The butthurt was mighty and profound when I panned G2 Research’s Radically Invasive Projectile (R.I.P., get it?) cartridge sight unseen, with some readers claiming that since I didn’t personally fire the round and conduct my own tests, then my analysis was obviously suspect, incorrect, and premature. I guess a grasp of basic physics and years of marketing experience are less credible than suitably dramatic music and a voice-over guy who sounds like he should be shilling for monster truck races at the fairgrounds.

In any event, Dan Zimmerman at TTAG got his hands on R.I.P. ammo and ran his own tests. The cartridge performs somewhere between a volley of .22LRs and a .380 hollowpoint. Yes, the R.I.P. dramatically under-performs other conventional 9mm hollowpoints in its class.

It’s still great if you get attacked by a balloon, though.

Update: The Gunwire has posted video from RatedRR of the R.I.P. being fired into bare gelatin, gelatin after two layers of sheetrock, and  and gelatin after two layers of sheetrock sandwiching residential fiberglass insulation.

The bare gelatin shot worked roughly as advertised though the trocars appeared to be shallow (seeming to confirm Zimmerman’s second batch of tests), but the R.I.P.’s performance through two layers of sheetrock (a single uninsulated interior wall) was abysmal.

As you can see, the hollowpoint was jammed with gypsum and the trocars failed to separate. The bullet slewed sideways, and the bullet failed to penetrate to an adequate depth.

The shot through wallboard and insulation saw several of the trocars shear off, but most stayed attached to the base and did not separate. Those that did carved very narrow wound channels.