Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Bullet test - .44, 240 gr. XTP and the two 40 gr. HP, .22 LR

Had kind of an interesting day at the range. Tested the above on my standard 12 inch long, 2.5 gal. water jugs.
The Hornady .44, 240 gr. XTP was fired from my 4 inch Smith and pushed by 20 grs. of 2400 and a CCI 300. At 15 ft., I got splashed with water. Blew the first jug completely apart and sent water in all directions. Punched right through the second jug, but couldn't enter the 3rd. Recovered bullet weighed 231.3 grs. and looked very evenly expanded at about .64 inches on the average.
Even more interesting were the .22 LR tests. The CCI Velocitor 40 gr. HP split the front of the jug and exited. That's 12 inches of water plus the plastic skin of the jug. Not bad at all for a 3 inch Smith 317 revolver. Bullet not recovered.
The WW, 40 gr. Power Point didn't exit. It just started to expand. Didn't appear to hit as hard either.
Looks like the CCI Velocitors are my ammo of choice in this little gun. E

Try the CCI SGBs, JFSAG.

E,
Those velocitors are my favorite varmint/small game round out of my 22s. Quite accurate as well.

The 240 XTP is one of the most accurate bullets made but penetration on deer is not good. They open too fast. Better to use the 300 gr.
How about blowing up four, splitting two more and penetrating 14 jugs with a revolver?

Not enough penetration for deer ? That thing penetrated 24 inches of water and four plastic surfaces. On people, anything that penetrates more than 15 inches of water is considered too much for the "nervous about over penetration" crowd.
JJHack has reported that even the 180 gr. loads have enough penetration for black bears. E

Water has excellent bullet-stopping qualities, especially if the bullet expands when it hits. According to literature I have seen that I believe is credible, a bullet can be expected to penetrate approximately 1.55 times as far in ballistic gelatin than it will in water. So if a bullet penetrates 24" of water, it should penetrate about 36" in gelatin designed to simulate muscle tissue.

36" of penetration would make the 240 XTP very effective for deer hunting, IMHO.

The only three deer I shot with 240's, behind the shoulder, no bone hit. If I had not seen them go down, like thick country, I would not have found them because of not having two holes and no blood trails. Think of big bones and tough muscle on bear or a large hog. How about a quartering shot that needs more penetration?
These bullets were against the rib cage, barely reaching the hide.
Believe what you want with jug tests, I believe what I see in the field. The miserable penetration caused me to go to hard cast WLN, RNFP's and WFN boolits from 265 to 330 gr.
Now if you believe in a 180 gr, I feel you will change your mind very quickly with experience. You will also dump the 240. You will find the 300 gr XTP is as good as it gets.

E,

The hornady 240 garin bullet is one of my favorites for wild hogs,I have killed six or seven of them with it in the last few days.

A couple were over 200 pounds. It penetrates to the vitals and often exits,that is what I've seen first hand.

If you want to do a test, try water soaked phone books and paper. The 240 will only make 11" and the 265 gr cast will go 33".
A .475 420 WFN gr hard cast will go 37" but a 400 gr XTP only does 12". A 400 gr soft nose gets to 14".
If you can get a 240 XTP to go through 36" of animal, you are performing magic tricks.

I was in on a hog hunt when a fella shot a boar with the 240 XTP. The bullet was recovered in the off shoulder, never going through it. By the time the outfitter and the rest of us got there it was a 1/2 hour and the hog was still alive. Had to be shot again.
Even a .22 will reach vitals. I suppose you can kill a hog with a .380 and maybe a .32.
To err on the side of "just maybe" is silly when there are better bullets. Even a 240 Speer Gold Dot performs better then a 240 XTP.
Just what is so hard about going to a 300 gr? They are just as accurate.
These arguments are a never ending thing and once understanding that "reaching the vitals" is not enough for game recovery 100% of the time, or instant death of an animal, they will continue.
A friends daughter loved a .223 for deer because of the lack of recoil. She made a perfect shot last season and four of us searched. Not a single drop of blood anywhere.
An hour later I found the deer 200 yards from where she shot it. I gutted it and found the bullet indeed reached the vitals, blew up, destroyed a lot of internals but the deer thought otherwise. I called and while waiting for them I back tracked the deer. No blood anywhere.
I do and will forever hate anyone saying "it reaches the vitals." So will a sharp stick.
If anyone thinks blowing up a water bottle will also flip an animal head over heels, he has a lot to learn.

