.

[Long Trang]

My father and I were talking about bullet proof vests the other day. He made mention that when he was an officer, you learned that a bow could penetrate a vest easily, whereas most small-medium sized rounds couldnt or would have trouble.

[BOB VANDRISH]

Long Trang,from my own personal experience,I feel that a lot would depend on where the bullet or arrow hit the animal.
The general rule of thumb for killing power with a rifle is that it takes 1000
ft lbs of energy to guarantee a clean kill.
With any bow,I believe the number is 40 or 45 ft lbs.(at 50 yards,the Equinox delivers 90 ft lbs)
I would expect your Equinox,and any crossbow for that matter,to have at least equal to or better penetration over a 30-06 rifle.
I happen to own a 30-06,and the shocking power as the bullet expands causes the damage,whereas with an arrow the kill is accomplished by a massive blood loss.
Interesting topic,and I am sure you will get lots of comments from the rest of the troops who are members of this site!

[Matthias72]

On my past experience with carabines, their penetration power is many times more than a crossbow, it depends on cartrige type, but I remember many years ago I was shooting at 400 yards for a coca cola tin and I saw a nice beech tree (hard wood) with a diameter of 2 feets near the target. So I decided to hit it with my 7x64 (that is a very stupid think to do, but I was young )...so when I gone there to see the penetration I saw that all the 3 projectliles passed through the tree complitely !

Bullet proof vests can stop pistol projectiles or small cartriges but not carabines. Of course respect a 9x21 pistol cartrige sure a crossbow arrow with a good point can penetrate more inside a Bullet proof vests.

Regards.

Matthias

[wabi]

The arrow has very little energy, the rifle bullet has a whole lot.
The penetration of a rifle bullet depends a lot on bullet shape and composition. A soft pointed, or pure (soft) lead bullet will expand and not penetrate well through bone, but a pointed copper jacketed bullet will. The best place to put a soft point style bullet is through the "boiler room" (heart/lung area) where it will have minimal bone structure to penetrate and will do massive damage as it expands. The solid jacketed or hard alloy bullet is best directed at heavy bone, such as the scapula (sholder) region where it will damage bones and stop the animal from being able to run.
The arrow doesn't have the energy to penetrate heavy bone structure, but with a sharp broadhead will slice through small bones such as a whitetail's ribs. The arrow depends on the broadhead's cutting ability to cause massive bleeding to kill game. A blunt point will kill small game by shock, but on anything much larger than a rabbit or squirrel a sharp broadhead is a better option in most cases.
Never saw any game wearing a bullet-proof vest, so I'm not too concerned with how well they stop bullets or arrows, but I think they are made of a substance composed of thick woven material of super-tough fibers similar to what a fast-flight bowstring is made of. Hard for a blunt bullet to penetrate, but would be less resistant to the slicing principal a good "cut on contact" type broadhead uses.

[BigTiny]

A broadhead is sharp enough to penetrate a ballistic vest(level 2), but there is nowhere near enough energy in a bolt to get it to penetrate. Stabbing through by hand with the bolt would stand a better chance, but it would still be tough going.

[chris4570]

My question is this, in ranges under 50 yards, how do you feel the equinox would compare to a 30-06 for penetration and bone crushing power?

Broadside, with nothing larger than rib bones hit both will more than likely pass through a deer sized animal. The 30-06 with a well designed bullet will smash through shoulders before it exits. An arrow from the equinox, any bow, will be slowed signifcantly or stopped.

[Boo]

Sectional density (basically the surface area and mass) determines the ability to penetrate with a bullet. Sectional density has much to do with an arrow but in a conventional bullet proof vest that uses fibers the determining factor has more to do with the ability to spread the fibers rather than slice anything.
Armour defeating bullets are usually coated with something slippery to allow this to happen. Flax jackets or any armor with sacrificial plates defeat arrows and 'cop killer bullets' because there are no fibers to spread. Ice pics are a good example of something that penetrates some old light armor because it is pointed and slow enough to part the fibers.
I don't know for certain but I can only imagine that a 220 grain 30-06 will out penetrate an arrow in an animal by a country mile and do many times the damage on the way through unless some unconventional arrow mass is used.
Interesting subject but a bit morbid.

[Long Trang]

.

[bait pile willie]

remember seeing a comparison on an old video where a fella shot into a plastic pail of sand with a 44 mag.pistol and than with his compound bow, only the arrow penetrated through the backside of the pail.

[A.W]

It's the balistic weave that stops a bullet. The bullet spins and as it hits the "soft body armour" (not bullet proof vest) it begins to expand/mushroom. The bullet then gets entangled with the balistic weave which in turn stops it.

Even if the bullet is stopped there would still be lots of "blunt trauma force" which can destroy flesh/muscle and if hit in the right spot it can still kill.

A broadhead can slice through the kevlar balistic weave.

When we were first issued soft body armour each vest had 4 kevlar panels. Two for the front and two for the rear. A 22 long rifle bullet would go through one panel but not two.

There are a couple of other just about every day things that can puncture a vest but I'll refrain from posting them.

Back to your original question....

My question is this, in ranges under 50 yards, how do you feel the equinox would compare to a 30-06 for penetration and bone crushing power? Now I am not talking about gelatin blocks, but real world useage on very large game.

There is no comparison. I wouldn't shoot at live game at 50 yards with a bow but I would with a rifle...and a lot farther.

[Long Trang]

Interesting. Do you feel the power is inadequate or the accuracy?

[A.W]

Apples and oranges.

[Long Trang]

Not really, just a question about penetration.

[BOB VANDRISH]

I just looked up some statistics on a 150 gr 30-06 Rd Nose bullet,loaded to yield 2800 fps muzzle velocity,will still have over 1000 ft lbs of energy at 500 yards(1220ft lbs to be precise)
When you see that the Equinox firing a 400gr bolt at 350 fps,will still have 90 ft lbs at 50 yards,that pretty well sums up their respective killing ranges,with a bit to spare.
I don't know of many rifle hunters who would sight their gun in for 500 yards,nor do I know of many crossbow hunters who would be sighting in for distances over 50 yards,so that leads to the decision or judgment to shoot within a comfort index for either the rifle of the bow.
Killing power is not in question,it is accuracy.

[sumner4991]

The accuracy isn't in question either. The crossbow you have is plenty accurate. However, there is a ton of room for human error. Even after getting a perfectly straight and balanced bolt, then add perfect fletchings, broadhead, serving, and string . . .you still have to get the yardage correct and make the shot. There is a lot of detail work put into making consistant 50 yard shots. Of course, you need to throw in the weather and all other hunting condition issues.

Anyway, I also believe the 30.06 wins that battle without question. Even a heavy bolt will have trouble busting a shoulder on a large animal. The 30.06 will do it every time. My Uncle gave me some Army issue 30.06 shells once(he had a box from his days in the U.S.Army). They were hard nosed . . .those things would penetrate anything, however, they had very little knockdown power. I killed a deer 5 times with those bullets, well, it would have been killed 5 times with the soft nosed shells I normally used. I had 5 perfectly placed shots and the deer never fell. I had to track, see, and shoot until it dropped. I never used those shells again. They were like shooting a .22, except they kept traveling. They made a hole about the same size as a bolt with a field point. I was 16 at the time, didn't know better. The deer barely flinched at each shot.