.223 debate

woodcock

woodcock

New member
If I'm not mistaken, there's a bullet the military used a while ago that starts tumbling as it leaves the barrel. Was it a smooth bore? Was it a M16? What caliber was it? Does it have any relation to the .223? There's a debate going on over here and I'd like to set the record striaght.
 
OH NO, NOT THIS ONE AGAIN!!! This subject always gets people going. There are a couple of threads on AR15.com regarding this. I never served in the military but 2 of my friends who have in the 80's both say that the round was intended to tumble so I'll go with that answer and wait for the debate to begin. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif
 
Well I was in the military and this BULLCRAPOLA.
The bullets I fired did not tumble,they all left clean holes.
What I think you are wondering about is that they do have a tendancy to tumble after hit flesh.I shot lots and lots of military ball ammo M193 and can say I personally saw no effects of tumbling.
I've shot lots of groundhogs with ball and they bored right on thru.
When I first joined the Army I heard all kinds of bullcrap from know it all guys who in reality didn't know doodley squat,like that AK-47s could fire our ammo 5.56mm in there 7.62x39mm weapons.
I think this is an urban legend thats been told over and over so much that people have come to believe it.
 
I think this came from the horrendous wounds inflicted by the 5.56 high velocity round-vs-the standard military rounds of the time.
Just think about it, a tumbling bullet flying thru the air, you couldn't hit your house with it and the maximum range would suffer due to poor flight characteristics.
my 2.
Carl
 
I never heard of such a load being deliberately used. As pointed out, it would have no accuracy. That means that it would only be of any use at very close range.

I do know that in the early introduction of the M-16 in 'Nam, there was a mismatch between the ball load issued and the rate of rifling in the barrel. The bullet was not properly stabilized and accuracy suffered. Once the problem was identified it was corrected and ceased to be an issue.
 
I won't get into this in any great detail, but I am responsible for the firearms training for my division of the state police. Let's put this rumor to rest. Here is a sketch of reality, if you want/need more information, it is widely available on the internet.

Most specialized military and law enforcement 5.56/223 ammo is designed to penetrate several inches of tissue; the bullet then yaws (turns sideways). When this happens, the projectile fragments, usuall at the cannelure first (Yes, even the SS109 projectile)because of the incredible velocity and resistance that is placed upon it. Try to think of the physics of the heavy bullet base wanting to overtake the lighter weight nose of the bullet, due mainly to disruption of the spin (which is what is stabilizing the bullet). The fragments take seperate paths in their travel through tissue. Ballisticians and forensic pathologists all agree that this is a significant wounding factor, seen in this caliber.

The above facts are, and have been well documented by the U.S. Army Wound Ballistics Laboratory (ie. Dr. Martin Fackler, MD), leading pathologists (Dr. Vincent DiMaio, MD), and the Firearms Training Unit (FBI, Quantico, Va.), as well as "your's truly" when testing .223 rounds in calibrated ballistic gelation. This was first seen in soldiers shot in Vietnam by captured M16's, with the M193 (55 gr. Ball). It's a phenomenon distinctive of this velocity/projectile weight, ie. the specific round.

The problems arise when people read this material, don't understand it, then start making outlandish posts on the internet. The rumors start flying, then it's cast in stone as factual.

If you want additional information, go to:
www.firearmstactical.com or
the International Wound Ballsitics Association (IWBA).

I hope that my comments are a helpful lead to those who are interested in putting this silly "tumbling bullet" fairy tale to bed. My explanations are not intended to by scientific, but are the best that this dumb cop can do.
 
Okay heres what I've heard on the subject. I've got a friend that was part of a special operations group in Vietnam. He says that there was a bulet made to tumble. Thet bullets were not common at all and except for some very special close range operations were not used. In truth I doubted this very much, but he said that if you pulled one of these bullets you'd find a dent or pock mark at the base near or on the edge. He did not know if there was something in that hole to add instability or not but he said that you could hit a man at 20 yards well enough but beyond that forget it. I believe that this was intended to limit range, not to inflict more damage to the target. He does have some odd stories about experimental weapons turned out in machine shops on board aircraft carriers, short M16's, shotguns designed to shoot a flat pattern, silenced weapons. I don't know, but he sure is serious when he talks about it. His main job was running the big plastic river boats that you occasionally see being flown in as a sling load under helocopter's.
 
I never knew this was a debate...

I liked doorgunner's post, and only have a few things to add.

1. Maybe 10 years ago saw documentary on history channel or discovery channel that talked about some European country trying to design a bullet that spun in the body to create bigger wound. No idea what the caliber was. Remember militaries don't use hollow points.

