SRM 2460/2461 Standard Bullets and Casings Project

Published

July 10, 2002

Author(s)

Jun-Feng Song, Eric P. Whitenton, David R. Kelley, Robert A. Clary, L Ma, Susan M. Ballou, M Ols

Abstract

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Standard Reference Material (SRM) 2460/2461 standard bullets and casings project will provide support to firearms examiners and to the National Integrated Ballistics Information Network (NIBIN) in the United States. The SRM bullet is designed as both a virtual and a physical bullet profile signature standard. The virtual standard is a set of six digitized bullet profile signatures originally traced from six master bullets fired at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). By using the virtual signature standard to control the tool path on a numerically controlled diamond turning machine, 40 SRM bullets were produced. A profile signature measurement system was established for the SRM bullets. The profile signature differences are quantified by the maximum of the cross correlation function and by the signature difference between pairs of compared profile signatures measured on different SRM bullets. Initial measurement results showed high reproducibility for both the measurement system and production process of the SRM bullets. A traceability scheme has been proposed to establish the measurement traceability for nationwide bullet signature measurements to NIST, ATF and FBI. Prototype SRM casings have also been developed.

Citation

Journal of Research of the National Institute of Standards and Technology

Volume

109(6)

Pub Type

Journals

Download Paper

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Keywords

ballistics, bullet signature, SRM, standard bullet, standard casing, standard reference material

Citation

Song, J. , Whitenton, E. , Kelley, D. , Clary, R. , Ma, L. , Ballou, S. and Ols, M. (2002), SRM 2460/2461 Standard Bullets and Casings Project, Journal of Research of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=822361 (Accessed October 18, 2025)