I’d set up a picnic table full of jello (tall molded jello would work best). Line them up so the bullet would go through say 5-10 molds of jello first, then into a garbage can filled with mud. You could tip the table slightly and then tip the garbage can a bit so that it would hold more mud. Or suppose you fired it straight up in the air in a large open area, let it fall down and then search for it with a metal dectector?
What you need is Ballistic gelatin: a mixture of 10 percent by weight of gelatin dissolved in water. It is used when at a temperature of between 5 and 10 degrees Celsius. Ballistic gelatin closely simulates the density of human and animal muscle tissue, and is used as a standardized target for testing firearms and ammunition. From 15 feet or so, a round would rather easily be retrieved with relatively little damage to the expended round.
Well, I thought of an idea, but it would it would probably be hard to find a willing volunteer, and would just end up in a big mess (and most likely, hurt feelings).
I originally misread your post as suggesting a very flat werewolf, so you could load a bunch of them in the station wagon.
I fail to see the importance of wanting a portable system. If the purpose is to just see how silver bullets shot, won’t they shot pretty much the same whether you are on a farm outside Mayberry, or in New York City?
I’d go with several big plastic trashcans filled with water, backed up by a solid dirt berm. Line three or four trashcans up, fill with water, and then tape your target to the end one. If you are really paranoid about over-penetration(and you should be) fill the last one with wet newspaper, solid. A standard-velocity .45 should end up somewhere in the newspaper.
The ballistic gelatin suggestion is the best, but is likely to be a bit pricey for a civilian.
I was sure when I opened this thread it was going to be kung-fu related, a la The Last Dragon, which of course would have been more suited to Cafe Society than GQ. I am happy to discover that this question is actually grounded in reality: a well-prepared and carefully tested plan of defense against werewolf attacks.
Carry on.
P.S. - The lazy man in me votes for the swimming pool method – less set-up & clean-up.
The problem with the swimming pool method is the very real possibility of a ricochet. Trisk wants to fire three rounds, to make sure that the silver bullet feeds and cycles properly. This means that, objectively, the weapon should be fired horizontally. To use a pool as a “catcher” would require firing more-or-less vertically. Anything less than vertical is just inviting an accident.
The best portable bullet catchers I have seen are phone books. Just get a phone book and it will catch the bullet, or slow it down tremendously so you can dig it out of the earth. For safety, two phone books will catch a bullet from any normal handgun. My Kimber 1911 .45 will sometimes make it through one phone book, but never two.
Keep in mind, no matter what you use, to be safe, etc. Also, be aware that the bullet will mushroom and not look like the bullet it used to be, no matter what you use.
I would also point out that it is illegal in my county to fire a pistol at anything other than a certified range, since there is no where in the county that is not inhabited over a radius equal to the probable travel distance of a missed shot. So, the swimming pool idea requires travelling to another political jurisdiction.
I am not strong enough to carry a barrel of sand, and I don’t think they range guys are going to let me set up a picnic table of jello on the firing line. Sandbanks and stuff require an admittedly small chance of arrest as well, unless they are berms at the end of ranges, or out in the country where the law is different.
Don’t let that six dollar an ounce figure fool you, until you actually get one ounce of 999 fine silver in your hand. But, while the value of the slug is fairly modest, there is a certain level of emotional investment in this particular silver bullet, what with it being the only one I will have ever shot. I really want to shoot normally in terms of range, level, and firing technique, since that will provide the best real test conditions, and the test is the real reason to fire at all.
So, everyone seems to think that the rounds will penetrate more than two and a half feet of soaking wet newspaper, which surprises the hell out of me. I was advised that wet paper is approximately the same penetrability as ballistic gel. Are .45 ACP wounds in humans routinely through and through? Hell, at two and a half feet of solid paper, shots would routinely go through a freakin’ bear! That’s at least six telephone books!
Tris.
I thought it would be stage magic. Same thing as kung-fu movies, I guess.
Since I don’t know much about guns, I’ll comment on Who Stole My Name?'s arrow post. According to an archery book I read, a modern hunting bow will usually pull about 75 pounds, and use a relatively light broadhead arrow. That will go right through a deer. A medieval longbow would pull about a hundred pounds, and use a heavier spike-head arrow. The author claimed to have seen an oak door six inches thick with the points of embedded arrow heads showing through on the inside.
Well, the sounds of gunshots are more likely to attract the attention of law-enforcement authorities in Mayberry than in Brooklyn …
Really? I would have thought it would be the other way around!
I saw the thread title and thought immediately of the *Mythbusters * TV show, as they’ve used ballistics gel several times. A smidge of Googling shows that the gel is both expensive and a bit of a pain to make up. It’s rather more complicated than making a box of Jello, and you can’t just get this stuff at the grocery store.
As to wet newspapers, there’s a specific way to do it, and as a bonus, if you’re shooting at a range that only allows paper targets, guess what? It’s paper!
Rather than drag you through a small forest of popups and suspicious things that tried to auto-download, I’ve excised the relevant parts here: (Why does it always seem that the good, but obscure, info is in the worst neighborhoods on the web?)
Nahhhh! He wants to frame The Lone Ranger.
If you have any friends that are officers of the law they may be able to help you. I have a buddy who’s a Portland Police officer. I’ve shot in a couple of their ranges, including the one in the basement of the central precinct downtown. They have ballistic gel in that one, so maybe your place would too.
Heck, you might even be able to talk the local cops into it, assuming you’re not someone they know from not so good experiences. Just let them knonw what you want to do… they may allow you yet!
What about a swimming pool or several trash cans filled with jello? After the experiment, you can have your friends over to eat the jello, and give a prize to the one that finds the bullet.
Tris, you might try a red clay bank. (As in a hill or cliff of red Piedmont clay.)
Triskadecamus, I say you work with phone books, you can take three or four phonebooks, set them on top of each other or side-by-side in a bathtub, fill it with water and allow them to soak overnight, this sort of acheives the same affect with the wet newspaper, but a little less difficult, anyway… just another suggestion.
How do you catch a bullet?
Why stand in front of it, of course.
NYC Cop #1: “Yo, Rich, is that gunfire or a bunch of car backfires?”
NYC Cop #2 (looking up from newspaper): “Gunfire, I think.”
NYC Cop #1: “Yeah, that’s what I thought. Hey, I’m gonna get some donuts-you want anything?”