Are mercury tipped bullets legal? Yes, this is where all this "mercury tipped" stuff comes from. Mercury Fulminate is an impact-sensitve explosive that, when packed into the tip of a bullet, will explode on impact and cause a large wound. Mercury is pretty much on par with bullet lead which is usually alloyed with varying amounts of tin, and antimony, which lowers the mass of pure lead. Since mercury is liquid in its' natural state it posesses charactistics which render it truely devastating upon Terminal Impact with a live body. A semi-jacketed hollowpoint bullet so loaded will retain its initial mass and momentum. But, the mercury being liquid will escape the confines of the bullet during the mushrooming stage and expand so quickly as to in effect, explode, creating a hydrostatic shock zone of destruction far greater than the bullet alone. Such a projectile being properly made if shot into the torso will virtually liquify the internal organs and if impacting a human head it can quite literally explode that head. All of this of course occuring in milliseconds of time. The Mercury Load is the MAKE SURE bullet of the professional assassin and requires a good deal of skill in its manufacture_not something that can be whipped-up in a few minutes on a kitchen table. Such a bullet must be milled and loaded to tolerances far greater then can be decerned by the human eye. Otherwise, it will quickly become unstable in flight and all hope of downrange accuracy is lost, even at a range of 100" or so. In fact, an improperly constructed Mercury Load can and under the right conditions will cause a catastrophic instability inside of the weapon's barrel with an outcome that will definently be felt by the shooter. So folks, do not try this at home! Besides being illegal in many places it is damn dangerous to play around with