Shotguns vs rifles

[JHC]

That's horrible performance, and I will be the first to agree that 5.56 is greatly dependant upon using a quality projectile. This year, I will be using Browntip. Past years I have used, with great success:

-75gr Gold Dot
-RA556B
-70gr GMX (variable...won't be using that anymore. Had a failure to expand at 125m, the ones that DID expand were excellent, however.)

I've liked the results on deer from:
- 60 grain Nosler Partition - shot head on into the throat - recovered a nicely expanded slug about 16" back in the cavity. Range was short coming at me down a trail. Buck fell backward and I jumped and ran to it quickly and massive gouts of blood was being ejected out the entrance wound. Under that entrance wound looked like a 3" wound channel into the chest cavity. That deer expired very quickly.


- 55 grain Trophy Bonded Bear Claw - double lunged a buck at approx 10-12 yards. Recovered picture perfect expanded slug under the opposite hide. Get this, TWO ribs were fractured around the .22 cal entrance wound. WTF is up with that? Wound channel through the lungs seemed similar to a .30-30's. Bored a 2" hole through everything.


- 68 grain OTM (Black Hills load) - broadside on a doe at like 15 yards. This one completely souped both lungs and shredded the heart open like a big flower. Only noticed some copper fragments.


- 77 grain OTM (Black Hills load) - two deer were bang flops. One on a doe at about 40 yards through the neck, left a gaping 4" dia exit wound on the opposite side. The other was a buck shot in the shoulder at about 15yards when he paused after nearly trampling me on a trail during the rut. He dropped in his tracks. Light was fading it was windy and frigid and I did no autopsy in the dark during hasty field dressing.


- 55 grain Barnes VOR-TX load - not recovered but not for lack of searching. This buck was shot in the throat and the wound channel passed through the chest and the slug punched a .5" dia hole through the diaphragm and I never could find the slug in the offal.

Notably, each shot with these was at close range. I have recovered a couple of them and will try to find where I stashed them and get some pics. Never found an OTM even when in the case of the 68 grain OTM I didn't find an exit wound on the off side. Saw a few fragments in what was left of the heart lungs.


ETA: One thing I like about my close range deer hunting with the .223 is there isn't the massive fragmenting of bone slivers blasted all over the insides and meat as I saw from a couple killed under 100 yards with .308 loads. I think .30-30 is about perfect. Nil bloodshot meat and 2" dia holes augered through everything soft and hard things more just broken.

[Unobtanium]

I've liked the results on deer from:
- 60 grain Nosler Partition - shot head on into the throat - recovered a nicely expanded slug about 16" back in the cavity. Range was short coming at me down a trail. Buck fell backward and I jumped and ran to it quickly and massive gouts of blood was being ejected out the entrance wound. Under that entrance wound looked like a 3" wound channel into the chest cavity. That deer expired very quickly.


- 55 grain Trophy Bonded Bear Claw - double lunged a buck at approx 10-12 yards. Recovered picture perfect expanded slug under the opposite hide. Get this, TWO ribs were fractured around the .22 cal entrance wound. WTF is up with that? Wound channel through the lungs seemed similar to a .30-30's. Bored a 2" hole through everything.



- 68 grain OTM (Black Hills load) - broadside on a doe at like 15 yards. This one completely souped both lungs and shredded the heart open like a big flower. Only noticed some copper fragments.


- 77 grain OTM (Black Hills load) - two deer were bang flops. One on a doe at about 40 yards through the neck, left a gaping 4" dia exit wound on the opposite side. The other was a buck shot in the shoulder at about 15yards when he paused after nearly trampling me on a trail during the rut. He dropped in his tracks. Light was fading it was windy and frigid and I did no autopsy in the dark during hasty field dressing.
I know people who get it for free, nearly, and their use on hogs has been poor. I think the gristle plate queers the deal, so YMMV with this one, and buyer beware, imo.


- 55 grain Barnes VOR-TX load - not recovered but not for lack of searching. This buck was shot in the throat and the wound channel passed through the chest and the slug punched a .5" dia hole through the diaphragm and I never could find the slug in the offal.

Notably, each shot with these was at close range. I have recovered a couple of them and will try to find where I stashed them and get some pics. Never found an OTM even when in the case of the 68 grain OTM I didn't find an exit wound on the off side. Saw a few fragments in what was left of the heart lungs.


