« Short but Sweet | Main | O Caption, My Caption! »
UPDATE: Response Below!
The funniest "spatter" I ever saw was at the Factory Gun Nationals in Barry.
The revolver shooter [who will remain nameless] apparently had one bullet
with little powder in it, so the bullet came out of his gun slow enough to
watch as it only dented the paper target at 5 yds, and bounced back! The
dent was deep enough to be clearly visible, and it was scored an alpha, but
the target wasn't perforated. It got pasted immediately to avoid further
inspection. The round-nose jacketed bullet was recovered and you couldn't
tell it had been fired through the barrel. [Does the bullet have to penetrate the target to constitute a
legal hit?]
Thanks for all your input! Here is the official answer according to RMI, George Jones
The current rulebook uses the word "hit". It does not mention "perforate" therefore the "hit", if indeed caused by a bullet fired from the competitor's gun, would score.
Granted, the bullet's power factor was likely "wimpy", but the official power factor is determined at the chrono station, not by the gallery's perception of the sound of the ammo. If the shooter's ammo had multiple squibs, it would be declared unsafe and removed. I would not recommend asking supposedly unsafe ammo to be chrono'ed simply to prove that it is sub-minor.
Squibs, when they make a hole in the target, are still scored. It would usually be unlikely that the specific hole in the target could be identified as the squib shot. This was an extreme and rare case where there was no resulting hole. The shooter was fortunate that he was not engaging a popper.
you couldn't tell it had been fired through the barrelDo you mean the bullet was so undersized that it left no rifling marks?
Posted by: Rob Boudrie September 23, 2006 07:39 AM
Rule 9.1.5 of the green edition of USPSA rules state
"9.1.5 Impenetrable – The scoring area of all IPSC scoring and penalty
paper targets is deemed to be impenetrable. If a:". So no the bullet does not have to penetrate (I'd hate to see a target with a projectile still stuck in it!!!). The RO should not be watching where the shooter's rounds are impacting, only ensuring that the shooter is safe in gun handling. A second RO could be watching for foot faults, procedurals and what not so they may see the light shot. Now if the RO is unable to determine (distinguish) the shooters shots, a reshoot of the stage is mandatory according to US 9.1.4.
ALL A's,
Scott ty48526 (ro)
Posted by: scott j clark jr ty48526(ro) September 23, 2006 08:52 PM
My guess was that he put a 9mm round in a .40 gun or a .40 round in a .45 gun (since there were no rifling marks) or he needs a new barrel, the one he has had been shot so much that the barrel had smoothed out.
Nothing in the rule book says that the bullet must penetrate the target, all it says is "hit." So my ruling is an "A" provided that you know for a fact that the "dent" was not there previously and if the "dent" was from a bullet (and not a pebble that got kicked up from shooting another target)
Posted by: Bob A September 25, 2006 11:59 AM
While RO'ing in the mid '80's I saw a similar situation occur. I "DID NOT" score the "Indention". If it doesn't have enough umph to penetrate a target it sure won't make the minimum PF and it's not uncommon to see indentions from handling targets.
An auto with that kind of load won't usually cycle, a Revo will. Some guys have luck, the rest of us have to plan better.
Posted by: Dave Williams September 28, 2006 05:32 AM
Sounds like a hanging chad to me ... If nothing else, I would be inclined to question the PF of the round fired. If it can't penetrate paper, it's probably sub-minor! Sub-minor ammo does not score. Tough question, but I probably would have denied the hit.
Posted by: Mike Carraher October 3, 2006 08:34 AM
While I didn't post the Sept 20 story, it sounds very much like the incident I saw at the 2003 Factory gun nationals that I did report in another forum, either Brian Enos' or the IPSC list. Below are links to pictures of the target before pasting [it was a Charlie hit] and the bullet. If you look close, you can see the rifling. I don't think it was an undersized bullet. It sounded like a light load, but not a squib [primer only].
http://home.comcast.net/~sjpenkala/factorynational/the_target.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~sjpenkala/factorynational/the_bullet.jpg
Posted by: Stan Penkala October 5, 2006 11:18 AM
To me, it scores, since there is no indication that the CRO or RO stopped the shooter. It's a hit, though not a complete punch-thru. I cannot find a rule that states the bullet has to go through full diameter. I also cannot find a rule that states that every round has to make minor, though in anything above a club match I might be tempted to require a (re)calibration to determine whether a sample does meet minor.
Posted by: Dan Close October 17, 2006 04:46 PM
OK The shooter was using a revolver, so it was more than likley a .45 or a .40 cal. So when you go up to the target looking for hits and all you find a one hole and one dent in the target. You start thinking about wanting to give the shooter everything that they earned. So you look at the dent some more and pull out your overlay and find out that the dent's not big enough for the cal. they are shooting because the bullet didn't go through the target and leave a nice radius to score. Now what do you do? I don't think I would have scored it unless it would have been the correct size by the overlay.
Posted by: Duane Eggers October 28, 2006 10:13 PM
If we're going to be PRACTICAL, a dud round has no effect in real life, so it should be scored as a Miss during a match. Let's get real here!
Posted by: Freddy Funk November 2, 2006 07:53 PM
Practical doesn't necessarily apply in a game with ported barrels and red dot scopes. Rule wise, if the RO is certain of the hit then it needs to be scored. Of course it didn't make power factor, but that is determined at the chrono and not on individual stages. The truth is, it probably sounded soft, and that second shot could have had unfortunate results had the bullet not cleared the barrel. The RO let the shooter continue probably because they saw the bullet leave the barrel and hit the target. In the end, if the shooter makes PF at the chrono, the hit should stand.
Posted by: Stephanie Luttrell November 12, 2006 01:10 PM
qry7tbmfcz2h8w5w
Posted by: Alvaro Buckley November 12, 2008 01:26 PM
