Just reading through these replies…it dawned on me that the obvious choice is Jello(gelatin) made with newspaper. A LOT of it. I don’t see a reason why you couldn’t make jello with newspaper. Either that, or jello wrapped phone books.
MHO of course.
(If it were me, I’d dig a hole 8 feet deep or so at a 45 degree angle and fill it with wet phone books and water. Stand on something stable to get the angle of trajectory right, and fire).
-K
Well, I haven’t fired a gun in ages, but the physicist in me says that the shorter the distance you want to stop the bullet in, the more deformed the bullet will be. I suspect that to keep the bulllet as pristine as possible, you want something that will stop the bulllet over 2-3 feet, something that can freely rearrange to disperse energy. I like the idea of newspaper in gelatin. I wonder if throwing some sand into the mix would help as well.
I knew it. You live in the Romania/Hungary general area, right?
Don’t know about the efficacy of silver bullets on vampyres, which is that region’s specialty, but I have heard it rumored. I think we could pretty much all agree on their efficacy for werewolves. (The Invisible Pink Unicorn would nod in agreement, I believe.)
As far as a portable stop, a bullet of uniform shape goes through water pretty straight until it starts to slow down. It also keeps a round-nosed bullet intact enough to reload (in my experience).
The plastic (or even paper) milk cartons full of water seems like your best shot (no pun intended). It’s totally portable, and if you are concerned about deflection just lay out the cartons or jugs like bowling pins, but on about a three to one ratio.
1 carton in the first three rows, 3 cartons in the second three rows, etc. Yeah, it’s a lot of cartons, but you carry them empty and fill them from a hose (or stream) on site.
I’ve seen a .38 special penetrate about 7 feet of water when fired INTO the water. When fired FROM underwater, I’ve seen it go farther. Evidently entering the water has a major stopping effect. A .45 will have less penetration generally; the .45 was designed as a round that will not pass through a human body (which is some 98% water), but I’m not sure that this hold for water not encased in flesh.
Going from one bucket to another may increase the rate at which the bullet slows down, but it may also impact the deflection… so…
Oh, I got it! Get 20’ of firehose. Lay it out as straight as possible. Cap the far end, hold the near end up about waist high and fill it with water. Seal the near end with some heavy plastic and a hose clamp. Check the straightness of the firehose and fire away. If the bullet deflects within the water in the firehose the angle it hits the wall of the firehose will deflect it back into the water.
Good luck, and let us know how the test works out. We’ve got some pesky menehunes we need to take care of out here.
You should set out some bullet food under a box that you’ve propped up with a stick. The bullets can’t resist – they fall for it every time!
The jello/newsprint in a block sounds pretty good to me. Shouldn’t cost more than the bullet itself will, and after all, as someone pointed out, it is a paper target. 
Two blocks gives me two feet of newsjello to shoot through, three times. I think I could set the blocks up fairly quickly, and take them down quickly as well, so it won’t represent any real imposition on the folks using the range, aside from holding fire for a few minutes while I tote the bales in and out.
But, it’s fairly warm for jello to set up, lately. I wonder if the Seven Eleven would let me leave it in their walk-in overnight. (Assuming I didn’t mention guns and bullets, that is.)
I think I will stop by the State Police barracks on the way to work, one day next week, as well, and see if I can use a more technologically sophisticated method of test firing this thing. Getting the bullet back pristine is a pretty neat idea.
Of course that pretty much blows any chance of implicating the Lone Ranger in any shooting. Oh, well.
Tris
A steer carcass?
Or maybe…a bullet-proof vest, or some other Kevlar? (Might be pricey, though…maybe you could find a damaged one, or a “defective” vest that was made with good materials, but ended up with four armholes, or something?)
By the way…could you give us some details on the bullets you had made? Are they hollow-point, jacketed, etc.? (Photos would be most welcome.)
The slugs are currently being made, and will be solid 218 grain 999 fine silver, in a standard parabolic nose 45 ACP shape. They will be loaded into rounds based on the appropriate load for the weight of the slugs, by my new acquaintance at the range. I don’t have web space right now, but will be happy to provide digital pictures to someone who does, when the final product is finished, probably a couple of weeks.
