Is This a dumb Idea ?

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the lone gunman

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As I metioned in another post I am the very happy owner of a marlin 1894 44 mag lever action. I have been using Blazer 240 jhp ammo. I had this little brain fart the other nite that I can drop a BB size #6 from my 20 guage into the HP and seal it with fingernail polish. wouldnt it make the bullet expand more/ (not that you really need it to) just for fun blasting water jugs and such.. I got to much time on my hands I guess.
 
IMHO yes according to your topic , but feel free to play with the idea , afer all that is how we learn . and milk jugs wont sue you for modding ammo.
 
Usually plugging up the cavity with something will defeat the design of the bullet and make it expand less, not more.

But what the heck, try it and see what happens, it's not like you're doing anything dangerous. Just make sure they're sealed in there and recoil won't dislodge them and, as an earlier poster mentioned, jam your action.

But for God's sakes, don't put anything explosive in the cavity like a large magnum pistol primer! ;)
 
Cor-Bon? anyone?

I see what you getting at, but I believe the Cor-Bon Pow-R-Ball has already tried to fill that niche of the ammo market. Other than that, go for it.
 
"But for God's sakes, don't put anything explosive in the cavity like a large magnum pistol primer"

Oh Boy ,dont get me thinking !!!! Expolosion at point of impact , Awesome!!
 
Not to steal the thread... but along the same lines...

... once heard of a dude that claimed sealing a "drop" of mercury into a hollow point round... "would wrack havoc upon a body".
Anyone ever hear of this?
 
The "primer in the hollowpoint" thing is spectacular, but is pretty much only surface.

Explosive rounds have been tried in the past on big game (like... elephants, dude...), and they resulted in surface wounds, little penetration, and lots of reddish matter between the elephant's toenails.

The pow-r-ball gets goopy and allows the thing to expand when it hits. A lead ball would just fuse and act like a LRN...
 
I have the 1894c in .357 and love it. just don't shoot lots of 44spl through it wihout cleaning the chamber real good. deposits make the longer version not fit anymore
 
... once heard of a dude that claimed sealing a "drop" of mercury into a hollow point round... "would wrack havoc upon a body".
Anyone ever hear of this?
Click to expand...

Well never heard of it loaded in the point of a bullet but mercury is a poison. Causes all kinds of short and long term health problems.
 
... once heard of a dude that claimed sealing a "drop" of mercury into a hollow point round... "would wrack havoc upon a body".
Click to expand...

Yes, a hollow point hitting a body would most definately wrack havoc...As far as the Mercury goes; maybe.:D
 
once heard of a dude that claimed sealing a "drop" of mercury into a hollow point round... "would wrack havoc upon a body".
Anyone ever hear of this?
Click to expand...
As far as I know, it was first portrayed in the movie "The Day Of The Jackal." (1973)

The concept is that the heavy metal would, through inertia, continue onward through its target. Of course, the movie didn't take into account the added weight of the bullet, nor the increased pressure curve from chamber through barrel, let alone the changes occurring in the bullet's trajectory.

Of course the movie led the viewer to believe that all the shooter had to do was to place the scope's crosshairs onto the desired target, and that, magically, the bullet would arrive at the destination exactly at that precise spot, whatever the range said bullet met target!
 
I've tried that. It will not expand the same as if the hollow point gets clogged by clothing. If you want a more pronounced effect get some 'flying ashtray' rounds, shallow but wide hollow point, try a variety of them.

Mercury will alloy with the lead making it brittle. This can cause the bullet to shatter in the barrel or on impact. It's been discussed quite often.

http://yarchive.net/gun/ammo/mercury_in_bullet.html

Now a frangible bullet is not a bad idea for some applications but not one that uses mercury which is brain eating nasty. Look up mad hatters disease.
 
And, whatEVER you do, don't even think about drilling out the hollow point and inserting a .22 blank backwards into it. NOPE. Don't even THINK about it!
 
Tried inserting a primer in the hollow and fixing it in place. It would wedge into one of the Speer hollow points so we didn't have to try to glue it in. It failed to detonate on every round which shocked both me and the friend who were trying it. Recovered rounds didn't much expand either. The primer would press into the lead. It might work if you were to put the primer on something harder than lead and then put a BB or something to act as a striker on the primer but we never got back to trying the silly stuff. :)

Had not heard of or tried the .22lr trick, I think it would need a custom made bullet/sabot to hold it. Sounds like one of those joke polish pistols though. :)
 
I have actually seen the .22 blank in the nose trick done. It works pretty well...but, considering the tubular mag, you would need to make sure they were flush or slightly sunken in the nose if you wanted to load it up.

.32 rimfire blanks in 45-70 work well also. They go off every time if you are shooting at something pretty hard. Probably wouldn't on a water jug but rocks, yes!
 
the lone gunman said:
As I metioned in another post I am the very happy owner of a marlin 1894 44 mag lever action. I have been using Blazer 240 jhp ammo. I had this little brain fart the other nite that I can drop a BB size #6 from my 20 guage into the HP and seal it with fingernail polish.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't do this.

For the same reason you don't use round-nose bullets in ammo which goes into a tube-magazine - recoil will bump the nose of one bullet against the primer of the round in front, perhaps hard enough to cause a KB.

Husker1911 said:
Quote: once heard of a dude that claimed sealing a "drop" of mercury into a hollow point round... "would wrack havoc upon a body".
Anyone ever hear of this?

As far as I know, it was first portrayed in the movie "The Day Of The Jackal." (1973)

The concept is that the heavy metal would, through inertia, continue onward through its target.
Click to expand...
Not quite. First, mercury is toxic (in sufficient quantities). Second, like water, it's pretty much incompressible - so when the bullet impacts and tries to crumple, Newton's third law comes into play. "For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction", so the force trying to compress the bullet results in an opposite reaction, essentially exploding the bullet through sheer opposite force (similar in concept to the old "hydraulic bullet", which is a hollow-point filled with water and sealed with lead).

I'm no chemist but I understand that mercury dissolves lead over time, so you may have to use the bullet fairly quickly.
 
careful with the BB

In your tube mag, the BB in the bullet nose would be a little firing pin sitting against the primer of the cartridge in front of it. I could almost guarantee interesting results.

My .02 on the mercury is that people have been known to confuse "mercury" with "mercury fulminate". Two different things. Also mercury dissolves lead, I believe. You might end up with a mercury amalgam section at the front of your lead core, which would be like a dental filling. Maybe. Maybe the planet Mercury would be a better choice.

I understand (but have no experience - and really no experience - I am not playing coy) that any heavy fluid in the tip of an HP will cause violent expansion. I still think it is a lot of effort to produce something of questionable performance that requires great care to handle and not leak all over and make a mess.

Sorry for the edit - I noticed you specified a #6 shot BB. The lead BB might not set off a primer in a tube mag, but might deform instead.

Also - hot tip on things to avoid - didn't the ATF rule that Winchester hollowpoints with the expander ball were illegal a few years back? Winchester made a pocket pistol load with a (steel) BB in the HP cavity to assist in expanding. A lead BB might plug up the HP and cause it to expand less. A hard (steel) object might (and did?) push it open. The ATF thought the idea sucked as it allowed a .25 acp to punch several layers of kevlar. I recommend against replicating anything that could cause incarceration.
 
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