What exactly happens to .17 hmr ammo on impact ?

[30-6]

I know that .22 rimfire subsonic ammo upon impact deforms but stays whole ( excepting the newer cci segmenting ammo ), and usually passes straight through the target. But with a .17 hmr rimfire (17 g ballistic tip) what exactly happens to the ammo on impact ? Is it only the copper jacket that fragments and the lead deforms but stays whole, or does the lead fragment as well ?

 

The reason i ask is, i witnessed a fox being shot ( it had started to mooch around a farm building eating the calf afterbirths and disturbing the cows ). It was shot at about 70 yds to the chest after being in a sitting position looking at the gun with remmington accutip, it flared up on its back legs done a little dance and dropped about 5 yds away. Upon looking at the entry point it showed a substantial wound, oozing blood, and there was a small patch of blood on its flank, so i assumed this was an exit point. There was a lot of blood within the 5 yds radius, so i am thinking that if the blood on the flank came from this it would have covered a bigger area.

 

Q1 - Was that an exit wound, i thought the whole ammo fragmented, so would a small piece travel about 12 inches through its body ?

 

Q2 - How does range affect the fragmentation process, or does it take place at whatever range ?

 

It was an adult dog fox in good condition, but i noticed two things about it. It smelled really, really foxy ( musky ),and under its chest the hair had been rubbed bare down to the skin like if it had been constantly rubbing against something.

[Vince Green]

UHV ammunition ofter break up totally on entry and nothing goes through. This is a fault rather than a desirable feature. Massive entry wound but no penetration does not give reliable kills (little or no organ damage) but can result in lots of shock, hence the dance you witnessed. In another instance it could result in a runner.

 

One of the criticms of 5.56mm military ammunition is roughly the same. Big blow up on impact but not enough penetration in military situations.

Edited July 24, 2011 by Vince Green

[Dave-G]

I know that .22 rimfire subsonic ammo upon impact deforms but stays whole ( excepting the newer cci segmenting ammo ), and usually passes straight through the target. But with a .17 hmr rimfire (17 g ballistic tip) what exactly happens to the ammo on impact ? Is it only the copper jacket that fragments and the lead deforms but stays whole, or does the lead fragment as well ?

 

The reason i ask is, i witnessed a fox being shot ( it had started to mooch around a farm building eating the calf afterbirths and disturbing the cows ). It was shot at about 70 yds to the chest after being in a sitting position looking at the gun with remmington accutip, it flared up on its back legs done a little dance and dropped about 5 yds away. Upon looking at the entry point it showed a substantial wound, oozing blood, and there was a small patch of blood on its flank, so i assumed this was an exit point. There was a lot of blood within the 5 yds radius, so i am thinking that if the blood on the flank came from this it would have covered a bigger area.

 

Q1 - Was that an exit wound, i thought the whole ammo fragmented, so would a small piece travel about 12 inches through its body ?

 

Q2 - How does range affect the fragmentation process, or does it take place at whatever range ?

 

It was an adult dog fox in good condition, but i noticed two things about it. It smelled really, really foxy ( musky ),and under its chest the hair had been rubbed bare down to the skin like if it had been constantly rubbing against something.

 

Sounds like its been sheep shackin mate, wales is well known for this.

 

I tried to resist posting this but the devil took hold of me and made me do it - yes really honestly.

Edited July 24, 2011 by Dave-G

[30-6]

Sounds like its been sheep shackin mate, wales is well known for this.

 

Hey - don't knock it if you haven't tried it. I can remember when i was a kid my mother my mother used to say "eat your cabbage", to which i used to reply "don't like it mam", she would then say " but you haven't tried it". I love cabbage now.

 

If ever you get around to a sheep, always drag it to a cliff, they push back like hell.

[Dave-G]

Sounds like its been sheep shackin mate, wales is well known for this.

 

Hey - don't knock it if you haven't tried it. I can remember when i was a kid my mother my mother used to say "eat your cabbage", to which i used to reply "don't like it mam", she would then say " but you haven't tried it". I love cabbage now.

 

If ever you get around to a sheep, always drag it to a cliff, they push back like hell.

 

Ha that sounds like good advice

 

Not on a fox (we aint alowwed HMR for fox in Leic's) but I have felt HMR fragments behind the skin when I shoot for pure pest control. I dug some out a few times and would say that the bits I have found might account for a 1/4~1/3 of the bullet but spread thin if that makes any sense. For me, this is one of the main benefits of the HMR in that any bits that might leave the quarry will be very lightweight and sufficiently deformed as to render those fragments harmless beyond a few feet.

