Odd happening at the 'range'

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chris in va

New member
I have friends with some acreage. We shoot off their deck into a depression into the hillside at steel plates and various targets.

Scrounging up my brass I found one of my fired 45 LRN perfectly intact...right in front of the 'firing line'. No indications it ricocheted off anything. It wasn't a squib.

Ideas?
 
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Hal

New member
Are there rifling marks on it?

Are your friends the "practical joke" type that might toss a bullet out when you weren't looking just to make you wonder "what the ....." ?
 
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PetahW

New member
.


If the boolit has rifling marks on it, IMHO you should go buy a lottery ticket or three :p

If so, you got lucky that it didn't stick in the bbl, and cause damage to the gun (or yourself), when the next shot was fired.



.
 
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buck460XVR

New member
Scrounging up my brass I found one of my fired 45 LRN perfectly intact...right in front of the 'firing line'. No indications it ricocheted off anything. It wasn't a squib.
Click to expand...


Only a coupla explanations. Most folks claim that a primer is capable of pushing a well lubricated lead bullet outta a barrel, but not by much. That in itself will not cycle a autoloader tho. You should have experienced a FTF or the action not locking back on the last round. If the bullet has a dent in the back(even ever so slight) it may have been stuck and shot out with the next round. But that too should have not cycled the firearm. Shooting into dirt sometimes can leave a bullet almost perfect. If you shot into snow this winter, it too will stop a bullet quite quickly and not leave a mark on it. Someone else may have found the unmarked round at the berm and brought it back by the deck. Does your buddy have kids?
 
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Pahoo

New member
They will come back at you !!!

You did not mention the yardage but on short yardages, I have seen them, come back. The last time I experience this was when a fella next to me was shooting his .40 at a swinger. Don't know what they call them but it was a man's outline with a metal insert/internal swinger. When you hit the vital swinger, you knew it was a good hit. I started feeling something hitting my pant leg and the ground in front and to the side of me. Not once, but enough that I called it to there attention. Those that hit my leg, didn't have much steam. .. ;)

Now then, I have seen warnings on some swingers that gave a minimum distance on placement from the shooter. ... ;)


Be Safe !!!
 
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g.willikers

New member
But a ricochet or bounce back will deform the bullet.
His wasn't.
Lead bullets usually flatten out like a coin from hitting steel.
Maybe he will reply and say if there's rifling marks on it.
 
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James K

Member In Memoriam
Did you do any shooting at that "range" in the winter? A snow bank will stop a bullet like the .45 ACP FMJ without leaving a mark on it. When the snow melts, there is your perfect bullet!

Jim
 
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44 AMP

Staff
Rifling on the slug will only tell us if it went through the barrel, or not. Nothing else.

Bullets, especially slow pistol bullets tend to bounce off hard objects. Shooting at steel is great fun, but be aware that bullets, or parts of one can come right back at you.

I have dug .45acp slugs out of old wood fenceposts in virtually perfect condition. Or with a very small flattened spot on the nose, and no other deformation other than rifling marks.

Lots of things are possible.
 
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Grant D

New member
I fired a 41 cal. black powder derringer at a pie plate on a post at 25 feet, and it bounced back and hit me in the chest!

I might be little, but I'm hard to kill!! lol

(big bruise on my chest though)
 
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Hal

New member
Rifling on the slug will only tell us if it went through the barrel, or not. Nothing else
Click to expand...
Yes - that's correct, but, an unfired bullet may have been in the range bag or a pocket and fallen out.
I guess the same would hold true of a fired bullet, but.....
 
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skizzums

New member
ive had a perfectly intact bullet land right next to me when shooting at a paper target hanging on a tree, lots of other trees around it, somehow just perfectly bounced around those litttle trees to come right back to me

at first i thought maybe i just dropped a boolit or it came out somehow, until i picked it up and t was still warm, also no deformation, wierd and a lil scary
 
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wayneinFL

New member
I've found bullets shot through tires lying on the floor of the range. Sometimes a low shot will hit the ground in front of a berm, go through a high spot and come out, and you'll find it right in front of a berm. Sometimes, a little erosion, and bullets will fall out of the berm. Or another shot breaks some dirt loose, and bullets come back out of the berm.

You might be surprised, depending on the type of soil, how shallow a handgun bullet might go.

And if a bullet hits something like tires or dirt, you won't see much damage. If it was shot through a tire, you might see a black scuff on it.

ETA: Just saw this: "...right in front of the 'firing line'." Sorry, thought it was further downrange. That is a little weird, assuming it's yours. I have seen bullets come back from downrange, but it''s pretty unusual, and usually involves steel. I'm chalking it up to "bullets do weird things".
 
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Dragline45

New member
The only thing I can think of is if it was a swinging plate the plate on the back swing caught the bullet and knocked it back towards you.
 
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jmr40

New member
FMJ bullets don't always deform. I've seen bullets recovered after firing that looked good enough to be reloaded and fired again.
 
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g.willikers

New member
He said it was a LRN, not FMJ.
It would have deformed if it hit just about anything that would have caused return fire.
Sounds like a squib, whether it was obvious or not.
With lots of shooting going on, it's easy to miss it, sometimes.
Or maybe an AD that missed his shoes.
Gotta' watch those fast draw shots.
The idea is to make the other guy dance, not yourself. :)
 
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Catfishman

New member
Correct me if I'm wrong but I've been told not to shoot low velocity bullets (22lr out of a pistol, cowboy loads etc) at steel.

BTW - My opinion is that someone placed that bullet there.
 
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DPris

Member Emeritus
Low or high, just expect some backsplash if the steel isn't angled downward correctly.
I've taken most of a .38 lead slug in the lip from the bay next to the one I was standing in front of at one match.

Angling the steel so lead bounces down into the ground rather than back at you helps greatly, but there are no guarantees.
Denis
 
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