Why are hard cast bullets so great and FMJ so bad?

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Macchina

Macchina

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When people ask about what ammo to carry for self defense against criminals, the answer almost always comes back some kind of JHP. When the question pops up about what ammo to use for self defense against bears/lions/monsters the answer almost always comes back with some flat point hard cast lead bullet. The question "what to carry for protection against bears" often refers to revolver calibers, hence the question posted here.

My question is: what supposedly makes a hard-cast lead bullet so much better than a FMJ? Most FMJ bullets for powerful revolvers (357 Mag, 44 Mag, 45 Colt, etc.) come in a similar nose shape (flat) to the solid lead loads so often recommended. If you're just going for penetration, why would a solid lead bullet ever be better than a FMJ of similar shape and size?

It seams the FMJ is always regarded as a practice bullet with only marginal SD effectiveness, yet it appears to me to be a tougher bullet than a solid lead hard-cast without much of the issues like bullet creep and barrel leading...


44 Magnum 300 grain Hard-Cast "Bear Load"
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44 Magnum 300 grain FMJ
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A proper hardcast for the purposes you mention (deep penetration in large critters) will be either a Keith-type semi-wad with flat meplat & a secondary "cutting" shoulder, or something similar with at least a flat meplat.

The difference in performance between that & an FMJ is that the round-nosed FMJ just pushes tissue aside as it passes through, while the flat meplat disrupts, cuts, and tears tissue as it travels & does more damage.

This is in general terms, and the Keith-style is usually considered more effective (efficient) on large game than a flat-nosed FMJ.
Denis
 
The nose shape is everything, or almost. Most SWC or LBT style cast bullets will have a much larger meplat (the flat part of the nose) than any FMJ. This causes far more tissue destruction than any FMJ can manage. They also tend to penetrate very straight without tipping and tumbling. They are designed for deep penetration on game.

Construction is the second biggest factor. Most FMJ pistol bullets are not designed for deep penetration on big game. They are designed for utter reliability in autos and to be cheap to manufacture. They have soft lead cores and thin copper jackets. There is a popular misconception that they are tough, deep penetrating bullets. In reality, their soft cores and thin jackets make them relatively fragile. They won't fragment like a JHP but they will deform and quite often the core will separate from the jacket. A proper hardcast bullet will be hard yet tough enough to smash heavy bones and penetrate through the vitals with very little deformation.
 
DPris said:
A proper hardcast for the purposes you mention (deep penetration in large critters) will be either a Keith-type semi-wad with flat meplat & a secondary "cutting" shoulder, or something similar with at least a flat meplat.

The difference in performance between that & an FMJ is that the round-nosed FMJ just pushes tissue aside as it passes through, while the flat meplat disrupts, cuts, and tears tissue as it travels & does more damage.

This is in general terms, and the Keith-style is usually considered more effective (efficient) on large game than a flat-nosed FMJ.
Denis
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I understand what you're saying (I've heard it said many times), but why not make a jacketed bullet in this same highly effective shape? Why do we only see Hard-Cast bullets in these shapes?

A theory here is that it is easier to cast unique bullet shapes than set up a jacketing station for the exact same shape of bullet. This has caused bullet manufactures to talk us into the idea that Hard-Cast>FMJ without providing us with any data to back that up.

If two bullets are the same shape and if that is where performance comes from: why wouldn't you use the bullet that is both tougher, can be loaded to higher velocities, and has less likelihood of moving under heavy recoil (jacket bullets)?

MY QUESTION IS NOT ABOUT BULLET SHAPE, BUT INSTEAD ABOUT MATERIAL. WHY DO WE PICK A SEEMINGLY INFERIOR MATERIAL (HARD CAST) OVER A MATERIAL THAT SEEMS PERFECT FOR TOUGH HIGH SPEED LOADS (JACKETED).
 