 

My brother and shooting partner caught this lucky piece of HMR fragmentation on video - it may look like a shoot through but we were alongside each other with me shooting off the car door mirror:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ra4AnvyQjDM&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

[Gimlet]

I use 17 gn Winchester Supremes in my HMR. From fragments I've found it seems the copper jacket peals away causing a lot of surface damage, the outer section of the lead fragments and widens the wound and a thin core like a needle penetrates and sometimes exits.

The fragmentation of ballistsic tips is unpredictable though. I head shoot all my rabbits and nearly always side-on. You'd think the wound would be much the same each time, but sometimes theres a hole you could put your thumb through and other times just a small blood patch with the skull more or less intact.

I've actually got foxes listed on the HMR entry on my ticket. I usually head shoot theses too. I have gone for heart shots but they run more often than not. They sure don't when they're shot in the head.

By the way it sounds like your fox had a touch of sarcoptic mange which is highly contagious. Careful how you handle mangey foxes if you've got animals at home.

Edited July 25, 2011 by Gimlet

[kent]

I know that .22 rimfire subsonic ammo upon impact deforms but stays whole ( excepting the newer cci segmenting ammo ), and usually passes straight through the target. But with a .17 hmr rimfire (17 g ballistic tip) what exactly happens to the ammo on impact ? Is it only the copper jacket that fragments and the lead deforms but stays whole, or does the lead fragment as well ?

 

The reason i ask is, i witnessed a fox being shot ( it had started to mooch around a farm building eating the calf afterbirths and disturbing the cows ). It was shot at about 70 yds to the chest after being in a sitting position looking at the gun with remmington accutip, it flared up on its back legs done a little dance and dropped about 5 yds away. Upon looking at the entry point it showed a substantial wound, oozing blood, and there was a small patch of blood on its flank, so i assumed this was an exit point. There was a lot of blood within the 5 yds radius, so i am thinking that if the blood on the flank came from this it would have covered a bigger area.

 

Q1 - Was that an exit wound, i thought the whole ammo fragmented, so would a small piece travel about 12 inches through its body ?

 

Q2 - How does range affect the fragmentation process, or does it take place at whatever range ?

 

It was an adult dog fox in good condition, but i noticed two things about it. It smelled really, really foxy ( musky ),and under its chest the hair had been rubbed bare down to the skin like if it had been constantly rubbing against something.

 

 

The exit wound could well have been the balisic polymer tip, have seen this many times and its not uncommon

 

The fragmentation is range dependant and also dependant on what and were it hits, as a rough guide a V-max will violently expand at 40 yds in the chest of a rabbit yet at 160 and over it might fail to expand much at 200 yds it will virually always fail to expand. Also a Rabbit shot in the guts will initiate more violent expantion than one in the chest as the chest cavity is pretty much empty other than the lungs its full of air

[al4x]

UHV ammunition ofter break up totally on entry and nothing goes through. This is a fault rather than a desirable feature. Massive entry wound but no penetration does not give reliable kills (little or no organ damage) but can result in lots of shock, hence the dance you witnessed. In another instance it could result in a runner.

 

 

 

where does it sound like a fault or a poor kill? To me sounds as it should, to have a fox with an entry and exit wound to the chest you know its not going far. The dance is pretty irrelevant you can get that with whatever you use, a deer that drops in that timeframe would be seen as usual and foxes are if anything tougher. One thing you know is with a hole in the chest its a dead fox whether it runs a few yards or not. Ample blood shows you have had plenty of expansion and probably taken the heart out. I've had them dance with everything up to .243

[Gimlet]

I've had a fox dance with a .308. Shot it through the brisket with a 155gn hollow. I reckon the foxes body offered too little resistence to the round and it barely expanded at all, just whistled straight through imparting little energy and somehow missing anything vital. It wasn't a round I would have chosen but it was an opportunistic shot.

I don't have a dedicated foxing rifle. If I'm specifically targeting foxes with the .308 I prefer light ballistic tips. There is no question of dancing or running, they're safer than a hollow or a soft point and with sub-100 gn tips pushing 3900fps they're very flat and easy to shoot. Hit a fox in the chest with these and the animal just bursts.

I'm not convinced that a .17hmr is fast enough for ballistic tips to fragment reliably. I have always understood that ballistic tips should be pushed to the limit of their stability in flight so they're ready to break up against the slightest surface with the released core providing the penetration. Maybe the terminal energy and velocity is too low in HMR.

Edited July 25, 2011 by Gimlet

[Beretta28g]

30-6

 

PM your e-mail and ill send you some ballistic tests we did into putty blocks.

