"Exploding" Bullets from a .22 Revolver?

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dgludwig

New member
I recently finished reading a book regarding the attempted assassination of former President Ronald Reagan where the author(s) related that protagonist John Hinckley purchased ammunition known as "Devastators" off the shelf from a retail store for his .22 rf caliber, Rohm "Saturday Night Special" revolver; having "...especially brutal bullets designed to blow a hole in the target by exploding on impact, spewing hot shrapnel."

Upon learning that a bullet lodged in the lower left neck of Secret Service Officer Tom Delahanty was an "unexploded Devastator" that might "detonate at any minute", surgeons operated on Officer Delahanty only after donning bulletproof vests.

I like to think that I can learn something new every day but this account, claiming store-bought, exploding .22 bullets are/were available to the general public seems completely preposterous to me from all that I think I know about rimfire (or centerfire, for that matter) ammunition.

I have asked this question on a couple of different gun sites. Have I learned something new?
 
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I don't know hardly anything about them, so feel free to ignore me, but I think there was some kind of compound inside a normal HP bullet that "exploded" to give better expansion. I believe the real deal ones have long ago been taken off the market. There may be a shop out there offering a somewhat similar one though. I wouldn't be putting them in my guns, especially not for any human defense. Lawsuits galore.

That seems a bit too much marketing to me, and at 15 bucks for 6, that's an expensive "I wonder if they'll work?" experiment.
 
Thanks for the inputs. I guess I have learned something new but I still have to wonder if bullets already fired and impacted on target can still "explode" if someone attempts to remove them.
 
I remember hearing about this at the time. Not much since, but I always thought it was more gimmick than anything else. It appears that even though they were designed to expand rapidly with a little help from a tiny charge, they all failed to work as advertised.

That is the exact opposite approach most shooters are going after today.
 
If you're a fan of Wikipedia they've got a summary here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attempted_assassination_of_Ronald_Reagan#Shooting

The day after the shooting, Hinckley's gun was given to the ATF, who traced its origin. In just 16 minutes, agents found that the gun had been purchased at Rocky's Pawn Shop in Dallas, Texas.[34] It had been loaded with six "Devastator" brand cartridges, which contained small aluminum and lead azide explosive charges designed to explode on contact; the bullet that hit Brady was the only one that exploded. On April 2, after learning that the others could explode at any time, volunteer doctors wearing bulletproof vests removed the bullet from Delahanty's neck.
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heard of them, twas quite the sensation for a few minutes after the assassination attempt. Not sure if they are still available today, or not.

the important information about them is,
#1 that while they are called "explosive" there isn't enough "explosive" in them to be regulated as an explosive.
#2 they rarely WORK
#3 doctors are paranoid

there simply isn't room for a dangerously large bursting charge in a .22 bullet, its NOT a hand grenade, so while there is increased damage from getting shot (when it goes off as promised) danger from removing the "unexploded bullet" isn't as great as it would seem by the donning of bullet proof vests, and the doc's hands are about all that is at risk.

The azide compound used to make the bullet explode (again on the rare occasions it actually works is very similar to the "explosive" in your car that deploys the airbag (when that actually works ;)).

I had either not heard of, or had heard and had forgotten that the bullet that hit Brady was one of the rare times the explosive actually worked.
 
Filling the hollow-point cavity of 22LR ammo with black powder and capping them with a percussion cap is possible when you're young and dumb, but really doesn't work well.

Don't ask me how I know this.
 
I have made exploding 357 loads with a drilled out hollow point loaded with black powder and a small pistol primer in the nose. It works but I didn't really see the point and shot up the 6 I made and never made anymore. A good hollow point would have been better. And I like penetration far more than I like expansion.

If Hinkley had of been using regular 22 rounds he may have actually killed somebody. What a jerk.
 
And all of the sudden I think I know what I want to do with that Halloween pumpkin that's still on my porch...
 
This same question was asked elsewhere and my reply below. Some of which doesn't fitbecause the other forums conversation went on tangents.
Are any of you aware of the effects of a small amount of compressed air or CO2 introduced to the body? Causes considerably more problems than a 12GA.

If the bullets functioned as advertised, I suspect the immediate effect of even a minuscule explosive charge would be quite painful and devastating. The long-term effect of contaminating the would area and making it considerably more difficult to sterilize would greatly increase the chance of mortality.

The thing is they won't work on soft flesh. If the impact was sufficient to set them off, they would explode when fired. Exploding on bullet proof windows is only minimally effective by chance of tiny shrapnel randomly reaching the target.

Thank God the crazies who do these things are usually the crazies with lower IQs.
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If someone could make a design that reliably detonated it would be effective. Seeing as it took more than a century to get hollow-points where they are, I'd not recommend holding one's breath in anticipation.
 
Explosive bullets in handguns are (legality aside) not very effective unless they strike bone, as happened to James Brady, and probably saved his life; a solid .22 LR bullet would have killed him.

Jim
 
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I just shot a groundhog ..
 
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