ETA: One thing I like about my close range deer hunting with the .223 is there isn't the massive fragmenting of bone slivers blasted all over the insides and meat as I saw from a couple killed under 100 yards with .308 loads. I think .30-30 is about perfect. Nil bloodshot meat and 2" dia holes augered through everything soft and hard things more just broken.

Soft tip bonded rounds that expand aggressively like TBBC dump energy very rapidly. That is why you saw fractured entrance ribs. RA556B saw several fractured ribs on entrance on my deer, as well. I'm sorry for the crap quality of this photo, but I lost my host site to it, so it's what I've got. This is the entrance on a deer shot at 25m with RA556B.


The monolithic bullets tend to dump energy a bit more controlled, through the deer, and offer larger exits but their shape, especially the X bullets, tends to shred more on t he lower end of the velocity spectrum.

Bullets may impact at 2500fps, but what are they doing 1/3, 1/2, 3/4 of the way through that animal? The shape of the X rounds maintains velocity through medium better than conventional (smaller surface area for same "swept" area), and the sharper profile tends to cut tissue down to a lower velocity than the smooth dome of a JSP/bonded round, which begins pushing tissue out of the way sooner.

Observe the difference in these deer (again, I'm sorry for the crap photo quality).

The top 2 photos are a progression, showing a RA556B from left to right in the picture series, impact at 25m.

The bottom photo shows a 70gr GMX round, again, from L to R in the photo, impact at 27 yards.

Both deer were similar in size, and both traveled within about 10m of the same distance once hit. The GMX round left a much healthier blood trail.

I look forward t o reporting back on how Browntip does. FWIW, 75gr GDSP performs more like a monolithic but also has hard initial impact like a soft point. My only aversion to it is that I'm pushing high 2400's out of my 14.5 with it, vs. 2800fps with Browntip, and they have very similar BC's. So I went with BT.



I wish I had taken/could find pix of the slug-hit deer. It was underwhelming by comparison.

[TCinVA]

This is EXACTLY what I see with my 5.56, or with my 12ga.



The only difference is when I field dress the shotgun hit deer, I see a clean hole through vitals.

Well, when you shoot it with a slug, sure. Your video showed a slug hit. That's what slugs do: Just punch a hole. A big one to be certain, but it just punches a hole. The slug is great if you need to penetrate through heavy bone and if you get the right slug you might even get some expansion out of it, but the most likely outcome of shooting a medium sized critter (be it a deer or a human) with a slug is that it's going to poke a big hole all the way through unless you happen to put that big hole in the CNS.

Buckshot, when properly delivered, puts multiple projectiles in the same place at the same time. It is that multiple-impact phenomenon that gives buckshot the edge in terminal effect. Hence the video I posted earlier...a good pattern delivered right where it needs to be at realistic defensive distances is a completely different result than what your video shows.

I've seen the results you posted above plenty of times with weapons ranging from pistol shots up to .30-06 delivered right in the good stuff. The only rifle I have seen put deer down immediately is a .300 win mag...but even then it wasn't like the 13 yard buckshot kill shown earlier. The animal went down and thrashed quite a bit, unable to get back on its feet to run. It eventually lost consciousness and that was that.

I don't know if you bow hunt, but I've done a fair bit of that myself. Typically when I've dealt with a bow-killed deer they've been shot through the lungs. With modern bow tech it's almost always a complete pass-through. The last bow kill I witnessed (I wasn't shooting) saw the arrow go through the buck. It jumped on impact, took a few steps and looked back at where it was. It then trotted off not really sure what happened. The animal dropped about 20 yards later. When you opened the animal you didn't see much blood...but that's because the animal was shooting blood out of both sides of its body from the arrow hit. It exhibited significant external bleeding. There wasn't a blood trail so much as a blood superhighway leading right to the animal. A testament to how efficiently broadheads work.

When you shoot a deer with a 12 gauge slug, you are poking a very large hole in the animal...a very large hole that allows a lot more blood to leave the chest cavity than, say, the typical entrance and exit wounds dealt by a high-velocity projectile. But, ultimately, the cut from a broadhead is likely going to be more efficient as a means of producing rapid blood loss than the crush from a slug.

I feel like the shotgun is full of mystique much like the .45 ACP.

As 03 has pointed out in his posts, it's not. It's every bit as effective as alleged with buckshot that delivers a proper pattern on target. Slugs can be extremely effective by the sheer fact that it's a full ounce of lead hitting whatever you put it in, but it still primarily just cuts a great big hole.

