I have shot a bunch of monolithic bullets in tightly-stacked dry newspaper, my favorite media for testing any bullet for impact on heavy bone. Have yet to have any of them fail to fully expand, including non-tipped TSX's. This suggests that liquid (or other softer media, such as wax or gel) is necessary for hollow-point expansion.
As a more general comment, ran into yet an older guy (even older than me) last fall who shot a mule deer through the lungs with some sort of controlled-expansion bullet and because the buck went maybe 75 yards before falling over. He thought the bullet didn't expand because the exit hole was "caliber size." I asked if he actually looked at the internal damage, and he claimed he did, and it was considerable. I then asked him how in the hell he felt (the only word appropriate at that point) the bullet did not expand. His answer was so vague that he apparently had no idea that he was contradicting himself.
“Montana seems to me to be what a small boy would think Texas is like from hearing Texans.” John Steinbeck
