bullet effects

Dragunov · Post by **Dragunov** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 9:17 pm

Curse you dragunov, you grave digging scumbag!

Sorry guys, but this popped up.

"- Dmitriy Fedorovich, there were personal weapons in each Sherman that arrived in the USSR, Thompson submachine guns (also known as the Tommy gun). I read that rear area personnel stole these weapons and that few tanks arrived in units still equipped with them. What kind of weapons did you have, American or Soviet?

- Each Sherman came with two Thompson submachine guns, in caliber 11.43mm (.45 cal), a healthy cartridge indeed! But the submachine gun was worthless. We had several bad experiences with it. A few of our men who got into an argument were wearing padded jackets. It turned out that they fired at each other and the bullet buried itself in the padded jacket. So much for the worthless submachine gun. Take a German submachine gun with folding stock (MP-40 SMG by Erma -Valeri). We loved it for its compactness. The Thompson was big. You couldn't turn around in the tank holding it. "

http://www.iremember.ru/index.php?optio ... &Itemid=19

possible or not so? check out the rest of the article anyhoo, pretty interesting and strange. baby eaters?!?!?

Reb · Post by **Reb** » Wed Jan 24, 2007 7:14 am

Draganov

There are similar stories about virtually every weapon. I've fired the Thompson and thought it an admirable gat in most ways - excepting mag change which I found kind of clumsy.

Hitting power? Well, .45 is a slow round. Under the right circumstances it can fail. Usually that circumstance being God in a real good mood towards the guy it was fired at. Typically .45 is probably the best of pistol cartridges for knockdown power.

9 mm would go through the padded jacket every time. But 9 mm doesn't have the stopping power nor does it stop people as fast as your big clunky cousin .45 ACP. And .45 usually goes through the jacket well enough.

cheers
Reb

phylo_roadking · Post by **phylo_roadking** » Wed Jan 24, 2007 9:41 am

Would also depend on TWO other factors....

how far away from the "target" he was when he fired? All rounds don't reach their maximum velocity until a certain short distance away from the muzzle; if he "drew and fired" pointblank, against the material in a pushing-shoving argument.....

And it would, suprisingly, depend on the material in the padding! Some natural materials have remarkable absorbing properties, such as felt and kapok! Remember, the "bowler hat" or "Hard Hat" as its known in Northern Ireland, was first designed as protective headgear for beaters for falling shot!!! And its just boiled, shaped FELT!

Carl Schwamberger · Post by **Carl Schwamberger** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 9:00 am

Early in my service one of the senior sgts in the battalion remarked on being hit by 45 caliber round from a "grease gun" type SMG. (This was a cheap short barreled version with a folding stock.) It hit a thin fibreglass plate (4 or 5mm thick) & was stopped. The plate was part of the protective vest or flack jacket we were commonly issued. These were well known to only protect against grenade fragments & would definitly not stop a rifle bullet. The incident would have occured in the 1960s in Viet Nam.

A contributing factor to the story of the Soviet soldiers is extreme cold. In the artillery we had to insert a large correction into our gunnery calculations to compensate for the effect of low temperature on the propellant burn & gas expansion. If the soldier ahd their argument on a day with the temperature ten of twenty degrees below freezing the velocity of the bullets would have been significantly less.

phylo_roadking · Post by **phylo_roadking** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 9:13 am

A contributing factor to the story of the Soviet soldiers is extreme cold. In the artillery we had to insert a large correction into our gunnery calculations to compensate for the effect of low temperature on the propellant burn & gas expansion. If the soldier ahd their argument on a day with the temperature ten of twenty degrees below freezing the velocity of the bullets would have been significantly less

...and also, of course, felt and kapok are "breathable" but dense materials - denser with less bodyheat on cold days!!! Remember it was the kapok-filled padded "jack" or gambeson that was the REAL armour layer under chainmail centuries ago.