Hunters: Measure Bullet Performance with Bullet Test Tube
Planning an important fall hunt? Here’s a product that will help you pick the most effective bullet for use on big game. The Bullet Test Tube (BTT), an innovative product from Ballistic Technology, allows hunters to test the terminal performance of hunting bullets. This $69.95 unit contains a re-usable wax-like compound that simulates how a bullet penetrates and expands when shot into a game animal. With the BTT, you can measure the wound channel volume (with water), then split the medium in half to measure the wound channel’s length and width. To re-use the BTT, simply melt the wax-like core material in a standard 1.5 gallon crock-pot or large pan and pour it into a replacement cardboard target mold.
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Click the screen below to watch a YouTube Video that demonstrates the whole process. (If you are at work, turn down the audio volume first.)
To learn more about the Bullet Test Tube, read this Product FAQ. The Bullet Test Tube has earned the NRA Publications 2007 Golden Bullseye Award and Field & Stream’s 2006 “Best of the Best” Accessories Award. The product is available through major vendors including Cabelas.com, MidwayUSA.com, and Sinclair International.
If you wish to capture the bullet after it passes through the test medium, add the Xtender accessory which slips on the end. This allows hunters to examine bullet integrity as well as wound cavity. Sinclair Int’l prices the Bullet Test Tube at $61.25, while the Xtender is an additional $57.60.
In case anyone else is considering spending money on this, don’t. The density is much higher than either ballistic gelatin or flesh, which means the pressure at the front of the bullet is higher when it hits – that makes bullets expand MUCH more than they should. It makes some nice pictures, but for actually evaluating the performance of any bullet, this is worthless. A bullet which would expand nicely in ballistic gelatin will be destroyed when fired into this wax, and a bullet which doesn’t expand at all in gelatin (because it’s too tough or too slow) will expand in this wax.