man, next time you will want the plates at a steep angle pointing down. But ideally if you want to see the performance at that distance (there are legit reasons) you can make ballistic gel block to capture the impact and deconstruction a bit safer.

hope you are well.

We are all well. We are going to complete the test. No angled plates. Going to shoot them square like before. Only this time I think we will use a lead sled as a remote firing position.

Good idea, do it like myth busters do.

It's always a good idea to not angle the static plates, good luck with your test

Im waiting on the AR500 results. My swinging 550 gong dimpled at 75 yds with a 40 grain vmax out of a 24" .223

Use thicker plywood since we all know wood stops bullets very well.

I don't recall ever seeing a static plate that wasn't angled down.

***ETA*** from multiple different target companies:
"It also means that the target face needs to be flat and smooth and that the angle needs to be downward to direct fragments away from the shooter."

"Our 3/8" Angled AR500 Steel Static Targets are laser cut from high quality domestic plate. Angled steel targets can help direct splatter and bullet fragments downward and reduces energy subjected to target."

"AS with all of our Target platforms the Full Hostage has a natural 15 degrgee forward angle to direct richochets donward into the ground"

I knew someone was going to take you serious.

That bullet is way too fast for armor steel, that close. 3200 fps MV is rule of thumb. High energy does not hurt them, high speed does.

When I've had clients want to get DOPE on .224" cartridges, I put clays on the berm at 200 yards, otherwise it'll dimple my AR 500.

Pretty sure this about sums it up thus far. We had complete penetraton on the 1/4" at a mv of 3150, but nothing really but a very light mark with the 77g smk at 2990fps.

This was part of the reason of the test.

There are several parts that intend to test other than that though.

Also, to answer another poster. There is some mathematical formula that gives a percentage of energy lost per degree of angle. I don't want to leave anything to guessing which is why I am shooting it square.

The jacket separation was due to full penetraton of the 3/8" mild steel and the thicker jacket construction of the target style bullet. It basically peeled the jacket from.the core, flipped it inside and created a lightweight, high velocity projectile in reverse.

Had that jacket been another inch to the right, it would have gone right back down the bore.

I also have no doubt that if that jacket would have struck the 3/4" plywood it would have stopped it.

Regardless, the testing will be completed, albeit with largely different testing protocols in place so we don't repeat the previous.

Ultimately, besides everyone seeing the fallacy of it, in the end I believe there will be some questions answered as far as external ballistics vs steel of a given composition.

I have some hay baling twine that I can send you, should be good for several thousand trigger tugs. Hate to think I could contribute to science and did nothing.

Lol. Thanks. I think I've got the trigger pulling contraption figured out though.

Yup. A little safety protocol goes a long way.

Before you two start testing again, will you both sign life insurance policies where I am the beneficiary?

Sure man, just come out and video.

I don't think there's a camera with enough zoom to video at a safe distance from that setup. I'll have to pass.

I'm a very serious guy

Seriously though I'll be watching for the results of this test on the local news

Are you fellas related to the great and magnificent Spyros? Just curious.

Some people remind me of junior high. When everyone would pile on a few select kids all the time hoping they would never be one of those kids.

Is anyone else as confused by this thread as I am????

Probably, but I can give you a rundown. Two of my buddies bought some steel plates in various composition and thickness to do a video on private land. The goal was to see what caliber would penetrate what steel at what distance. They used minimal safety procedures and the result was one of them taking a ricochet to the face. They posted the video and a few fellow THF members twisted off pretty good. My buddy had a few glasses of rum and coke and decided to twist off in return. It got pretty ugly and the thread was locked. Now my buddies are going to finish their experiment with better safety precautions. That's it.

so us criticizing him finally got through that hard head and they are going to take some more precautions next time. Good deal

I'm pretty sure the copper jacket to the cheek bone influenced their decision for extra safety. That dude was ugly to begin with though. Now he just looks more like Jose Aldo.

Just to clarify, no ones opinion here, or anywhere else influenced anything in future tests. It would be blatantly stupid if we went back out and performed the same scenario without altering safety precautions. The reason I even posted it up for people to see was to learn from our mistakes and to realize how much damage a 20g piece of jacket can actually do. Thats why the video was labeled as it was. I have repeated this countless times. What pisses me off is the "bandwagon" reaction. That horse has been beaten beneath the ground. For people on here to act "Holier than thou" and get on their soap box and preach like they live a perfect, spotless life, and to judge someone as less than them, or dumb or whatever, just makes my blood boil.

Aside from that, the second after he was hit I was ready to shut the whole thing down. We decided to complete it. We will...next weekend with a different setup.

After reading the locked thread, the video proves this is a really stupid thing to do with a rifle at 15 yards.

Don't understand why you would want to do it again. There is nothing scientific about stupid.