guitar care in a war zone

what would be the best way to patch a bullet hole

You don't. You keep it as a memento and it will make a good talking point when you get home.

If your guitar gets shot at, there wont be much left. The wood would shatter into fragments. At the least, it would crack. Im nota gun expert, but I don't think it would make a simple hole in the guitar. Correct me if I'm wrong.

zero humidity, hmmm, I'd keep it in it's case as much as possible. If you have a place where they keep PCs that would probably be a good place to store it if you can.

If your guitar gets shot at, there wont be much left. The wood would shatter into fragments. At the least, it would crack. Im not a gun expert, but I don't think it would make a simple hole in the guitar. Correct me if I'm wrong.Depends on where it hits. I think a rifle bullet would punch fairly small holes through the thin body wood of an acoustic guitar, as long as it didn't hit any braces. Hitting braces, the bridge, the neck or the headstock would be considerably more damaging.

Shell fragments would make far larger, more ragged holes than a bullet.

I've shot lots of things, and shoot through plywood target backing sheets regularly, but I don't think I'm going to experiment by shooting guitars.

If your guitar gets shot at, there wont be much left. The wood would shatter into fragments. At the least, it would crack. Im nota gun expert, but I don't think it would make a simple hole in the guitar. Correct me if I'm wrong.

The result depends on the round being fired. Most rounds are regarded as being stable in flight, i.e. they have a yaw of less than around 6%, beyond which there is an inate instability. A stable round will cause a round hole in a thin sheet of wood. Depending upon whether it is a soft-nosed or hard-nosed round, exiting the guitar may be another matter. As soft-nosed rounds are banned by the Geneva convention, I'll ignore them. Hard-nosed rounds will almost certainly not be deformed greatly by passing through a thin sheet of wood (certainly not enough to mushroom beyond the bullet diameter), so the exit hole will also be a small hole.

An unstable round will not create a round hole but one closer to the side profile of the bullet, as it will start to tumble as soon as the nose hits the wood. The exit hole will look similar.

This is only because there is a thin layer of wood on all sides of an acoustic. Hit the neck with a 5.45mm AK round and all bets are off! Muzzle energy from a 5.45 is over 1000foot/pounds - even down to 500, hitting a guitar neck will turn several inches of it into matchsticks.

Bullets that are unstable in flight don't hit what they're aimed at. A 5.45mm bullet most assuredly is stable in flight. It's unstable in tissue or water because of the high density of the medium. A more or less straight on hit on thin sheet wood won't make it tumble, either. For that matter, few softnose bullets will expand enough in that thin wood to make a difference in the hole's size or profile. A few high velocity varmint bullets might.

Why don't you take your guitars out, shoot them with various sorts of rounds in different positions and from different angles, and post pictures? That'd be an interesting project.

A bullet which is stable in flight will not tumble when it hits tissue, it will mushroom (more or less, depending upon the type of bullet) and continue in stable flight - which is why soft nose bullets work. If it were designed to tumble, there would be no need for the mushrooming. A bullet which mushrooms and then tumbles is less efficient than either one that mushrooms and remains stable or one that tumbles. It's all about dissipating the energy from the bullet into the tissue - which is why a tumbling bullet is also less efficient than a mushroomed one.
But, you're right, a bullet is unlikely to deform very much through the thin wood of a guitar.
A few high velocity varmint bullets might.

Extreme high velocity will hinder expansion and deformation. Fire a candle at high enough velocity and it will penetrate a wooden board rather than splatter on the surface.

You won't have to worry about humidity so much, just as long as it doesn't change back and fourth really quickly. Afghanistan is really dry and stays that way, so you'll probably be OK. I would worry more about temperature than humidity.

I definately wouldn't play the thing in the middle of the day without some shade at the very least. The direct sunlight would heat it and probably loosen the glue, particularly on the bridge and might cause it to come off. If it get's above 110 I'ed put it back in it's case. In the night it should retain heat fairly well if you keep it closed. Might wanna wrap the case in some extra blankets to be sure. The key is to make teperature changes gradual. If it's really cold inside the case crack it open and let the temp rise slowly. Same thing if it's really hot in the case.

And don't put the case in sunlight, either. Most of them are black and will soak up that heat like no other. If you can, you might wanna paint it white/light brown to reflect heat. Plus it'll be all cammo'ed. :P

As for bullet holes, duct tape fixes near anything. :P

Greybeard, you're incorrect on several major points regarding terminal ballistics.

Yes, a bullet that's designed to mushroom shouldn't tumble. That produces inconsistent results when it happens. It usually won't, either, because of the shift of the center of mass toward the front of the bullet as it expands.