You're operating under several misconceptions. Firstly, material with regards to velocity is irrelevant. A handgun cannot operate at such high velocities that preclude the use of hard cast bullets. When matched with the proper hardness and diameter for the application, they can easily run in excess of 2000fps. Even as much as 1400-1600fps without a gas check. In that regard, jacketed bullets have no advantage. Due to friction, cast bullets run faster for a given weight/pressure.

Construction. A bullet made of a single material will always be cheaper to produce and easier to keep intact than one made from one or more. To make a jacketed bullet that does the same job (not better) as a proper hardcast bullet costs a great deal more. With zero return. It won't be any tougher, not for revolver applications.

Move up to bronze like the punch bullet or CEP solid and you have something but again, they cost a lot more. In the case of CEP's, exponentially more. Again, with no return on performance.

The reason hardcast bullets are marketed as better is because they are better. Elmer Keith proved it 80yrs ago, Veral Smith brought the idea into the 21st century but some people still don't believe it.
 
Cast bullets will expand upon impact with just about anything. An FMJ is designed not to expand at all. A JHP requires a specific velocity to expand reliably.
"...bullet manufactures to talk us into..." They have slews of people with fancy degrees in their marketing departments whose job it is to talk us into things. Most of which is no better than stuff we already have. Magnum rifles cartridges, for example, are the most successful marketing plan in history.
"...Hard-Cast "Bear Load"..." That is pure marketing. If Yogi is within 100 yards, PO'd and coming at you, you nor anyone else will ever be fast enough to recognise the threat and react before he's on you. And absolutely no handgun cartridge will ever stop Yogi in his tracks.
 
This is my own .02 and is based on my own observations rather than any statistics etc.

I do not see, at least in handgun calibers, any advantage with anything but solid slug type ammo when dealing with "bears/lions/monsters". Bears, for example, have not only thick fur, but a thick fibrous fat layer. Most self-defense bullets designed to expand will stop well short of penetrating those two obstacles. We get so caught up with expansion when dealing with self-defense rounds that we lose sight of the fact that too much and too rapid expansion also causes less penetration.

That is pure marketing. If Yogi is within 100 yards, PO'd and coming at you, you nor anyone else will ever be fast enough to recognise the threat and react before he's on you. And absolutely no handgun cartridge will ever stop Yogi in his tracks.
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This is absolutely false. Bears are successfully hunted with handguns all of the time. Granted, they are not usually charging down the hunter when the shot is taken but I personally know hunters who have taken bears with .44 magnum and 45LC. I even have a co-worker who recently took a Mountain lion with a .38 snubbie. They are big and strong but they still have a heart and lungs and are far more fragile than we are lead to believe.
 
Cast bullets will expand upon impact with just about anything.

An FMJ is designed not to expand at all.

"...Hard-Cast "Bear Load"..." That is pure marketing. If Yogi is within 100 yards, PO'd and coming at you, you nor anyone else will ever be fast enough to recognise the threat and react before he's on you. And absolutely no handgun cartridge will ever stop Yogi in his tracks.
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All patently false.
 
The way some folks speak of black bears, one would think that they are clad in rolled homogenous armor and have organs lined with Kevlar. :p
 
Macchina said:
MY QUESTION IS NOT ABOUT BULLET SHAPE, BUT INSTEAD ABOUT MATERIAL. WHY DO WE PICK A SEEMINGLY INFERIOR MATERIAL (HARD CAST) OVER A MATERIAL THAT SEEMS PERFECT FOR TOUGH HIGH SPEED LOADS (JACKETED).
Click to expand...

What is 'inferior' about a hard cast lead alloy that doesn't deform easily, tends to exhibit deeper, straighter penetration (in SWC and flat nose designs), and just happens to be economically priced?

You have thrown out an unqualified superlative, but without knowing what is inferior about that material it is hard to give a meaningful answer.
 
481 said:
What is 'inferior' about a hard cast lead alloy that doesn't deform easily, tends to exhibit deeper, straighter penetration (in SWC and flat nose designs), and just happens to be economically priced?

