þ Replying to a message originally posted in LOCSYSOP...

Bob, at 08:44 on May 20 1996, you wrote to Bill Grimsley...

BL> .44 Magnum pistol rounds? What a strange calibre. It would be
BL> rather effective at killing people, but not very good at range.

BG> It's actually a very useful calibre, especially for short-range
BG> work, such as with pigs. The muzzle velocity is only 1960fps
BG> but it has a massive amount of muzzle energy at close range,
BG> with its heavy 240g projectile. 

BL> Is it likely to replace 9mm?

Not a chance.  9mm has become the de-facto standard now.

BL> It started off more-or-less the same way as your 44 magnum, as a pistol 
BL> round that ended up the standard for submachine guns.

As did the .357 magnum, which is now also used in some rifles.

BL> At what range would the bullet become harmless... 100m or so?

BG> Hard to say. I wouldn't really like to be hit with a Z, even
BG> from 100m. Any bullet with forward motion is dangerous IMO. :) 

BL> I realise that. I meant at what range could it hit you in the chest
BL> say, and only bruise. An air rifle is like that almost point-blank...
BL> or at 10 metres.

Hard to say.  Over 100m the Z drops around 10 feet, so it would be pretty
hard to hit somebody intentionally at that range, but I've shot cats at 30
metres, and the bullet hasn't even penetrated their skin, so I presume that
velocity drops off quite dramatically at even relatively short distances. 
My GUESS is that at 100m, you'd be fairly safe, but don't ask me to prove
the point.  :)

BG> I'd sooner be shot at from a .22 than a fucking 9mm Uzi, or whatever. 

BL> I agree! This is my reasoning behind banning SLRs.

I was talking about a self-loading .22 actually.

BL> I'd much rather a loony went bonkers in a Mall with a 303 than an AK47.

There's not a lot of ballistic difference between a .303 and a 7.62mm round
(and the Russian 7.62 is quite a bit shorter than the NATO round as well).

BG> Give me a ¬" drill and 5 minutes, and I can turn ANY semi into
BG> a full auto, which means that anybody who's really serious can
BG> do exactly the same thing. 

BL> Yair... it's actually more difficult to make it semiautomatic, and
BL> keep the firing rate low on full auto.

Exactly.  I did it once, and it emptied my rifle's 30-round magazine in
less than a second (sounded like a high-pitched fart).  Fuck!

BL> I know all that, but a loony with the 303 will only get off one
BL> shot before I'm over the urban horizon, and he'll probably miss.

BG> Whether or not you believe that Oswald killed Kennedy, the
BG> Warren Commission proved beyond any doubt that it was possible
BG> for Oswald to chamber and fire three rounds in five seconds,
BG> ALL with extreme accuracy, from his prehistoric Mannlicher
BG> Carcano rifle.

BL> Actaully, they didn't. They asserted it, but in the actual tests, no one 
BL> ever suceeded in doing what Oswald is supposed to have done - put three 
BL> rounds into a moving target at 200m, firing from a 2nd storey window.

I think it was the 5th or 6th floor actually, but we won't split hairs. 
See if you can find a doco called "The Garrison Tapes" at your
local video library, and you'll see that it was proved beyond any doubt
that what I said above is indeed possible, and has in fact been done by
several people.

BL> But I agree that an expert can work a bolt action rather well. I
BL> forget the firing rate claimed for a 303, for instance, but it was
BL> surprisingly high, top-feeding preloaded 5-round clips... something
BL> like 30/minute. 

Yeah, that sounds about right.

BL> Oddly, being left-handed, I'd much prefer an SLR. It's
BL> a real bastard reaching over the top all the time.

The L1A1 SLRs weren't made for left-handers like us though.  We were just
lucky that there was no room left on the right side of the breech to put
the cocking lever (plus there's no need to remove your hand from the pistol
grip when reloading the weapon).

BG> That can logically be extended to 36 aimed shots per minute, or
BG> 360 shots in just 10 minutes. Deduct maybe 25% of that total
BG> for reloading the 5-shot magazine with clips (takes about 2
BG> seconds), and it means that even with an old bolt-action rifle,
BG> Bryant could still have killed 35 people in well under 2 minutes.

BL> You're assuming that Bryant is a crack shot like Oswald. He wasn't.

Probably not, but he still dropped most of his victims with head shots.

BL> And I can't imagine a psycho being perfectly calm, either.

Dunno, many reports seem to indicate that he appeared to be exactly that.

BG> And in your example above, you'd get just a few feet before his
BG> second shot put your lights out for good. 

BL> If I got 5 feet, he'd never hit me. 

Oh dear, I fear that you'd be sorely disappointed then.

BL> As a kid firing shanghais, 5 feet was all I ever needed, and a shanghai has 
BL> the firing rate of a 303.

Perhaps, but it doesn't have the MV or ME of a .303, and if you can show me
a slingshot which can still kill at 1000m, I'd buy one tomorrow.

BL> The Armalite .223 really works at close range. I read an article on
BL> the M-16. The hydrostatic shock of the mach-3+ bullet is almost always
BL> fatal close up.

That's because the much lighter .223 projectile is designed to expend most
of its energy in the victim's body, unlike the 7.62mm which just keeps
going.

BL> The old 303 or the 7.6mm is better at range, but the kill-rate of the 223 
BL> is incredible at 50m in a jungle situation.

It also causes far greater tissue damage without necessarily killing the
victim, which is the whole idea.  If he dies, bad luck, but if he lives, he
requires evacuation, surgery, hospitalisation, and in general, wastes a
massive amount of resources which would, in the past, have been put towards
far more important things, like killing your enemy.  The .223 was no
mistake.

BG> ballistics manuals, compare the velocity and energy figures
BG> between a .22 and a 7.62mm, then come back and tell me that
BG> you'd still prefer the .22 for a mass slaughter. 

BL> The Oz Army has stuck with the 5.6mm. They could have bought anything.

They prefer the smaller calibre for the reasons outlined above.

Regards, Bill

--- Msgedsq/2 3.20