[Unobtanium]

Well, when you shoot it with a slug, sure. Your video showed a slug hit. That's what slugs do: Just punch a hole. A big one to be certain, but it just punches a hole. The slug is great if you need to penetrate through heavy bone and if you get the right slug you might even get some expansion out of it, but the most likely outcome of shooting a medium sized critter (be it a deer or a human) with a slug is that it's going to poke a big hole all the way through unless you happen to put that big hole in the CNS.

Buckshot, when properly delivered, puts multiple projectiles in the same place at the same time. It is that multiple-impact phenomenon that gives buckshot the edge in terminal effect. Hence the video I posted earlier...a good pattern delivered right where it needs to be at realistic defensive distances is a completely different result than what your video shows.

I've seen the results you posted above plenty of times with weapons ranging from pistol shots up to .30-06 delivered right in the good stuff. The only rifle I have seen put deer down immediately is a .300 win mag...but even then it wasn't like the 13 yard buckshot kill shown earlier. The animal went down and thrashed quite a bit, unable to get back on its feet to run. It eventually lost consciousness and that was that.

I don't know if you bow hunt, but I've done a fair bit of that myself. Typically when I've dealt with a bow-killed deer they've been shot through the lungs. With modern bow tech it's almost always a complete pass-through. The last bow kill I witnessed (I wasn't shooting) saw the arrow go through the buck. It jumped on impact, took a few steps and looked back at where it was. It then trotted off not really sure what happened. The animal dropped about 20 yards later. When you opened the animal you didn't see much blood...but that's because the animal was shooting blood out of both sides of its body from the arrow hit. It exhibited significant external bleeding. There wasn't a blood trail so much as a blood superhighway leading right to the animal. A testament to how efficiently broadheads work.

When you shoot a deer with a 12 gauge slug, you are poking a very large hole in the animal...a very large hole that allows a lot more blood to leave the chest cavity than, say, the typical entrance and exit wounds dealt by a high-velocity projectile. But, ultimately, the cut from a broadhead is likely going to be more efficient as a means of producing rapid blood loss than the crush from a slug.



As 03 has pointed out in his posts, it's not. It's every bit as effective as alleged with buckshot that delivers a proper pattern on target. Slugs can be extremely effective by the sheer fact that it's a full ounce of lead hitting whatever you put it in, but it still primarily just cuts a great big hole.

Presuming the deer did not collapse because a pellet hit the CNS, would we attribute this to "knockdown power"? What is the phenomenon we shall call this? I have indeed seen what you're talking about re:buckshot dropping deer fast/arrows not, etc. but I can find no reason for this unless one argues the energy "shocks" them.

[Spartan1980]

I've liked the results on deer from:
- 60 grain Nosler Partition - shot head on into the throat - recovered a nicely expanded slug about 16" back in the cavity. Range was short coming at me down a trail. Buck fell backward and I jumped and ran to it quickly and massive gouts of blood was being ejected out the entrance wound. Under that entrance wound looked like a 3" wound channel into the chest cavity. That deer expired very quickly.


- 55 grain Trophy Bonded Bear Claw - double lunged a buck at approx 10-12 yards. Recovered picture perfect expanded slug under the opposite hide. Get this, TWO ribs were fractured around the .22 cal entrance wound. WTF is up with that? Wound channel through the lungs seemed similar to a .30-30's. Bored a 2" hole through everything.


- 68 grain OTM (Black Hills load) - broadside on a doe at like 15 yards. This one completely souped both lungs and shredded the heart open like a big flower. Only noticed some copper fragments.


- 77 grain OTM (Black Hills load) - two deer were bang flops. One on a doe at about 40 yards through the neck, left a gaping 4" dia exit wound on the opposite side. The other was a buck shot in the shoulder at about 15yards when he paused after nearly trampling me on a trail during the rut. He dropped in his tracks. Light was fading it was windy and frigid and I did no autopsy in the dark during hasty field dressing.


- 55 grain Barnes VOR-TX load - not recovered but not for lack of searching. This buck was shot in the throat and the wound channel passed through the chest and the slug punched a .5" dia hole through the diaphragm and I never could find the slug in the offal.

Notably, each shot with these was at close range. I have recovered a couple of them and will try to find where I stashed them and get some pics. Never found an OTM even when in the case of the 68 grain OTM I didn't find an exit wound on the off side. Saw a few fragments in what was left of the heart lungs.