You have thrown out an unqualified superlative, but without knowing what is inferior about that material it is hard to give a meaningful answer.
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I shoot my 357 magnums at a range I made with a stack of pine logs as the first barrier in the backstop. I recover my bullets every once in a while. One thing I've noticed is the extreme deformation that hard cast bullets (22 Brinell SWC) exhibit in contrast to FMJ bullets. A lot of the FMJ bullets look as if they could easily be reloaded while hard cast are almost always "smeared" on all their surfaces. Many times I find hard cast bullets that are bent and almost all of them have those nice sharp corners smoothed off into large radii (much more rounded than a flat-point FMJ ends up as). If a hard cast bullet hits something hard (like another bullet) it almost always strips off half of the nose on an angle and the bullet ends up bent and sideways in the log. If a FMJ hits another bullet in the backrest it does surprisingly little damage to it.

Pine is softer than bone so I'd imagine the same effects to occur on bullets entering a large animal with heavy bones.
 
Well if you get attacked by a tree, maybe FMJ is the way to go.

I wouldn't compare penetrating inches of pine board to a bone.
 
44 Magnum Cast Bullets

These were fired into damp sand at about twenty paces. All bullets were cast using Lyman's #2 alloy with a Brinell Hardness of about 16.

It's been a while since I recovered these, but at the time all my 44 Magnum loads were very near max loads of Hercules 2400. My 2400 is in Hercules cans.
 
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Macchina said:
I shoot my 357 magnums at a range I made with a stack of pine logs as the first barrier in the backstop. I recover my bullets every once in a while. One thing I've noticed is the extreme deformation that hard cast bullets (22 Brinell SWC) exhibit in contrast to FMJ bullets. A lot of the FMJ bullets look as if they could easily be reloaded while hard cast are almost always "smeared" on all their surfaces. Many times I find hard cast bullets that are bent and almost all of them have those nice sharp corners smoothed off into large radii (much more rounded than a flat-point FMJ ends up as). If a hard cast bullet hits something hard (like another bullet) it almost always strips off half of the nose on an angle and the bullet ends up bent and sideways in the log. If a FMJ hits another bullet in the backrest it does surprisingly little damage to it.

Pine is softer than bone so I'd imagine the same effects to occur on bullets entering a large animal with heavy bones.
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OK, if I take your response correctly, that jacketed bullets don't deform against hard materials as readily as un-jacketed alloy bullets, then I'd have to ask you what do you think happens to those bones that are struck in an animal?

If you are using a heavy hard cast bullet in the proper caliber, those bones often break, sometimes shatter, sometimes to the point of no longer supporting the animal often creating secondary fragments that produce additional damage even if the hard cast bullet does deform. Pine has different mechanical properties than bone so I am not sure that it tells us very much about how bullets act when they hit bone.
 
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eldon519 said:
Well if you get attacked by a tree, maybe FMJ is the way to go.

I wouldn't compare penetrating inches of pine board to a bone.
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Not comparing penetration, I was comparing bullet deformation. Big difference.
 
Material differences between hard cast lead in a tough and high speed bullet:
1. Lead is softer (Hard Cast lead gets up around 35 Brinell while most copper jackets are harder than 100 Brinell).
2. Hard Cast Lead is more likely to move under heavy recoil: The harder the material on the outside of the bullet, the stronger the crimp will be. A higher hardness directly resists deformation.
3. Hard Cast Bullets are more likely to leave residue in the barrel: Sure many times they shoot just fine, but lead will almost always be more likely to leave more fouling in a gun than jacketed bullets.
4. Lead bullets generally require lubricant. Lubricant can be removed during handling and can cause smoke when fired.

