Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!bellcore!att!cbnews!military
From: gudeman@arizona.edu (David Gudeman)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Exploding Bullets
Message-ID: <7436@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 14 Jun 89 03:26:30 GMT
Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM
Organization: U of Arizona CS Dept, Tucson
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From: gudeman@arizona.edu (David Gudeman)

In article  <7364@cbnews.ATT.COM> mjt@super.org (Michael J. Tighe) writes:
]From: Michael J. Tighe <mjt@super.org>
][ Discussion on exploding bullets]
] 
]I am not familiar with the bullets used by the Chinese Army, but I am
] 
]They are not like hand grenades. If you are not hit you will not be
]hurt, unless of course a small fragment gets in your eye or something
]like that.
] 
]I do not know why they were invented. As far as I know they are not
]very useful. I do not know of anybody who uses them (police, SF, etc).
]They are just a novelty.

The intent of "exploding" bullets is not to destroy things by the
force of the explosion, which isn't that powerful.  The explosion is
only meant to cause cause bullet expansion and perhaps fragmentation.
The expanded or fragmented bullet is less likely to over-penetrate, so
all the bullet's kinetic energy is used to destroy tissue.  Although
the theory is reasonable, as far as I know there aren't any exploding
bullets that really work well.  Hollow points expand more reliably and
Glassar safety slugs fragment more reliably.
-- 
					David Gudeman
Department of Computer Science
The University of Arizona        gudeman@arizona.edu
Tucson, AZ 85721                 {allegra,cmcl2,ihnp4,noao}!arizona!gudeman