A pointed bullet that doesn't expand will nearly always tumble in tissue. A pointed bullet that's got its center of mass toward the rear of the bullet will tumble more rapidly. That's why the British started making their military bullets for the .303 with paper or aluminum inserts in the nose back around 1912, so they'd tumble readily on impact and cause more damage. They were, however, quite stable in flight and accurate to long ranges. All bullets of course yaw to a slight extent, but all military rifle bullets are designed to be dynamically stable in supersonic flight. The yaw they leave the muzzle with steadily decreases as they travel downrange. They are not stable in tissue or water, as the medium is far denser than air. Hatcher's Notebook contains a chapter explaining the physics of this that you should read. It would take a rifling twist on the order of 1 turn in 3/4" to make most rifle bullets stable in water, which approximates the density of most soft tissues. Typical actual twists for modern military rifles range from about 1 turn in 7 inches to 1 in 12 inches. That's sufficient to stabilize the bullets nicely in air, but not at all in tissue.

A tumbling bullet is extremely damaging, and when it's travelling broadside it produces a wound cavity comparable to the mushroomed bullet. Many bullets, such as our own 5.56mm and the Germans' 7.62mm ones, fragment when they turn sideways producing multiple secondary projectiles diverging from the original path of the bullet, producing punctures that tear as the main wound cavity expands, increasing the extent of damage. Google up "Martin Fackler" and "wound ballistics" for further info on this.

There is no velocity at which increasing velocity reduces expansion of a bullet. Once a critical velocity is reached where mushrooming begins, further increasing the velocity very rapidly increases the mushrooming until the bullet fragments shortly after impact. Anyone who has fired high velocity "varmint rifle" cartridges such as the .22-250, .220 Swift, .17 Remington or .204 Ruger in the field is familiar with how their ultra-fast bullets disintegrate on impact with very small animals, weed stems, just about anything they hit. True, if the bullet's moving fast enough the mass density of the lead will punch right through steel plate, but what comes out the back is a mist of tiny fragments. As one moves up the velocity scale with light gas guns that simulate meteor impacts, you can punch through armor plate with tiny plastic pellets, which are vaporized by the force of impact. Spacecraft are protected from such missiles by a light sheet metal shield that can't stop the missile but is massive enough to disrupt or vaporize it. That shield is spaced several inches out from the main wall of the vehicle, which receives a spray instead of an impact. The same principle has been much used in protecting armored vehicles from shaped-charge warheads.

Taking an ordinary expanding hunting bullet designed for firing out of a .308 or .30-06 and firing it at much higher velocity out of a .300 Weatherby Magnum, .300 Remington UltraMag or .30-378 will invariably REDUCE its penetration in tissue, while making a much bigger hole of shallower depth, because the bullet expands too rapidly and fragments on impact at the higher velocity. That's why there's been such a proliferation of "premium" bullets of solid copper and such in recent years.

None of this expanding bullet stuff is germane to the hazards of guitars in war zones, though. Simply looking at the 1/4" plywood target boards on the rifle range tells me that military rifle bullets make a nice small round hole of slightly smaller diameter than the bullet on the front side (due to wood fiber spring-back) with a bit of splintering around it on the back side where the bullet exits. Thinner wood would be expected to splinter less. The 2x4 wood frames, when hit, splinter rather badly. That's more analogous to hitting the neck of a guitar.

I don't think Chris has much to worry about so far as his guitar getting shot. Don't get yourself shot, Chris, we want you back here safe, and soon!
:D

Greybeard, this being a guitar maintenance and repair forum, it would be better to carry this terminal ballistics discussion (if you want to continue it) elsewhere. I'd suggest the "Reloading" forum at Accurate Reloading.

None of this expanding bullet stuff is germane to the hazards of guitars in war zones, though. Simply looking at the 1/4" plywood target boards on the rifle range tells me that military rifle bullets make a nice small round hole of slightly smaller diameter than the bullet on the front side (due to wood fiber spring-back) with a bit of splintering around it on the back side where the bullet exits. Thinner wood would be expected to splinter less. The 2x4 wood frames, when hit, splinter rather badly. That's more analogous to hitting the neck of a guitar.

But a guitar isn't made out of plywood is it? Wouldnt the guitar crack if it hit a grain line?

Might. (Probably not.) As a matter of fact, many guitars are made of plywood. The manufacturers prefer to call it "laminated wood."

jese where did you all learn so much shite about balistics ??? lol

I suggest you put it in a titanium box, 10 mm thick all round lol.

If they break your guitar, you know where to shove the neck.

So it seems the real problem here is not the damage done to the guitar, but whether or not you are playing it at the time, right?

I'm with Nick. Just make sure you are not behind it if it does get shot. In any case if it does get shot, RETURN FIRE!!!