Does anyone know how detrimental shooting Wolf ammo is against steel targets at 100-yards? When I tried this previously it left indentations that seemed deaper than FMJ.
Does anyone know if the WOlf’s bullets have any steel or other hard metal in it? TIA.
doesnt wolf has a thicker jacket on it, i dont think it fragments like M193 does
If this website is accurate: Wikipedia - Wolf Ammunition
Here is why Wolf should not be shot at steel targets:
Steel-jacketed bullets
Not only the cases of Wolf rifle ammo are steel. Most of Wolf’s rifle cartridges use steel jacketed bullets, though they look like copper jacketed. The copper exterior of the bullet is only about .005 inch thick, (about twice the thickness of a sheet of paper) with a steel jacket underneath about 1/32 inch thick. Only the cartridges in the yellow and black boxes have real copper jackets. The core of the steel jacketeted bullets, sometimes marked “bimetal”, are lead. Some rifle ranges have started magnet testing shooter’s ammunition to determine if bullets are steel jacketed. The steel is said to be more likely to ricochet, and also to cause sparks on impact, which can be a problem when shooting in dry grassland, or forest areas. In addition, a large majority of pistol ranges will not allow shooters to use Wolf, or other Russian ammunition types because of the steel jacket components on many of their products. The reason cited for this is because they claim it damages the backstops.
I also put a magnet to the Wolf ammo I have on hand as well as the XM855 (as a control). And sure enough, the magnet stuck to the case and the bullet for the Wolf ammo but only the bullet for the XM855.
Steel targets are to be worn out. Blast away.
Not just no, but hell no!! If it were just me shooting at a $200+ targets (I have 2 of them) then maybe. But with 3 to 6 os us, the life expectancy of these targets would be greatly reduced if we all used Wolf or any other steel-cored ammo.
use AR500 plate and quit worrying about your targets…
it’s not steel cored, it’s steel jacketed- and it’s soft “junk” steel. they’re still lead core.
He said it all. I have had some AR500 plates that we have been hitting with all sorts of FMJ ammo for ten or more years now. Closest is at 100 yds, others at 150, 200, 300 and 350 yds. The 100 and 200 have some small pock marks, thats about it.
My pistol tgts are all 500 as well. They have held up very well. I have “turned” a few of them, thats about it. Other than a few pocks marks they are still GTG.
FN in MT
And even AR500 has a limited life. Here’s a piece of AR450 that I’ve been shooting on for probably the last 5 years. M193 with its velocity will do WAY more damage to steel gongs than wolf or even M855 with a penetrator.
Only 6 shooters? We have monthly matches averaging 20 shooters per and we shoot the shit out of our steel, wolf and all. the only craters we have are from the idiots that show up with SS109 or equivalent.
Should not be a problem. Nothing like character built into you steel. AR500 if you have any doubt.
Yep. I actually did a comparison of M855 vs M193 once. Contrary to popular belief, M855 does significantly less damage to the gongs at the exact same distances. You’ll get a lot more sparks from ss109s. I guess that’s why people are freaked out by it.
I had the photo documentation of the tests on the ARF photo server, but I don’t know what ever happened with that thing.
We’ve shot AR500 and AR450 for years, and the steel penetrator is harmless… well at least no more abusive than any other ball ammo.