I installed an Aimpoint sight on a 500 S&W pistol for a guy today. He lives in North Idaho and has been hunting here and elsewhere for 30 years. He’d been in and out of our shop, trying to figure out how to make the little Micro sight stay put on his 500 bore, G-force production factory, so we’ve gotten acquainted.
Today he brought in one of his many hunting photo albums. He keeps records of each harvest; date, details of the animal, distance, and so on.
One of his kills was of a circa 2,000 lb Bison bull he got in South Dakota using a traditional muzzleloading rifle. He used a 200 grain XTP 45 caliber handgun bullet in a 50 caliber sabot. Muzzle velocity; ~2000 fps. (he could state his velocity extreme spread off the top of his head). He knows his rifles and his trajectories from years of practical use. That bull was shot from 150 yards. I ran the numbers in Modern Ballistics, and the impact velocity would have been around 1280. The jacketed hollowpoint bullet struck inside the front shoulder (so as to avoid the heavy shoulder joint, he said) in a quartering-toward shot, penetrated the heavy hide, busted a heavy rib, penetrated both lungs, the diaphram, and stopped in the spleen. The bull walked a few yards, laid down and never got up, shot with what amounted to (energy-wise) a 45 magnum handgun.
Some (most)(no; virtually all) would say that his choice of round was drastically too fragile and drastically under-powered, taking a shot at the “practical” range limit of the firearm, but he’d worked with this system for years and knew it’s capabilities and limitations from experience. Do not try this at home.
Anyway; it’s fun to talk with people who actually do things.
By the way; Installing the Micro sight on a 500 Smith requires the “permanent” red (as opposed to the “high strength” red) thread locker. I had to special order it as no one in town knew it existed. According to the tech I spoke with at Aimpoint, you also need to crank the cross-bolt down far beyond the 180-after-contact spec in the instructions, if’n you’re mounting it on the 500 hand cannon. This time we used a ratchet wrench. He’ll try it out tomorrow after the required 24 hour cure time and we’ll see if it worked. I wish they’d go with a square cross bolt for high recoil applications, but in nearly all other applications it matters not a bit, one way or the other.
There is also some high strength green stuff that comes out more like a gel than the typical watery fluid. Holds like a champ and sets up very very fast.
The fact that his kill walked for a few yards demonstrates that this sick fuck doesn’t know shit.
Put him downrange from me with my 45 magnum handgun and I’ll show him how it’s done.
Wasn’t it Col. Bill Jordan’s book, “No second place winners” where he mentioned some kills with a Colt SAA (.45 LC for you Magnum fans), which were in the hundreds of yards? Or was it Jeff Copper’s book? I mix up anecdotes from the two. Anyway, skill is the handmaiden of experience, and to a practiced pistolero, kills at hundreds of yards on thin-skinned game are not only possible, but commonplace among the few who have that skill level. They are also the ones who don’t put themselves on Reality TV or You Tube, so you may not see the evidence, but the ballistics books say that any bullet makikng 400 foot-pounds at target is capable of a kill, and some kills have been recorded at much less energy levels.
Mr. Mann, even a direct heart shot can result in the animal walking some distance. Only s spinal or brain shot will guarantee to put the animal down where it was struck.
Rod Mann; I will assume that you’re joking.