I often see people writing about "transfer"of kinetic energy but no one seems to want to quantify it.
Which seems odd for such an easy-to-quantify commodity.
How much energy must be "transferred" for the bullet to be effective?
I wont quantify precisely how much , but I know for fact that less energy transfer can prove more effective.
ie; a solid that does the work/task required of it and exits ,vs, a soft with the same energy on impact
that then fails to do the work/task required, but still spends all its energy coming to a stop in the animal.
Starman -
You are correct.
For a bullet to be effective (kill something quickly) it has to disrupt vital function. A bullet that expends all its energy blowing up in a shoulder may or may not disrupt vital function. A bullet with less energy that destroys the heart certainly does.
And that is where people like smokinrope go wrong. A bullet's energy defines the MAXIMUM energy if can transfer to a target, doing work in the process. What it does NOT define is how much energy will ACTUALLY be transferred to the target or in what time period; if or how much the bullet will expand; or whether it becomes a blunt mushroom, a shrapnel cloud or a shank with rotating petals that combines both blunt-force with cutting action as the petals rotate.
In other words, the energy of a bullet does not predict the efficiency with which or time frame in which it will transfer some or all of that energy to a target. What can be said is that for two identical bullets with the same mass but different velocities (i.e. different energy levels), and all other factors being equal, the bullet with the greater energy has greater POTENTIAL to do damage.
But since it is "such an easy-to-quantify commodity",
smokinrope should let us know how much velocity is needed for a bullet to be effective. He won't provide it because he cannot.
