Multiple-Impact Bullets for Home and Drone Defense – SHOT Show 2016
Russ Chastain 01.28.16
Say you’re in a high-stress situation such as defending your life with a firearm. Someone is coming at you, and maybe they’re shooting at you. You need to draw your gun and fire NOW.
Chances are pretty good that you will miss your first shot. That happens a lot. You’re stressed, you’re rushing, you’re on sensory overload. Well, with this bullet you can hit a bad guy even when you miss.
They’re calling it the Multiple Impact Bullet or MI Bullet, and it’s pretty impressive. It’s been around for a few years now, but I can’t be the only one who hasn’t heard of it until recently. Company co-founder Jaye Kuchman grabbed my attention as I passed by their booth at the SHOT Show, and I’m glad he did. Here’s the scoop.
You know what a saboted bullet is, right? It’s a projectile smaller than the bore of the gun in which it’s fired. Sabots of plastic, wood, or another light and forgiving material act as spacers to fill the gap between the bullet and the bore. Now imagine the sabots being made of metal, that there are three of them, and that they’re all connected via string.
What you have is a central bullet that acts just like any other bullet – it flies straight and true, having had spin imparted on it by the rifling in the barrel (or choke tube). But just behind that bullet in flight, you have these three other projectiles, tied together. The spin of the rifling causes them to spread once they leave the barrel, but the string keeps them equidistant from one another. This “web” flies along the same path as the central bullet, and greatly increases your odds of hitting something.
The above is true of their shotgun ammunition, but their handgun ammo doesn’t contain a central bullet, just the three-part web of metal “sabots.” I suppose a central bullet would have to be pretty small (diameter) in a handgun cartridge, anyhow. These home defense loads are currently available in 45 ACP and 12 gauge.
To further explore the reasons why they developed this ammo, take a look at this page on their site.
A bullet enhanced with Multiple Impact Technology (a prior-to-impact expansion technology) is designed to compensate for most if not all of the typical marksman’s error caused by Last Second Twitch. The new design divides a single projectile into 3 interconnected segments that will spread to a predetermined orientation and finite diameter when fired. Once deployed, the segments of our proprietary Wide Envelopment Bullet (W.E.B) are tethered together (like a spider web) to offer the shooter a much wider impact zone, reducing the occurrence of missed shots and thereby reducing the risk of collateral damage.
(A standard .45 cal slug is .452 inches in diameter and remains that way until it collides with something, where as a T3 round of the same caliber can be made to expand (instantly upon leaving the barrel) to a predetermined diameter (range 6 “ to 16 “ or greater). This one of a kind Accelerated Radial Spread makes possible a wide spread pattern that ensures an ultra-high hit probability for each and every shot, resulting in unprecedented accuracy/hit probability, ensuring the shooter a greater tactical advantage.
The video below has some impressive photography illustrating this. Even if your aim is off to the side, as with the guy in the video whose aim was on the edge of the target, chances are good that at least one of the other projectiles will hit the bad guy.
They also have MI Bullets made with other materials to reduce their lethality. And the concept has been expanded on to create their new Skynet “Drone Defense” ammo, which fires a five-arm “web” to take drones out of the sky.
In 12 gauge, you get a 6-foot-diameter “net” of projectiles. In 40mm grenade launcher format, that grows to 9 feet. Watch the video below for more details.
What do you think? I like it, myself. It’s pricey; the 45 ammo runs $188.95 for a box of 50! Or you can pick up a 10-pack for $39.95 or grab 30 rounds for $114.95.
But what’s more precious: your money or your life?