 

 

Beretta

[Vince Green]

where does it sound like a fault or a poor kill? To me sounds as it should, to have a fox with an entry and exit wound to the chest you know its not going far. The dance is pretty irrelevant you can get that with whatever you use, a deer that drops in that timeframe would be seen as usual and foxes are if anything tougher. One thing you know is with a hole in the chest its a dead fox whether it runs a few yards or not. Ample blood shows you have had plenty of expansion and probably taken the heart out. I've had them dance with everything up to .243

The point I was making is that any large entry wound is dubious because it tends to indicate the bullet has come to pieces on the surface and not driven through to the central organs. You want the bullet to expand but not break up so it can do the damage further in. Much of the bullet material will have gone sideways in producing the entry wound like that and although it may be messy it possibly wont be that deep. Thats all I was meaning.

 

You can demonstrate this with a HMR bullet by shooting at a two pint plastic milk bottle filled with water. The light and flimsy bullet often doesn't penetrate through to the other side. Shoot another bottle with a .223 and you will get a hole right through. HMR bullets can be too "explosive" to give good penetration on bigger boned animals like foxes. The jacket is paper thin and doesn't have the strength to keep the bullet togeather, the ballistic tip drives right through the soft core from front to back breaking it up rather than just expanding it once the jacket has gone. The whole thing just ends up as a load of fragments.

Edited July 25, 2011 by Vince Green

[kent]

The point I was making is that any large entry wound is dubious because it tends to indicate the bullet has come to pieces on the surface and not driven through to the central organs. You want the bullet to expand but not break up so it can do the damage further in. Much of the bullet material will have gone sideways in producing the entry wound like that and although it may be messy it possibly wont be that deep. Thats all I was meaning.

 

You can demonstrate this with a HMR bullet by shooting at a two pint plastic milk bottle filled with water. The light and flimsy bullet often doesn't penetrate through to the other side. Shoot another bottle with a .223 and you will get a hole right through. HMR bullets can be too "explosive" to give good penetration on bigger boned animals like foxes. The jacket is paper thin and doesn't have the strength to keep the bullet togeather, the ballistic tip drives right through the soft core from front to back breaking it up rather than just expanding it once the jacket has gone. The whole thing just ends up as a load of fragments.

 

Hmr bullets are "unpredictable" speed of impact is very relivent hence range dependant, placement is also very important i personally had big issues with crows when the wing was hit the 17's often failed to penetrate further than the fine fluffy feathers under the wing, breaking up too easy. Used 20's but they just over penetrated with inadequate expantion. with velocity windows that open and close within such short distances i feel the hmr realy needs a wider selection of bullets so we might choose what suits our individual needs

[kent]

where does it sound like a fault or a poor kill? To me sounds as it should, to have a fox with an entry and exit wound to the chest you know its not going far. The dance is pretty irrelevant you can get that with whatever you use, a deer that drops in that timeframe would be seen as usual and foxes are if anything tougher. One thing you know is with a hole in the chest its a dead fox whether it runs a few yards or not. Ample blood shows you have had plenty of expansion and probably taken the heart out. I've had them dance with everything up to .243

 

Agreed You will not stop dancers and mad dashers no matter what you hit them with. hit in the heart or lungs death comes when the brain is starved of the oxegen those organs either supply or pump. In the brain they can bounce around a bit due to nerves, had a roe doe do a back flip over a 5ft fence one time when i brain shot it, weirdest thing and not nice to watch the brain was totally destoyed on impact BTW. Sometimes stuff just goes down from chest shots and dies on the spot but it still takes a few seconds till brain death actually occurs. Neck shooting tends to give the least movement, but is no more humane IMO

 

No i don't regulary shoot deer in the brain as a primary shot before anyone jumps down my throat

[welsh1]

I can't say i have had any real problems with the hmr on foxes(split cases aside).

The hmr round is very effective as long as it is used carefully,by that i mean shot placement and distance,i rarely go for the shoulder shot with my hmr,and find that a bib shot or head shot does the job every time.

Also what the hmr bullet hits in the body makes a huge difference,i can shoot straight through a rabbit with a chest shot,but a head shot is a messy business,the round fragments very well when it hits bone.

 

Its not always the depth of penetration that is important,but the amount of energy imparted,and from my experience the hmr gets in enough to expand and cause terminal injuries and shock to whatever it hits.

[Catweazle]

I've been wondering about this HMR "unpredictability" for a while.

 

Take a rabbit headshot for example.

 

Sometimes there is a small entry hole and no other visible damage ( apart from bulging eyes ), sometimes the back of the head is gone. It would seem to be a lot of difference, but what if the HMR was expending all the energy inside the head and for a fraction of a second the head was blown up like a balloon. Some "balloon" heads burst, which then looks like a lot of damage, some don't burst which then looks like little damage. Both heads are mashed inside.