ETA: One thing I like about my close range deer hunting with the .223 is there isn't the massive fragmenting of bone slivers blasted all over the insides and meat as I saw from a couple killed under 100 yards with .308 loads. I think .30-30 is about perfect. Nil bloodshot meat and 2" dia holes augered through everything soft and hard things more just broken.

Good info for the new .223 deer hunters like me. Were these shots taken from an elevated position?

[JHC]

Good info for the new .223 deer hunters like me. Were these shots taken from an elevated position?

Whoa NO. I will NOT get up in a tree! Naw just hiding along trails in cover. Not the most productive method I'll grant ya that.

[WobblyPossum]

Presuming the deer did not collapse because a pellet hit the CNS, would we attribute this to "knockdown power"? What is the phenomenon we shall call this? I have indeed seen what you're talking about re:buckshot dropping deer fast/arrows not, etc. but I can find no reason for this unless one argues the energy "shocks" them.

@TCinVA can probably explain this a lot better than I can, but my understanding is as follows: the tissues in your body can stretch a certain amount before tearing. If you hit these tissues with one projectile, the projectile may or may not stretch the tissue past its limit. If you hit the tissue with multiple projectiles simultaneously, each area hit by a projectile can’t stretch to its maximum potential because other areas of that tissue are also being taxed by other projectiles. The tissue will tear much sooner than it normally would of hit by a single projectile.

[TCinVA]

Multiple projectiles hitting at roughly the same place at roughly the same time overwhelms the ability of tissue to stretch...meaning it tears more readily.

More torn tissue means more rapid blood loss.

More rapid blood loss means that blood pressure drops below the levels necessary to power consciousness sooner.

That's the primary effect you get from buckshot.

If you put that effect in the most vital area of the critter you are trying to stop...be it on 4 legs or 2...the effect is pretty dramatic.

Ultimately we are dealing with a pressurized hydraulic system. Our goal is to drop the pressure in that system as quickly as possible. The big high-pressure blood vessels are pretty tough, designed to stretch quite a bit without tearing. But if you challenge that tissue at multiple points in roughly the same area that stretch potential is now divided among the different impact points...which means it doesn't stretch, it just gets pulverized. The pressure is relieved...quickly.

As for a "shock" effect, it certainly looks to exist but it's not readily quantifiable. I would imagine that it's like the kind of blow that "knocks the wind" out of someone/thing...only on steroids. Maybe there's something that results from the amount of nerve damage done to the area. It's not at all uncommon for someone who has an implanted defibrillator to hit the ground when it detects an abnormal rhythm and delivers a shock. If you deliver crushing and tearing trauma to a bunch of serious nerves in the most vital area maybe it causes something to happen that gives the hammer of Thor effect...but to the best of my knowledge nobody has done the science-ing necessary to prove that's a legit thing.

[TCinVA]

@TCinVA can probably explain this a lot better than I can, but my understanding is as follows: the tissues in your body can stretch a certain amount before tearing. If you hit these tissues with one projectile, the projectile may or may not stretch the tissue past its limit. If you hit the tissue with multiple projectiles simultaneously, each area hit by a projectile can’t stretch to its maximum potential because other areas of that tissue are also being taxed by other projectiles. The tissue will tear much sooner than it normally would of hit by a single projectile.

Right.

Low velocity projectiles from, say, pistols, muzzle-loaders, and most shotgun slugs just punch holes in things. Permanent crush cavity.

High velocity projectiles stretch most tissues beyond their limits causing them to tear. That tearing is not uniform as different tissues stretch to different capacities...muscle and skin is very stretchy, but typical organ tissue (liver, kidney, etc) is not.

The simultaneous impact of multiple projectiles in about the same area exponentially decreases the ability of that tissue to stretch. Elastic tissue becomes inelastic. Inelastic tissue gets essentially pulverized.

The visual I use is a zip-lock bag full of water. Poking holes in it with an icepick will lead to multiple small streams of water and the bag will slowly empty. That's more or less what pistol bullets do.

Take a big knife, stab it into the bag and twist and you get a nice tear on both sides that drains the bag a lot quicker. That's what a good rifle round does.

Then imagine putting the bag in a guillotine that instantly removes one of the bottom corners about 1/4 of the way up. You don't get a stream so much as you get a dump of water that almost instantly drains the bag.

[Unobtanium]

May e at contact distances or a few feet, but all the deer autopsies and people autopsies I've seen involving buckshot fail to show large tissue damage unless it all struck as 1 mass. I grant that at 3 yards...yeah.