The only thing that I have shot with it is a 3 liter bottle filled with water. It exploded as expected. The reason that there isn't any outside testing is that most people, Evan Marshall included, want the ammo for free. I can see why, it ain't cheap, but RBCD does not give away ammo. They really don't care much about the civilian market. It wasn't even available to us until 1999 and even today nearly 80% of the production is for governments. That is why there is no advertising and when they do start advertising next year it will not be in regular mainstream gun mags. I never tried those other rounds mentioned, but back in the 1980's I carried Glaser Safety Slugs, dispite accuracy problems, and by 1994 I had switched to MagSafes. Joe Zambone even became a buddy of mine, we both rode the same kind of motorcycles. His stuff was good, but RBCD is faster, operates at lower pressures, penetrates intermediate barriers, and costs less.
That government ammo deal is odd. Frequently when the government offers you a contract to develop a load for them it comes with a non-disclosure agreement. I think just about everything that RBCD has did. In fact when I wrote that article on TFL about RBCD ammo being used by the Canadian sniper for the world record sniper shot in Afghanistan last year, Roscoe Stoker, the man who was the owner of RBCD, called me the next day because he had gotten a call from the govt. 'strongly suggesting' that he review his non-disclosure agreement with his attorney. Thing is that I did'nt get the info from Roscoe at all. He didn't know about it until I told him what happened. RBCD did a load called the 'Air Marshall' or 'Meteor'. It was developed under contract. It is a light bullet going nearly 3000 fps from a handgun. Blows huge cavities at 25 feet, but will not penetrate the skin of an airplane and will bounce off a leather jacket at 75 feet. It is considered non-lethal at 50 feet. Here is an article on it:
http://www.afji.com/AFJI/Mags/2001/August/MeteorRound.htm
This was done over two years ago. I spoke with a FAM this last summer and they are carrying SIG P229's with 125gr Gold Dots. I don't know what happened to the RBCD stuff.
Point is MANY manufacturers provide ammo to various arms of the govt. and many are told in the contract not to discuss it.
As far as an explanation, I can only guess. With a mechanical engineer friend we have decided that Roscoe has come up with a polymer that falls apart within a certain velocity area when passing through a particular desity of material. The slug will penetrate stuff that is hard, but when things soften up it expands faster. The density of the warm meat is the 'perfect' density, while in cold meat it will expand, but not as well. It goes through auto glass or a sheet of steel, but not a jug of water. Sheet rock is in between, so it penetrates some, then falls apart after many. It seems to be a combination of velocity and density. I don't think heat has anything to do with it. This is all just a guess, but it is the best I can come up with, if anyone has a better idea I would love to hear it.
Bluesbear, you need to go play with 2 or 3 of those rounds and shoot something good. Which .45 ACP load did you get? There are 3 different ones.