A pure Lead Cast Round Ball will upset and flatten going well under the Speed of Sound( 1135 fps, approx.) Your 1,000 FPE information was developed by MODERN shooters, using Smaller caliber Bullets, mostly Jacketed, that require velocities IN EXCESS of the speed of sound for the Jackets to expand, and allow the core to expand the nose of the bullets in soft flesh.
Modern bullets( typically .30 cal. and smaller) Begin making a much smaller Entrance HOLE in game, than most muzzleloaders will. Compare a .45 to a 30 caliber bullet. I have taken a RB that I will be shooting, and a similar round ball the same diameter as would be used in a modern cartridge to show people the Physical difference in size and weight. Its the best way I know to show them WHY comparing modern cartridge bullets to MLing RBs is Apples vs. Oranges. Most people have never held a cast lead ball in their hands. GIVE THEM THAT OPPORTUNITY.
Next, do some comparison penetration testing. When I got my new .50 cal. rifle, A friend at the club wanted to test the penetration of a bullet fired from his then-new Sharps replica, .50-140-550 Sharps cartridge.
I built a " box" using 1 inch pine boards, spaced one inch apart. The boards are actually cut to about 7/8", but that is a one inch thick board, by commonly accepted lumber standards. The box had 12 or 13 boards, front to back.
To begin, I fired some high velocity .22 LR ammo into the boards. I was surprised that these little hollow points, would travel through 2 of the boards and bury themselves into the 3rd.
Next, I use my .30-06, shooting Remington Core-loc 180 grain Jacked SP ammo. The bullet penetrated 8 boards, and expanded its nose to about 40 caliber.
I then shot two shots from my new .50, using 60 grains of FFFg, and then 100 grains of FFFg. .490 ball, with .015 patch lubed with spit. Both balls penetrated 6 boards, smashing into the 7. The ball fired with the heavier powder charge hit hard enough that its jagged edge stuck into the wood, but the spent ball fell off into my hand as soon as I touched it. Both were about the size of a nickel. Completely flattened.
I then fired a .45-70 Commercial .405 grain JSP bullet into the box. It penetrated 10 boards and broke( cracked the 11th board) It expanded well, reaching approx. 55 caliber.
My friend then fired his .50-140-550 Sharps. The bullet penetrated 12 boards, key-holing sideways the final 3 boards. It then penetrated an old railroad tie, soaked in creosote, about and inch and a half. We were able to dig the bullet out of the Tie using knives and hatchets. The bullet, made of some alloy, did NOT expand. It did, of course, penetrate further than anything Else fired that day, and smashed sideways through at least 4 inches of wood, after first penetrating 9 inches of wood and air space.
Save your spent balls and bullets.
I did a talk to some college students about guns, bullets and ballistics. They were members of a " Sherlock Holmes" club on campus. They wanted to know as much as possible about the guns and ammo used in the Conan Doyle Stories, by both Holmes, and Dr. Watson. I took to the presentation a couple of boxes of ammo and spent bullets. They were fascinated.
Most had never held nor shot a gun of any kind. Most had never held a live cartridge, nor spent bullets. Several of the spent bullets had been recovered from game my friend and I had taken over the years. Once they got over the " Icky-poo" reactions, they became fascinated that they were actually holding a spent slug or ball that had killed something. Talk about modern society disconnect! :shocked2: :nono: :idunno: :surrender:
I can truthfully say that those spent bullets made a far better impression on the students, than anything I said, using my extensive notes from all the Sherlock Holmes stories. They spurred more questions from the students than were asked about any of my references during my presentation.
If I were to do it again, I would begin with passing around the spent bullets( those retrieved from backstops, and penetration tests are just as awesome to the unknowing as a spent bullet or ball removed from game.)MY friend, Jim, who loaned me some of the cartridges I used from his collection, and provided some Large spent, Shotgun slugs( I didn't have any Brown Bess sized Balls to show) passed the bullets and balls around, all distorted, with only the center of the rear of the ball or bullet showing enough detail to determine its caliber. Some still showed rifling, so all these young " detectives" became immediately curious about how crime labs used these kinds of things to match bullets to guns, and empty casings.
I think they were most impressed that the soft lead balls, and shotgun slugs not only expanded MORE than bullets did, but that retained most of their original weight more than most bullets. When I explained the composition of most alloy bullets, and how the antimony actually makes the lead brittle, they began to understand why the 19th century, slow velocity .44 cal. revolvers mentioned in the Holmes stories would have such a devastating effect on the human body.
I hope this helps YOU understand BP ballistics, and then helps you do a better job of convincing the man why MLers have been killing game cleanly for more than 500 years.
If you read the hunting stories by these modern " experts" with their Super guns, you will find they really aren't HUNTERS at all. THEY tend to be "SHOOTERS", who need Magnum rifles, and big powered scope sights, because they don't have the woodsmanship skills to get closer to their game. They want more speed, more power, because they feel they have to break a leg bone of the deer they shoot, in order to knock the animal down right there. They don't know how to track game, other than to follow blood trails, which any kid can do. If that deer gets out of sight, they haven't a clue how to go about identifying its tracks, much less following those tracks to the body.
Because of limitations of our open sights, MLers have to get closer to game. We don't try to break legs with our shots. Instead, we aim right behind that front elbow, to put a ball 1/3 of the distance up from the bottom of the chest, right behind the leg, to hit the Heart/Lung area, to cause massive damage to these vital organs, and a quick drop in Blood pressure that renders the deer unconscious quickly.
The debate among us MLers is whether a RB of a given caliber does this better, and faster, than a conical bullet of the same caliber does. Conicals are conceded to give better penetration at any distance. But, we don't always see much evidence that a lead conical expands very much, compared to a lead ball.
Knowing the expansion that is possible when a pure lead shotgun slug hits a deer, I think the main problem with the "Debate " over RB vs. conical, rests in the fact that many MLers still BUY swaged alloy conicals, and its those conicals that give great (over?)penetration, and skews the debate into an "Apples vs. Oranges" issue again. :hmm: :thumbsup: