Supernatural Shooters Aug 15, 2015

actually, terminal ballistics on a .45 are significantly different from a 9mm. it is heavier and slower, so it carries about the same kinetic energy, but it is also fatter, which makes it behave differently on impact. - in most cases, it sheds kinetic energy more rapidly, doing more damage over less distance. I would expect a 9mm to penetrate cover more effectively than a .45 would.

and yes, I'm a .45 man.

Walking quietly.
Without the stick, in the house, I can walk as silent as anyone else.
This in part is due to my needing to test each footfall to see if my legs can take that step, but it also stands from living amongst those who would wake up at the sound of a mouse passing wind?...
One of the kids can make noise when walking on the concrete paving in carpet slippers you can hear through the back door when closed.

Even in work boots, I have walked up behind people who did NOT hear me at all, and are surprised I am there...
Even in quiet environments.

I have met a canteen full of Special forces in full combat and camo out on manoeuvre taking a beak.
First time I had met any of them, so it kind of was a memorable time... I think I was delivering something and decided to go get lunch.
At some point, a loud "Cough", and a hand signal.
The noise went from a canteen full of squaddies letting of a little steam, as you expect, full of raucous noise, the insults flew like moths to the flame, the banter was sharp, funny, and I got a few aimed at me, because I was "Different", so I joined in as much as I could without being a nuisance?.. it went from that to a complete absence of noise, so much so I believed I could hear my own pulse working?...
I believe the door guard has reasons to suspect their opposition, no one ever told me what was happening. It could have been a simple "Times up gentlemen back to work now", I didnt hear that.
The room emptied without as much as a single rustle, and that included several of them finishing their brews and eating the last on their plate.... a simple silent "se ya" salute from a couple of them and they were gone.
One thing you learn from them is never ever waste a good opportunity for a fresh brew and food.
Once outside, I never saw them again....
I suppose thats their job?

I also nearly crashed the landie when passing a field one time, to see the field erupt from a farmers field with haystack to a field filled full of camo training squaddies....
I wasnt expecting that.

But then again, I wasnt expecting a fully armed SAR "Black hawk" to pop up over the wall at an army hospital when I went past it one time, on a public road in Preston Lancashire {after me leaving the forces by 20 odd years) staring down the barrel of whatever they have these days as it faced me less than 100 yards away....?
New shorts please?... especially when it floated out over the road and went up above me over my roof.....
Apparently this is common about those parts, the locals get used to it.

Depends who you are.
I never needed to move silently around the place past getting out of a dorm room before anyone noticed I wasnt there.
But some people excel in the art of sneaking up on you.
I worked in a Bar where the owner was EX Special forces, he had that art, but me being a Biker, I notice "Things in the shadows" from the corner of my eye, so saw him coming often before I heard him.
He had the mind set that is he didnt need to make noise, why make the effort to make noise.
I dont ever believe he needed to sneak up on me, if he did, I suppose I would not have seen him either.
I also dont know if he ever did.....

With the walking stick, the regular tap tap of the rubber boot should give my position away.
I have never seen the point of trying to do that quietly.

Yes if you want to, you can move about unnoticed.
Depends on how patient you are.

I dont have the patience, if I sneak up on people, they are usually distracted, and I am not making unnecessary noise, they just didnt expect me did they?...

Yeah, the US don't build 'em like we do in Europe. Over here, a hurricane means a few shingles blown off the roof, maybe a couple of windows broken by flying debris and a lot of flooded basements, but the totally devastated houses we saw pics of from Louisiana back in 05? Ain't happening around here.

I shot the bottom of an old transmission with the .45. it did make a hole in the oil pan, but it did not penetrate any further. it also left a dent about 3 inches across from the energy transfer. the steel in the junction box is about as thick.

There's that and then there's the fact that most movies that portray shooting through walls are made in America, so it kinda makes sense to stick with the type of house that's typical in the US and not the type that's typical in Germany or Scotland.

maybe masonry, maybe lightweight sheet metal - depends on the construction.

Shooting through walls, Revisit.
And yes, I think we should.
As stated in above post, I watched this first airing in UK last night.
Standard wall construction will loose a LOT in translation across the world.
I think the idea of stalking in an older well built brick construction house in UK is a "BUSTED" from our UK point of view.

As stated already, we use much stronger stuff here in UK for walls....
And the same for pretty much most of europe as well.

Will bullet go through what we call breeze block?... its a sort of aerated concrete mix that is part hollow that is lightweight but incredibly strong, and has been used for many decades to make interior walls within the usual brick outer layer.
How do you know what you have until you try to get through it anyway?...
Walls move when houses get remodelled and redecorated....

MUD walls.
There is a lot to be said about old building techniques, and some were sun baked Mud tamped down with a mix of straw and animal hair.

Lath and plaster, in UK, (and other parts of the world) historically we use something called wattle and daub, for outside walls, which is sort of the same, twigs or laths as the wattle and daub is again a form of mud baked by the sun to create a strong outer layer, sometimes using Lime and Horse/Cow manure in with the mix as well.
Will that defect a bullet depending on what part you hit?

Can you also shoot through interior wooden walls where the wood is a couple of inch thick, and may be a laminate of a few layers where history and time has helped with redecoration of wooden panelling by a couple of layers.

Nails.... self explanatory.

I dont think they tested enough building techniques......
Or they should maybe have explained a bit getter why they didnt test those techniques.
I can take you to buildings in UK with Bullet holes in them from old civil war times.
I can take you to european places where there is WW2 ordinance holes in the outer walls and inner walls....
We dont expect them to explain why Bricks are bullet proof.

BUT....
We DO expect them to test where the walls were made for examples of say the Simpson's special, and that "Bomb proof" wall they created for testing Bed Liner...
Will a small high powered round penetrate where a large slow moving blast did not?...

Also, They did not test stud defections....
You have a stud finder on your sights?... how will you know you aint shooting through part of the wall with a stud in it?...
Studs for those that dont know are the strengthening bits of 2X4 wood used to strengthen large pieces of wall to stop then wobbling about.
And I have a stud finder here, because you cant always tell where they are, and I need to find them when doing Electrical work on internal stud walls, knowing where to break through to put new wiring in or put in extra sockets is vital.

So knowing where the woodwork is is important?...

And we all know from old westerns that wooden tables are of course bullet proof when it comes to the obligatory bar fight scenes....[/sarcasm]

By the way, how thick does wood have to be to be "proof" of modern side-arms?... I have a wooden table made from old thick boards, maybe 4 inch thick, Oak, I think its pretty solid....

Also, some factory walls have windows inside.
If you are testing the old hit man at work, can you shoot through glass as the target passes?... I suspect yes, but modern glass, just how much would laminate toughened glass defect or deform a round where the factory environment required toughened glass, or even Double glazed where offices required sound dampening from the noisy factory floor.

Carrying on from through the glass shots.
Toughened outside glass, from modern office blocks.
Can the Hitman do a sniper shot through the window from one building to the next these days?... just how tough are windows on high rise office buildings.

Bah Humbug, I have come up with a lot of "You didnt do it right"?...
No not at all.
I think the show went well, apart from the Visitor, I just had a few more questions when it finished, and thought maybe I would bring them here...
Because this place has been instrumental in me asking those questions.

Some may be more easy to answer than others.

I think we've adressed this already. I don't think pistol rounds will make it through any of those materials. Rifle rounds might, but they're not coming out in a straight line on the other side, so it would basically be spray and pray in terms of hitting anything.




Why didn't I think of this?

When I was training to go to Afghanistan back in 07 (never went - was transfered to the Iraq mission instead), a doctrine change came home from down there. We were no longer allowed to train in the use of hand grenades inside buildings. Why? Because most buildings in rural Afghanistan are made of mud/clay and various filler materials and, depending on the mud/clay to filler ratio, one of two things would happen. There would either be so much mud/clay in the mix that the explosion would be contained completely, creating so much pressure inside the building that even if the occupants weren't hit by shrapnel, they'd die from the shock (apparently that's bad... Geneva Convention stuff...), or there'd be so much filler in the walls that they wouldn't be able to stop any shrapnel at all and personnel outside the building (the ones throwing the grenades) would be at considerable risk of getting hit by their own shrapnel.

This is apparently based on first hand observations in the field, but I have to say, I think the first one is a little iffy... I just have doubts that any free standing structure could contain an explosion so well. Especially when there are doors and windows...




I've always been taught that wood isn't a guaranteed cover unless there's a full metre of it (3 feet), but that's against rifle rounds. Don't know about pistol rounds.

In the US - which is what is relevant. the military ONLY uses "ball" ammunition - jacketed lead. Anything else has been deemed "not sporting" by the powers that be.
hunters most commonly use soft tip bullets, which expand SOME on impact, just enough to cause rapid bleeding if it misses wrecking a vital part, but not enough to render your entire game animal into burger.
police tend to either ball or jacketed hollow point - which expand a bit more - or light AP, depending on the circumstance.
we also have the extreme version of the expanding bullet, which is sold under many different brand names; and is specifically snd exhaustively engineered to do as much harm as ballistically possible.
and finally, we have the frangible bullet, which is made out of powdered lead compressed into bullet shape, which is strong enough to punch a hole in a person, but tends to go "piff" when it hits something an ordinary bullet would ricochet off of. of all these, it is pretty much only the AP that is frowned upon for civilian use.

the thinking that allows expanding bullets for hunting is that there is no intent other than to kill the animal you are hunting. if you injure it, you are supposed to track it down and finish the job as quickly as you can; whereas in war, you want it to be either a quick kill, or a minor flesh wound. maiming the enemy is considered cruel and inhumane, even if it is tactically sound.