Lead mining

[JKR]

Not having the equipment to make proper dirt berms for backstops, I build them with dead elm logs. I make them about four foot square. I seem to have an abundance of dying elm trees that I cut into four foot pieces which I can handle.( barely)

After a season of shooting I need to rebuild them by adding new logs. The area where the bullets impact is pretty well reduced to sawdust and chips about half way through the pile.

The fun part is there are always lots of bullets to pick up. It’s my version of an Easter egg hunt, only more fun!

Today while I was working on my three hundred yard backstop and happily filling my pockets with lead, I found a jacketed bullets that my son had shot with his 7 mag and 6.5/284. Those tiny bullets where only a few inches into the pile while the big lead ones where way back.

High velocity versus bullet mass.

Jim

[Don McDowell]

Shot a cottonwood log about 3 ft thick length ways with the 45-70 once
The 20-1 postel bullet was sticking out the back side and when I got it wiggles out of there it resembled a paper patch slug the lube grooves almost smeared completely off

[Distant Thunder]

The .45-70 with almost any cast "round" nose bullet of 450 grains or more does not want for penetration. It happens to be right in the velocity niche where penetration is at the maximum and any more velocity reduces penetration and 500 grains of lead is packing a bunch of momentum. There are good reasons it continues to impress hunters and shooters today after nearly 150 years. Not many other cartridges can lay claim to such longevity! The little .22 short rimfire is the only one that can think of that has been around longer, at 163 years old.