Cost difference between Hard Cast loaded ammunition and FMJ loaded ammunition:
A lot of you are saying that Hard Cast lead bullets are cheaper to make than full metal jacket bullets. I agree that the individual component price is usually higher for FMJ bullets than pure lead bullets... however: LOADED AMMUNITION FMJ rounds are cheaper than LOADED AMMUNITION Hard Cast pretty much across the board. This leads me to believe that individual component cost of the bullet is not as significant of a contributor to the selling price of high quality high performance ammunition. As an example of this Buffalo Bore loads jacketed and hard cast lead bullets for many calibers: the jacketed and hard cast rounds are always the same price (solid copper rounds are more expensive than either).

Brought to an extreme example, you could say: is a Ford truck more expensive than a Chevy truck based on the cost of it's engine? No, it's probably less than 20% of the total cost of the truck however that engines performance makes or breaks the truck. On this same example: if Elmer Keith determined Chevy's were better than Ford's based on 80 year-old engine technology: would you think we may want to revisit that test using today's technology?
 
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Didn't someone quite recently have a post with excellent photos...

showing the underperformance of a fully jacketed bullet on a deer(?) relative to a partition/cast... something more effective of a bullet?
 
1. Lead is softer (Hard Cast lead gets up around 35 Brinell while most copper jackets are harder than 100 Brinell).
2. Hard Cast Lead is more likely to move under heavy recoil: The harder the material on the outside of the bullet, the stronger the crimp will be. A higher hardness directly resists deformation.
3. Hard Cast Bullets are more likely to leave residue in the barrel: Sure many times they shoot just fine, but lead will almost always be more likely to leave more fouling in a gun than jacketed bullets.
4. Lead bullets generally require lubricant. Lubricant can be removed during handling and can cause smoke when fired.
Click to expand...

I think I misunderstood your original premise. I was assuming you were referring to JHPs, not FMJs. I have since gone back and re-read:)

From my perspective, A JHP is a far inferior choice when penetration is more important than expansion. On the other hand, for self defense against humans, expansion is king in handgun calibers since there is little to zero cavitation.

FMJs, however, are an entirely different matter. While they can be prone to jacket separation, etc, they do penetrate typically as well as hard cast. I don't know about better...

Of your 4 statements above, the only one I would disagree with is #2. I have found that you are far more likely to have bullet setback with jacketed bullets, especially if you over-crimp. Both lead and FMJs will have issues but with FMJs not only do you squish the diameter of the bullet down, but you buckle the jacket so there is very little neck tension.

Personally, I don't shoot mostly hard cast because I feel it is superior. I do it because I enjoy making my own. I have even started powder coating which eliminates leading and stinky lube smoke. There are also merits to hard cast that you don't get with jacketed such as customizing bullet diameter for your firearm etc.

My bottom line is that, with so many variables such as cost, penetration, expansion, etc. there is not a one bullet solution for everything.
 
brinell hardness of hard lead alloy is 22, of gilding metal is 35-40.

lead scrapes off a cast bullet when it hits a rock. a fmj bullet dents, or deforms when it hits a rock.

lead bullets are cast. fmj bullets are drawn.

nose shape for semi-autos is usually round to facilitate loading.

nose shape for revolvers doesn't matter in regard to ease of loading.

the bullet shape in your second pic in post #1 is called "truncated cone", or "round nose flat point" (looks more like tc than rnfp). this bullet should penetrate just as well as the bullet in the first pic.

wikipedia has a lot of good info for you under "full metal jacket bullet".

murf
 
The way some folks speak of black bears, one would think that they are clad in rolled homogenous armor and have organs lined with Kevlar.
Click to expand...

The way some folks speak of bears in general, one would think that defense from them is a real concern for more than .01% of the population...



Oh, and I buy cast bullets because they are cheaper than jacketed in .44 cal... if jacketed bullets were cheaper I would buy those.
 
CraigC said:
You're operating under several misconceptions. Firstly, material with regards to velocity is irrelevant. A handgun cannot operate at such high velocities that preclude the use of hard cast bullets. When matched with the proper hardness and diameter for the application, they can easily run in excess of 2000fps. Even as much as 1400-1600fps without a gas check. In that regard, jacketed bullets have no advantage. Due to friction, cast bullets run faster for a given weight/pressure.