 

I don't open rabbit heads to look, but a countryman told me that if you can easily crack the rabbits top jaw by squeezing it the rabbit is young and good eating. Trying this has shown me that most headshot rabbits just have a bag of broken bone for a head, even if it looks intact from the outside.

 

Could the HMR be just on the limit of being able to burst the "balloon" ? Is that what makes it look so variable ?

 

Just a thought.

[al4x]

I think the variability is two fold, one depends how much bone it hits and whether its on the way in or the way out and secondly the range.

I've a mate who shoots a lot of foxes who reckons it kills better over 100 yards simply because its slower and doesn't explode so rapidly. I tuck them usually in the chest just behind the shoulder and so far the only runners have been with 20 grain ammo. Picked them not far away and they were dead with a hole in and a hole out but not enough energy transfer on the way through. To my mind its pretty effective because you have to pick your shots better and can't take the chances you can with a larger caliber

[dadioles]

UHV ammunition ofter break up totally on entry and nothing goes through. This is a fault rather than a desirable feature. Massive entry wound but no penetration does not give reliable kills (little or no organ damage) but can result in lots of shock, hence the dance you witnessed. In another instance it could result in a runner.

 

I was under the impression that "nothing goes through" is a good thing, absolutely not "a fault", as it means that all of the energy of the bullet has been absorbed by the target with consequential maximum damage.

 

That is the whole reason for hollow point ammunition.

 

The .17HMR round uses a plastic tip embedded into a bullet with a big hollow point. The tip ensures aerodynamic stability and disintegrates as soon as it touches something leaving the hollow point free to expand massively and transfer all of its energy.

 

If the quarry has bones that can absorb that shock and leave the animal wounded then you are using the wrong calibre or type of ammunition or are too far away.

 

That is why many police forces will not allow rimfire for fox, as an example.

 

Once again.... use the right tool for the job.

[cleaner4hire]

http://www.varmintal.com/17hmr.htm

 

lots of good HMR info here

[Vince Green]

Nothing goes through is good if the bullet goes deep enough to do the damage. A FMJ bullet goes clean through but takes most of its energy with it. On the other extreme a bullet which comes to pieces is equally bad from the other extreme.

A bullet which expands but ends up just under the skin on the other side is ideal. It has used all its energy destroying tissue and organs and nothing is wasted. Take the example of a fox. You want to take out the heart and lungs. If the bullet gives up all it energy taking out the shoulder joint you will probably get a a wounded fox with a massive but not immediately fatal wound. HMRs are variable in this respect. They don't do bone. My point is that too light a bullet of the wrong type behaves erratically from shot to shot. You cannot predict how thing will turn out. A heavier and more substancial bullet , even a .223 will be better and more predictable.

 

I think a HMR is great against rabbits and corvids but on foxes it is variable according to where the bullet strikes.

[al4x]

How many foxes have you shot with one Vince?

[cleaner4hire]

 

The .17HMR round uses a plastic tip embedded into a bullet with a big hollow point. The tip ensures aerodynamic stability and disintegrates as soon as it touches something leaving the hollow point free to expand massively and transfer all of its energy.

 

 

I thought that the polymer tips were used to ensure that the bullet expanded immediately, without the need for a massive HP (so not reducing the BC)... ie upon impact the tip is driven back into the bullet, initiating the expansion process before disintegrating. The thin copper jacket on varmint type bullets is not designed to hold together so the impact from the tip combined with the high rate of revolutions effectively explodes the bullet.

[Vince Green]

How many foxes have you shot with one Vince?

Don't shoot foxes anymore since my uncle died, shoot coyotes and groundhogs on my friends place in Prescott Arizona. We will be there in a couple of weeks time.

Edited July 27, 2011 by Vince Green

[dadioles]

I thought that the polymer tips were used to ensure that the bullet expanded immediately, without the need for a massive HP (so not reducing the BC)... ie upon impact the tip is driven back into the bullet, initiating the expansion process before disintegrating. The thin copper jacket on varmint type bullets is not designed to hold together so the impact from the tip combined with the high rate of revolutions effectively explodes the bullet.

 

Yep!... all that as well.

 

Not hmr but if you have not seen this it is worth a look...

Edited July 27, 2011 by dadioles

[al4x]

Don't shoot foxes anymore since my uncle died, shoot coyotes and groundhogs on my friends place in Prescott Arizona. We will be there in a couple of weeks time.

 

 

out of the 31 I've had with mine now two have run, both the same night and both with 20 grain bullets. Both were picked within 100 yards by the hound dead with a chest entry and exit but lesson learned and back to the 17 vmax and not had it since. Personally in the right situation it does the job perfectly the gun comes out foxing when near houses and roads etc where noise and potential ricochets are an issue with the .243 or .223