Which 240 gr. bullets ? What muzzle and impact velocities ?
240 gr. bullets fired from a .44 Magnum vary alot as to how tough they are. That, and the fact that they behave differently when fired at 1200 fps. vs. 1800 fps.
The other thing is that the hard cast stuff does not expand. It penetrates very well, but produces a small wound channel. That's why JJHack cautioned us about using them on black bears. The bears don't die as quickly as they do with expanding bullets.
The 300 gr. stuff can't loaded as fast as the 240 gr. stuff. They produce more recoil and don't shoot the same zero as the lighter stuff. If I want a good deer bullet, I can shoot the XTP. If I want lots of penetration, the old Remington factory 240 gr. lead loads will do fine. And they shoot the same zero. E

Thanks Ruraldoc. That's nice to know. E

You are correct about the Remington and it is a better choice. It is also true the velocity has a bearing on how a bullet expands. But you forget the accuracy point of a bullet where it needs to be shot.
The 240 XTP is most accurate with 24 gr of 296 and a Fed 150 primer. The 300 is best with 20.5 gr. and a Fed 150 primer. I don't have my chrono readings for these. Slowing the 240 will make it perform but at a huge accuracy loss. It is best in a .44 special.
Assumptions about hard cast are wrong though. At the proper velocity of between 1200 and 1400 fps they work but at lower or higher velocities, they need some expansion. This is where alloy work comes in.
A hard WLN or WFN driven too fast will move tissue out of the way in a secondary wound channel and just leaves a small hole when the secondary collapses. This is where you NEED expansion.
Too slow will kill but it takes longer and also the boolit needs some expansion to speed up the kill.
Cast is just like jacketed where it must be tailored for the velocity. To assume one alloy works or fails across the board is where mistakes are made.
Over or under expansion is a problem with both jacketed and cast. To work a bullet for the best expansion zone can shorten the range you can hit at. There is nothing worse then loss of accuracy unless you shoot all animals at 20 yards.
This is internal damage from a hard boolit at the proper velocity of 1329 fps.

MMM, that looks like the lazagna the wife made last night.

Lungs were jelly on that deer too.
Now get too soft with a cast going fast (1632 fps.) and this is what you get.
Complete penetration but a whole shoulder destroyed. A lot of bloodshot meat too. Alloy needs to be adjusted. This was with a 50-50 pure and WW mix. Need to go to 25% pure.

Now the perfect velocity and hardness. Total internal damage, fast kill and no meat loss. This is the exit hole.
Using a jacketed or cast, the same principals apply.
With over 360 deer kills and being in on hundreds more, doing a necropsy on all, I feel I know what a bullet/boolit needs to do and have come to rely on "dwell time" and boolit work instead of velocity and muzzle energy.

I do not want to get down on anyone, but please, please, don't rely on jugs of water or anything else. Only actual animals with all kinds of hits.
It is always best to get two holes. Make the boolit or bullet work on the inside before it exits. There is no such thing as wasted energy after a boolit passes through.

If you shot through two jugs and didn't enter the third,unless your jugs are made different in Cali.,that would only be 12 inches of water.For the record just took my milk jug out and measured.

And please don't tell these black bears on the east coast that hard cast bullets don't kill quickly.

I disagree with this. I have taken a few deer with that bullet out of my SRH using W296 power. Every one was a pass through and none of the deer went more than 15 to 20 yards.

Bob

The water jugs I used for these tests are a full 12 inches long each. They hold 2.5 gallons of water, not a gallon.
JJHack has killed or seen killed literally hundreds of black bears with various handguns. E