Anyone ever seen a bullet shot at memory foam?

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karz10

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I was just wondering, sometimes people post mythbusters stuff about what bullets will and won't penatrate, like today there's one about how deep and at what angles various bullets penetrate water, if someone went under water to avoid gun fire, etc...

Well, I have been wondering, after buying a memory foam mattress last year, which has done wonders for my back, BTW, how easily various caliber bullets would penetrate it.

I mean, it's just foam, it might fly through like a knife through butter, but since it's 14" thick, and some of it is denser memory foam, I wonder if it would slow down a bullet at all? Especially a lighter hand gun round, maybe?

Outside of general curiousity, I was also wondering from a home safety perspective, since the mattresses are light enough to slide off the bed and get behind it, seems that they would have more resistance power than a regular spring mattress with little substance.

Anyone ever heard of someone testing this seriously, or just for fun? I'm curious, not curious enough to try to shoot my mattress yet, as they are kind of expensive, but I wonder if anyone ever got some scraps and shot at it before?

I tried searching google/yahoo, and only got results for body armor OR selling memory foam mattresses, but nothing really combined, so it's probably not possible, or you would think someone would have something online about it, but just in case....

Just curious,

Karz
 
You didn't ask the salesman at the time?
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LOL, no. At the time I was more concerned with the price tag of filling up the house we just bought with things like a bedroom set, and ultimately trying to find a mattress that would be better for my back, that wouldn't blow the budget any further out the window...

This was before my recent awakening, HD/SD makeover, getting interested in purchasing my first gun, researching it, becoming a THR fan(atic), getting my first gun, range membership and joining an IDPA club...

So, I wasn't thinking tactically at the time :banghead:

Next time I go mattress shopping, I'll ask more questions, now that I'm thinking more clearly and have my priorities in order. :D

Karz
 
Well for what it's worth I've learned that density can be as important as hardness when it comes to stopping projectiles. Also ductility and tensile strength. But the point is that 14" of foam, even if it doesn't stop a bullet, would have to make it penetrate you less. Plus it'd be harder to aim at you.
 
That would be a heck of a selling point!
"Notice as Kelly jumps on the bed, the wine glass doesn't spill!"
"Now watch Kelly fire 12 rounds of 9mm +P at Frank! No injury at all!"
:evil:
 
That would be a heck of a selling point!
"Notice as Kelly jumps on the bed, the wine glass doesn't spill!"
"Now watch Kelly fire 12 rounds of 9mm +P at Frank! No injury at all!"
Click to expand...
ROFL


But the point is that 14" of foam, even if it doesn't stop a bullet, would have to make it penetrate you less. Plus it'd be harder to aim at you.
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Well, it does seem logical to me, I'd be real curious to see someone test it...

Karz
 
don't know about a bullet,but it will stop a arrow movin @ about 305ft/second with target points.
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Was it a memory foam mattress? I don't know much about bows, but my sister has a fairly impressive looking compound bow that I know nothing about(my only experience is with recurve bows in summer camp), but I've seen her arrows zip through a regular mattress.
 
Well. You could always buy a couple of those memory foam pillows and tape them together to get the thickness of your mattress. It would be a lot cheaper too. :D
 
OK, so who's gonna shoot their thousand dollar bed, so we can satisfy our curiosity.

We the "Bed O' Truth" guys here.
 
If I can talk them out of about ten pieces of 4x4 foam, I would be glad to test it out.

I may need some help with the 9mm and 40S&W though. I go from 38/357 to 10mm/41mag. I skipped the wundernine and the 40S&W.

Rifles I have covered, up to 7.62x54

bob
 
Oddly enough I have a memory foam sample piece that they sent me before I got my memory foam mattress. If I can find a place to shoot it I will report my results. FYI my piece is about 8in thick.
 
Why not ask the salesperson.... "Will this mattress stop a bullet?"

Watching the reaction ought to be good for a chuckle or two.

(If he or she says something like, "Well, depends on the cartridge and type of bullet," you may have made a friend!)

--------

For what it's worth, I shot my Crosman Walther CO2 semiauto BB pistol through some regular foam rubber once and it punched out the neatest "wound channels" you ever saw. Here's the result --entry was at the narrow end of the punchouts:
 
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Well it looks like Bob can do multiple tests if he gets his hands on some memory foam...

And Kd has some 8" sample foam he can shoot w/ his gun of choice after he finds a place to shoot it...

Maybe we will get to satisfy our curiousity :D

If all else fails, we could try to write mythbusters, I don't know if it's a myth or not, but it seems they like to shoot things and blow things up, they'd probably be down with it.

But I'm still interested to see what our members can come up with. Thanks for the replies!

Regards,

Karz
 
that sounds like something youd want to try out yourself. i know if ur in a shootout in your house the best thing to hide behind is a tv. the tv screen can deflect 9mm bullets. Another thing i had to try was those supposedly indestructable Nalgene water bottles. They say they can be run over by a car and all this nonsense. The water bottle didnt argue too much with a 12 ga slug going right through it. Half the fun is testing this stuff yourself. sometimes curiosity gets the better of me when i find lawnmowers being thrown out on the side of the road. it usually doesnt take much to get them running. Im sure theres someone else whos wondering how many 762x39 rounds it takes to stop a lawnmower.
 
I dunno if I would trust a tv screen to stop any bullets. Maybe I am just a skeptic on this front, but tv and other crt tubes aren't very thick.
 
CRTs won't stop a bullet no way. They're vaccum sealed, too...they make a nice pop.
 
WOW

i know if ur in a shootout in your house the best thing to hide behind is a tv. the tv screen can deflect 9mm bullets.
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I'm going to have to loose a few pounds if i'm going to climb up on the wall an hide behind the LCD screen.:p
 
I hear sample blocks are pretty easy to get a hold of...maybe I can snag one before the Austin shoot tomorrow. Assuming the rain stops, maybe I can plug it a few times with my .45 and post the pictures...
 
I'm going to stick my neck out on the line ...

and suggest that the best test would be the 9mm. Larger rounds tend to give better penetration in ballistic gel (I miss ammolabs:( )

And here are my predicted results. 1150 fps in front of mattress, 1130 fps in back of mattress, 1145 fps if shot thru 14 inches of air.

IOW, I don't think it will do much to slow the 9mm bullet. Other larger rounds will experience even less slowage ….
 
Thanks for the site link, asked for a sample.

I think its worth pointing out that you can order foam targets for shooting on-line, so the notion of foam stopping bullets isn't unprecedented. Might not be exactly the same foam, but we're in the same ballpark.
 
I would guess that a memory foam matress would be better at stopping a bullet than a regular spring one. I've got a Tempurpedic and man is that thing heavy so I'm guessing it's much denser than a coil spring one. So when you fire a bullet at a foam mattress, it has to go through solid foam. When you fire it at a coil spirng matress, it has a lot of air to go through.
 
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