Since someone seems to think that hollow points eeom to work on deer, let me amplify my comments. I have seen hollow point bullets that have expanded in deer. I have also seen hollow points bullet that were plugged with hair and hide that did not expand. Hollow point design for a wide range of diameter of bullets, and slugs, have been something I have explored over many years with a friend who designed his own bullets for better performance. He had been at it for 20 years before we met, so i had the benefit of not only seeing the slugs we recovered from deer, but also his collection of slugs. I have read similar comments in the literature from other writers over the years about this phenomena. That is why I said, Hollow point do not always reliably expand in deer.
Just as a reminder of a famous shooting involving hollow points, President Reagan was shot with a .22 hollow point with an explosive charge in the hollow point intended to make the nose of the bullet explode inside his chest. The bullet glanced off his rib, closing the nose of the hollow point, so that the explosive did not go off. It saved the President's life.
The current nylon tipped bullets that Hornady and others are making is a good idea, for insuring that the rounds feel properly through actions, and particularly that they won't set off another primer of a case in front of them in a tubular magazine when the gun recoils. But, No one expects them to expand the bullet 100% of the time on impact. Wish it were true. I believe that the engineers at Hornady have come closer to insuring expansion on impact than other have, because there is a empty hole below the tip for it to drive down into, but that almost surely depends on a square to the target hit, and may not work if a glancing shot off a leg or shoulder or neck bone is made that bends the nose enough to prevent such movement.
Hell, we use to put steel BBs in the hollow points of .38 bullets to help them expand, and even made some that had a grain or two with black powder under that BB to make them explode on impact. Most of the time, they worked. But not always. We did succeed in making semi-wadcutters for .38 and .357 revolvers that would penetrate windshields and car doors reliably by putting a BB in the bottom of the bullet mold before pouring the lead in. A small notch in the mold to center the BB allowed the BB to be surrounded with lead, with only the barest copper showing in the center of the bullet. But, when it hit steel, or tempered glass, it would go right through. Cheap armor piercing ammo, of course.
There are other websites where all the modern zip guns and their accoutrements can be discussed. This sight is about Traditional BP arms. I agree with Roundball and Runner on that point. We aren't nasty to folks who bring up matters on these zip guns, but we are also not the best place to get information.
I help friends who own those guns figure out why they aren't firing when they get in trouble, but other than that, and keeping an eye on the magaizine articles, I don't have any direct contact with zip guns. If I want to clean plastic out of a barrel, I will stick to my modern trap shotgun. My reason for choosing not to be involved with this stuff, is because at the heart of all of it, is the belief that you can invent a new wheel. We CAN make better Traditional guns, with better sights, and we can learn to be better shooters. But, all the science relating to the BP guns has been long worked out, and worked over ad nauseum.
What I do witness from the sidelines is people who don't practice shooting enough, and don't know their guns or equipment, buying cheap zip guns, with all the toys that go with them, trying to take advantage of certain State's Muzzle Loading seasons to take more deer. The guns they choose are large bore, and the loads they use produce heavy recoil they have not trained themselves to handle. They are not good shooters, and think they can compensate for the lack of talent, and practice by using a scope on these guns. They also think they can take good shots at running deer, and that a bad hit with a huge bullet compensates for poor shot placement.
They wound and maim a lot of deer, which is okay by the state game departments, because their primary concern is to reduce the number of deer/auto accidents in their state. The limit on the season, and the number of permits sold each year guarantees that there will be deer someplace in the state the next year. It may take 10 years for deer to work back into an area that is overhunted, but, again, the State doesn't care about that. They don't want the insurance industry screaming at the legislatures, and they don't want bambi dying of starvation on some bunny huggers front lawn. Everything in between is okay.
Just because the state allows something to be used to take game doesn't make it the right thing to do. The members of this forum have simply chosen to take a stand on the issue. Sorry if that elbows you a little .
