I could tell ya'll were not impressed by the impact of the 32 and 58 cal slugs on Ballistic Bear, so... I thought a comparison was in order.
Here are the contestants; a Smith and Wesson 357 with 38 spec wadcutter, 357 soft nose and jacketed hollow point and Chief Justice 87 cal with 920 grn slug and 2oz of 25 caliber buckshot.



Up first the SW from left to right 38, 357 soft point, 357 JHP. None of these exited the bear! What distance you ask...30 ft yes FEET.


This is the 38 special wad cutter which is one knuckle deep.


The 357 soft point had the best penetration from this gun. It is a hot load 1235 ft/sec 158 grn for 535 ft/lbs. Despite these three shots the bear was not moved.


Keeping the distance at 30 ft for the CJ, the first pic shows the bears thrown to the left by the single impact.



As you can see the impact is larger than the diameter of the slug. Barnes 87 cal 925 grn @ 585 ft/sec for 700 ft/lbs.

The depth is comparable to the 357 despite the much flatter tip, and a cross sectional area 6 times larger ( 0.1 sq in vs 0.59 sq in ).



This is the muzzle loading material for the buckshot. I'm using #3 buck (25 cal) here but any shot will do. The larger wad is the base the thin card is the top wad or card to hold it all in the barrel.



For safety and spread the buckshot was shot at 45 feet.



Note the penetration of the buck into the 6x6 pressure treated wood (three balls just below the center of the bear).



Here are all the slugs used during the testing. All were recovered in the bear, none were able to exit.


Oh, the knife shown was a recent Christmas present. It is a large piece which matches the massive energy and fun to be had with the Barnes Chief Justice. It is a liner lock, bone scales, polished blade and form fitted leather belt pouch as seen with the CJ in the second pic.



Kent



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/16/2009 07:41PM by Cajun Justice.

The Chief Justice Won!!! Yeah!!!! Yippie!!!! Whaaaaahoh!!!!!

I was pullin' for it ....

Another excellent post. Thank you. By golly ... where do I get me one of them Chief Justicesss???



Gary

Hey Kent,

I bought some of that duct seal this morning. ;?) That looks like too much fun.

Do you ever do anything to "re-glob-ify" it or anything? Heat it? Read to it? haha.

I'm amazed at how the stuff absorbs energy. Man ... looks like that would be some fine armor (if it could be carried).

Gary

Thanks Tofazfou,

The only reason I brought out the firearm was to have a "standard" which everyone thinks is a heavy hitter. The duct seal is very tough and I fear it gave a false impression of the airguns energy. To tell the true this was the first I had shot it with a firearm, it surprised me too. I had originally bought the duct seal just after Standing Stone IV to use as a silent back stop. It works great for this. It also catches slugs with minimal damage for examination of rifling etc.

To belatedly answer Gary's questions, it requires no maintenance, just mold it into a new shape, and the only thing I haven't figured out is how to separate it from all the lead it has absorbed over the years.

Kent

Hi Kent,

Guess it's about like one of those Stucky's Nut Log. Do you find yourself just staring at it, over a cup of coffee, at 3am? I know ... me too.



I'm "home alone" for nine days. Kelly's off to visit the grandkids in Arz. Oh boy ... this can't be good. Hopefully, the dogs will remember to feed me.

Gary

What kinda holster would you carry the CJ in?

Thats awesome

I was thinking ... a nice blue alligator hide ...

barnespneumatic Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I was thinking ... a nice blue alligator hide ...
>


Cool. red stitching?

Most excellent post Kent! There is a load of fun to be had here comparing the performance of the guns poor BB got blasted with. Personally, I lean towards the Carnivore as the big winner so far. The .58 penetrated as deep (looks like two knuckles is as deep as anything got) as the high speed .357 but did it from 5 times as far away.

Now if the winner is decided on what moves the bear the furthest it would appear the Justice is the only qualifying competitor!

Actually, we're the big winners here. How cool is to to see back to back comparisons between high power big bores and the familiar .357? With pictures? If this doesn't make the power of these guns clear, nothing will.

Pukka !!

Though I do believe the bear is now thumbing his nose at you for not a. full penetration and b. not knocking him over.

What ya got next for him....!!

Great post

Which really shows the hollywood myth of getting lifted up and blown away. Here this cute little bear stops a bullet in just inches, and hardly moves. Yet most these shots would vent a person even after hitting bone, and in hollywood, would go flying. Dory

Yeah, the Hollywood(land) types want us all to believe that a single shot from a 9mm pistol can knock a bad guy back at least a couple steps, and that a shotgun blast can throw him all the way across the room, but it's all total BS. To film those effects, the actors have to be hooked to harnesses that yank them backwards when the special effect squibs go off simulating the bullet impact. The wires attached to the harness are typically yanked by...you guessed it...a couple of sweaty dudes off camera that are probably enjoying dumping the actor back on his/her butt for the next dozen takes. In real life if someone gets knocked back when they're shot it's mostly incidental, and their own legs supplied the motive power.

My other pet movie peeve is the typical "Hollywood" explosion...giant orange fireballs and gouts of black smoke. Every car that drives off a road or gets shot up or whatever HAS to explode...I guess it's some sort of movie-magic rule. I've personally fired thousands of high-explosive rockets from helicopter gunships, and witnessed everything from bombs to artillery to hand grenades blowing up. I can tell you for dead certain that actual explosions are much more boring to watch (provided you're far enough away, of course!). There's NO huge orange fireball, NO giant cloud of roiling black smoke, nothing dramatic like that. What you really get is a strobelight-brief flash of white light and a relatively small, dirty grey cloud of smoke that quickly dissapates. The real damage is done by the jagged steel shell fragments that go ripping away from the explosion at extremely high speed. You never see those since they're moving much too fast to follow, though they might kick up a bit of dust here and there.

Hollywood aside, if you really want to knock something down you gotta use something heavy and slow...like a car. A three thousand pound sedan (21 million grain projectile) travelling at 30 mph (44 feet per second) works out to 90,270 ft.lbs of "muzzle" energy. To get the same energy level from a firearm, you'd have to fire thirty-three 12 ga. shotguns (with 1 oz. slugs) all at once, and have none of the slugs exit the target. When you figure the amount of energy involved at freeway speeds (especially with head-on collisions), it's not too surprising that car crashes are a major cause of death and injury. The surprise is that so many people walk away from them, which is actually more of a testiment to how far we've come in automotive design.

And of course as any parent knows, the average five-year old that comes crashing into your knees when you get home has far more 'knockdown power" than you'd otherwise expect!

Hi Sean,

Good info. And ... as a side note ... Thank you sincerely for your service to our country. I suspect there were a few rounds coming back at you.

The good ole Mythbusters did a series on the silly Hollywood effects. Funny ... as in so many areas of life ... people are complete disappointed with truth and reality. They demand fantasy - so they get it.

Was really neat to see Kent's comparison of real life shots. Jerry and I were talking last night: Funny how the .357 magnum has a magic name - to which people just instinctively attribute absurd power. It's got that marketing magic to the name ... like "Hemi, or titanium, new and improved!" haha.

Gary

Hey!!!!
If Dirty Harry says its as powerful as a 16" naval gun, thats good enough for me.

Come to think of it, SW must owe alot to ol' Harry

Sorry, the character Harry Callahan used a .44 magnum.

Correct . . . the "bad cop" vigilante in Magnum Force used a stainless .357 Magnum. Kinda like Kent's actually . . . hmmmmmm.

-- Jim



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/06/2009 05:17PM by Jim.

I've got a .357 Magnum just like Kent's too. As Harry noted, "a man's gotta know his limitations." The .44 might be great in bear country but I wouldn't want to go plinking with it. Milder rounds are available but the .44 is a big heavy frame gun for guys lke Dirty Harry... Hollywood heros that is.

Dudes!

LOOK what has happened to you all!! You're turning into a pack of .... animals!!!

FIREARMS???

Is THIS what it's come to??

hahahah

Gary

One of the "tactical" shows on one of the outdoor channels did a 1/2 hour on Magnum handguns. The histopry, what they cost in 1935 (US$60.00),why they are so popular, how they caught on , or not, with various law enforcement agencies and all the flavors.

spent the whole 30 minutes drooling......

I think you will find that Harry used to shave with his .357. Thats what I was refering to......
He also cleaned his nails with an old .45

And had handgrenades with milk for breakfast.

So there.

I've got one of those ultra-lightweight S&W .44 mag pistols, it's the one I carry around for fishing, picking blueberries, hiking, etc. It's by far the most economical gun I own, especially when I take it to the range to practice. Yes...good quality ammo in .44 mag is fairly expensive, but...

It hurts so much to shoot that nobody ever asks to shoot it more than once.

I can imagine it would hurt!! No mass to absorb the recoil meaning its the shooter sucking it all up!!
Ouch!!!

It's a pussycat with .44 Specials, tolerable with factory ammo up to about the 240 grainers, and brutal with the heavyweights you need for bears and other big critters. Buffalo Bore actually makes a special load just for this pistol, one with fairly heavy super-hard cast lead solids. They load it to the point where it'll do enough damage, but not to the point where the recoil is unmanagable.

I've shot it side-by-side with one of the S&W .500 Mags, and the larger revolver is much more gentle to shoot by comparison. Of course, that huge .500 also weighs about five pounds more, so it ought to be. I figure that if I REALLY need to fire it at a bear, the recoil will be a fairly minor concern.

Quote-I figure that if I REALLY need to fire it at a bear, the recoil will be a fairly minor concern. -Quote

LOL

this was one fun post to read. even though an airgun is not a firearm, it is pretty cool to dwelve into the comparisons between the two. well done.

nice guns too.

Well, this thread is especially good, because of Chief Justice (because of many reasons of course), but I got to say that I pretty much love the idea of Chief justice. Very large smooth bore airgun capable to shoot slugs accurately... and shots, darts and all such things.

I hope that there will come more threads where the Chief Justice has special role in