We have a winner!! Someone who understands.
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Sunray said:
Cast bullets will expand upon impact with just about anything.
Click to expand...


Umm...negative.

This bullet entered the left flank of a whitetail buck at somewhere around 1050 fps and travelled to the front of the right shoulder. Somewhere along the way it evidently hit a bone, probably the shoulder, but as you can see, it's anything but expanded. I cast the bullet myself and the Bhn was 12 - 12.5, fairly soft in todays world of cast bullets. (You guys that have seen this before look the other way or something)

44-250KT4_zps7228710d.jpg

bullet_zpsd62d630c.jpg

Schwing said:
This is my own .02 and is based on my own observations rather than any statistics etc.

I do not see, at least in handgun calibers, any advantage with anything but solid slug type ammo when dealing with "bears/lions/monsters". Bears, for example, have not only thick fur, but a thick fibrous fat layer. Most self-defense bullets designed to expand will stop well short of penetrating those two obstacles. We get so caught up with expansion when dealing with self-defense rounds that we lose sight of the fact that too much and too rapid expansion also causes less penetration.
Click to expand...

Very astute observation. Pay attention everyone.


Macchina said:
Material differences between hard cast lead in a tough and high speed bullet:
1. Lead is softer (Hard Cast lead gets up around 35 Brinell while most copper jackets are harder than 100 Brinell).
2. Hard Cast Lead is more likely to move under heavy recoil: The harder the material on the outside of the bullet, the stronger the crimp will be. A higher hardness directly resists deformation.
3. Hard Cast Bullets are more likely to leave residue in the barrel: Sure many times they shoot just fine, but lead will almost always be more likely to leave more fouling in a gun than jacketed bullets.
4. Lead bullets generally require lubricant. Lubricant can be removed during handling and can cause smoke when fired.
Click to expand...

1. You're assuming harder is always better. If this was the case we'd all be shooting tungsten or titanium bullets.
2. How is hard cast more likely to move under recoil? How can a crimp be strong when your pressing it (a thin brass cartridge case) into a harder bullet? Wouldn't the crimp be stronger if the mouth of the cartridge case could "bite" into something a little softer such as lead?
3. Sometimes, cast bullets can leave lead, but if sized properly, they don't. Ever hear of copper fouling?
4. Have you ever cast bullets or loaded cast bullets? I've cast and loaded tens of thousands and have never once removed the lubricant. How much smoke does the lubricant cause? I personally rarely notice it.

Macchina, if you prefer jacketed bullets, by all means use them. But cast lead bullets in my "mostly" opinion are still around simply because they work. Period. If they didn't work, no one would use them.

In my 35 or so years of actively hunting I've killed around a dozen deer with cast bullets; three from a revolver and the remainder from .30 caliber rifles. If I knew I'd never have to take another shot over about 100 yds. on anything larger than a deer or a hog, I'd never load another jacketed bullet. They're just not necessary.

35W
 
Macchina, here is the simple answer to your question. Jhps are used in self-defense against humans because they usually stop INSIDE the target. The last thing you want is for the bullet to zip through the bad guy and injure (or kill) an innocent bystander.

Hard cast, flat point bullets have tremendous penetration. This is not a problem with a charging bear in the woods, but it WOULD be in a self-defense situation in a crowded theater.

Happy shooting
 
Most jacketed bullets used in pistols are like Dairy Queen chocolate dipped ice cream cones; thin hard shell covering a very soft interior. Hard cast bullets a hard outside and inside. They don't deform very easily and that is one of the reasons why they penetrate so well in thick skinned and heavily boned game. Another reason is they usually have high sectional density because they are heavy for caliber. Yet another reason is they are fired at a velocity that does not result in the bullet material failing or deflection.
 
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