rifle the legs actualy jerk up, and the animal does a nose dive and never moves, not even a twitch.
Alot of times these light hollopoints showed minimal damage past the onside shoulder but didn't seem to matter.

I then switched to a 270 win when I was around the age of 20, loaded with 110 gr Hornady hp's, and I noticed that I could wander farther away from the shoulder and still get the DRT effect, I never really thought about it back then why I could shoot a deer middle ways through the guts while running and they would just die in mid-stride, not even as much as a quiver.
Once the range got much beyond 200 yards, they would run aways but inside 200, with a solid body hit they would just melt.

I noticed once I started shooting a 7mm STW that the DRT range with solid body hits would increase to about 400 yards.

Now in the fall of 2007 I had just purchased a 7mm AM from APS, had taken a couple deer with it 4 I think, a doe headshot at 375 yards, 2 bucks lungshot at 450 and 475 yards, another doe shoulder shot at 532 which was DRT.
I had a doe in a field at 585 yards, about 12 people wanted to watch the shot, I flubbed the wind call and POI was 12" right (downwind) of POA.
The 160 accubond hit 2.5" below the spine, just in front of the hams, through the flank. it hit hide in, hide out, and you could see no damage whatsoever anywhere except slight bruising of one of the inside tenderloins. she hit the ground and never got up, during the processing the guy helping me clean her up made a statement about there was no reason for the deer to be dead.


My opinion on this is, flesh is 70% water, if you can hit them hard enough in a place with enough resistance it will compress, when it compresses, it has to drive the blood backwards through the major blood vessels, the shockwave also travels throughout the body to the CNS to the brain, which I think overwhelms the body causing the brain to shut down all systems. Is the deer really as dead as they appear or does the brain send them into an unconsious mode and they die from damage of the bullet? I have no idea.
But I know for a fact that a light fast bullet placed in the area of most resistance appears to kill them deader than a lung shot with the same bullet.
RR