2. As most shooting victims in hospital ER's are shot with low velocity handguns, most of the "scientific" background for high velocity trauma wounds come from our prior wars. When I was in med school the lecturer said bullets can pitch and yaw and tumble and fragment (all IN the body) and had some pretty nice pictures of what that would do to tissue. Even though most civilian shootings with a rifle would be with "hunting" ammo, the medical journals and textbooks are full of the military cases with FMJ, so that is what they teach in school (the pitch/tumble stuff)
 
Thanks guy's for the clarification. I've read all your post's carefully. The debate was here, between the male members of my family. Not here on PM. I should have been more specific. One family member (A history buff) told a story of a M16 round that, if fired at a cinder block wall, would put a hole in it big enough for a man to crawl thru. The .223 cal. was mentioned. This story was told many years ago and came up again recently. I and others who heard it, ignorantly took it in as gods honest truth. I've never owned a .223 or any caliber close to it. My son bought one 6 months ago and I've fired it at 200 yds. seems like a nice flat shooting bullet. I read PM post's of guy's shooting 300-400 yds. with incredible accuracy and I had to say, this can't be the same bullet. So that's how I came to ask the question here. Thanks again, The Preditor Masters web site is a wealth of knowledge.
 
Woodcock: Take what you hear and read about the 5.56/223 round with a grain of salt. I love the round, and use it both professionally and recreationally. It represents a well balanced and very efficient round, and has performed very well in both military and civilian combat. It does NOT blow holes that big in cinder block walls, nor does the bullet tumble on the way to the target (when fired from a normal weapon). It makes a dandy low recoil varmint/predator round, and is excellent as a civilian defense round. Hell, I wish every home in america had a black rifle in it (but I won't go there). I guess in a nutshell, I never known too many people who bought an accurate .223 that were ever unhappy with it's performance. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif
 
Woodcock,
I'm not trying to go too far off base with this, but they do have grenade launchers mounted to m-16's, so maybe that is what your relative saw/heard about concerning the cinderblock. The military has 5.56 ammo that can shoot through cinderblocks, but it makes little .223 holes. Read "Black Hawk Down" for Rangers describing shooting people many times with this ammo and not falling over....
 
I have talked to vets that told me that the tumbling ammo was because on some weapons they were equipped with barrels that weren't rifled. They were smooth which would not stabilize the bullet, thus making it fly eratic and cause major damage. They told me accuracy was not that important when you are shooting at point blank in a jungle type fire fight. Hmmmm...
 
They tumbled due to using the wrong rifleing for bullet weight, the round was impressive on the rare occasion it hit where it was aimed, after the proper twist barrel was used the bullets stopped tumbleing, it was a political statement to hype the round up. read an article about it last week, wish I could find it now!
RR
 
Trust me, the 5.56 NATO M855 round with fragment like a son-of-a-gun when it hits a cinder block wall. That's exactly the round that the US Army Rangers were using in Mogidishu, Somalia. Everybody bitches when they get into a gunfight and the inteded target doesn't vaporize. The skinneys in Mog were so hopped up on Khat (ephedrine like plant) that they wouldn't know it if you hit them center mass with a .50 caliber. :rolleyes:
 
doorgunner,
I thought it said in the book that the people that had the hardest time putting the skinneys down were the ones using the then new round called the "Green Tip" which had the tungsten core so that it would go through a lot of stuff and not fragment, like the lead core bullets?
 
Doorgunner;
I was looking thru the wound bullistics site. Alot of infomation there. It's not for the squeemish either. I'm still tring to navagate thru it. Thanks for the link.
 
Sorry for the confusion, I was talking about the "green tips" when I mentioned cinderblock, not the military FMJ.
Edit: looked up M855, I heard they would penetrate cinderblock. Thanks doorgunner, good to hear from someone with experience.
 
Pokerplayer,
LOL /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
Just last week I was fishing and was telling a guy that there was Flatheads in there in the 40lb.+ size range.
He laughed and said them was minnows and proceeded to tell me that he was at the marina a few years back and a diver came who was diving for whatever reason???? and was visibly shaken (so this guys telling me) and he said he ask him what was wrong? He then said there was catfish down there big enough to swallow him whole!!!!
I ask how big? And he repeats himself.I ask him if he was under the influence of any drugs when this all happened.He was offended and told me he was there and thats what this diver said.
I said ok whatever.I can understand how these storys get started but I can't understand how people can believe them in the first place.Oh Well it takes all kinds to make up this wonderful world we live in.
 
I read a long discourse on the M16 and early problems with it. It was on the net somewhere.

Stu's response was the closest so far.

Early on, the twist rate and bullet weight used caused the bullet to be unstable in flight and it would tumble easily on impact.
Later they changed the rate and/or weight to make the gun more accurate and the bullet didn't tumble so well.
The problem was that the tumbling bullet was deadly, the non-tumbling bullet wasn't as deadly.

This explains why some people will say that they were there and never shot a gun with tumbling bullets. They shot a later version.

That's the story as I know it.

Jim
 
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