My silversmith says I can give his email address to interested parties, and he can make other caliber bullets fairly easily. He doesn’t do loads, though.
Tris
I’ve heard that an ordinary T-shirt hanging loose (ie: not taunt) off a clothes line can stop a bullet. It’s all to do with how the force is dispersed.
Maybe if someone’s in it. But empty… not in my experience. (Don’t ask.)
One thing to remember here is that the silver bullets are not going to expand like lead bullets. Unless it hits something very solid, the bullet probably won’t deform much at all. Any estimations of penetration that are based on the behavior of lead bullets should be reconsidered.
Thaumaturge is correct, if you line up a bunch of milk bottles, you’ll want to be careful when you aim. I believe I mentioned that this should be bench type shooting, not just standing there and blasting away.
Also, there’s an important supply I forgot to mention. You want to fire several shots, so you’ll need duct tape to repair some of the jugs.
Damnit, now you guys have me wishing I owned a gun.
My latest thought is this. When a bullet hits something light, it can go through, or it can take it with it. If it hits something like a four by four inch piece of bedsheet that could be carried off freely (suspend it from a tiny bit of tissue paper maybe), would it take it with it?
If so, imagine a few layers of that, say four inches apart, then a couple of layers of 8 by eight cloth. If the bullet takes it all with it, something like that has to have an incredible amount of drag, especiallly if you try pushing it through something like carboard.
What do you think? can anyone try it easily? It shouldn’t deform the bullet much at all.
My Dad suggests using a 1’ x 1’ x 6’ box of ballistic cotton. He says that’s what they use(d?) at the police department, for ballistic tests.
I regret to say that I can’t dig up any more information on such a system online, though. Sorry. 
Am I the only one who when they first saw this topic… they thought…
How do you catch a bullet? You don’t.
Have you asked the people at the range what they think?
Track down your local IPSC chapter. I used to shoot at knockdown steel plate targets all the time both for practice and in matches. If you look around the area of the target you find little quarter sized lead disks that used to be bullets, sometimes the jackets squish with them making little brass plated ones…
Make sure the area for 5-10 feet in all directions is clear of other shiny objects and you can find them no problem.
Doing it this way eliminates any of the exotic safety issues or purchasing any materials, just pay a range fee and do what they do…
If you are worried about reducing deformity I would second the vote for the pool, firing diagonally away from you into the deep end. will give it a good 10-12 feet of water to slow it down.
Snoooooopy: This idea is much better than my method. Brilliant! I’m trying it right now.
Now there’s a conversation I’d like to see… “Excuse me, officer, I was wondering if you could help me out with something. You see, I have just had some silver bullets custom-made for me…”
If you’re stuck for a place to host the images i suggest you try www.photobucket.com who provide free, image hosting that allows for direct linking. If you don’t want to sign up yourself, I would be happy to host the pictures for you (hell, I wanna see what these things look like, both before, and if possible, after you little test 
).
Checked with a couple of range-masters I know, and they suggest the following: Follow MrFantsyPants idea. Set up a line of cloth squares, say old sheet pieces, hanging in a line, held up by PostIts. Fire the first shot to the left of the squares, the silver bullet into the squares, and the third shot to the right. The pieces of cloth should catch the bullet and drag should do the rest. Be sure you have a solid backstop, however. Safety first. This is a setup that you should be able to rig at any range.
I have some sort of a facination with collecting expended bullets, and the phonebook/paper method is the one that I’ve always used. It’s probably the cheapest too, as you can find used phonebooks and paper quite easily for free.
A .22 willl go through a phonebook, so you have to use an excess of paper behind it. Since your .45 bullet is silver it will probably penetrate more than lead so keep that in mind. If you get about 18 inches of paper in a tight stack, it’s not going to go through. This will also be able to catch many rounds before you throw it away. I’ll take some pictures of my contraption and post it on a website when I have time.
cool! Validation for my theories from a rangemaster (presumably that’s even cooler than a webmaster?)