I made a mistake & I am glad of it

rodkayak

Well-Known Member
I was load developing for my 6.5x55 in preparation for my DSC 2
So I prepared loads with 140 SSTs with N160. Reloader 19 & 22. Only a mild load of R19 (45 grains) grouped well. I chronographed them & found that they were too slow at 2500 fps.
Well that was not going to be any good, surely/ The bullets would just loop like a mortar and the deer run off with a small entry but no exit wound in them??
Back to the drawing board. Next up, 129 grain SSTs with 52.5 grains of N560 behind them. Grouped well & out the barrel at 3060 fps AND LOTS OF NOISE & RECOIL. Well this is more like it, says I.
Anyway off to Devon and the rifle was sighted in & zeroed the evening before. It was not until I was actually stalking a Roe buck that I realised to my horror that I had actually grabbed the the ' slow (2500 fps) ammo. Disaster, but it was too late to change now. Anyway I shot 3 Roe bucks. 2 of them dropped like they had been hit by a truck & one ran a little way. The meat damage was minimal & the haematoma on the exit could be covered by a 50 p piece. There was no haematoma around the entry wound.
One of the bucks was shot high near the spine. If I had used my old 25-06 or the fast 130 grain bullets that had the same ballistic performance as a 270, they would have cut the animal in half & perforated the guts etc. I am totally sold on the slow & heavy method now.
 
Well even your slow loads are turning out 1943ft/lbs energy, so deer legal by a safe margin. I'd certainly not want to be the wrong side of 140grns at 2500fps!
 
Rod, don't let the "small & fast fascists" get you down. Your loading approximates to the Federal 140gn I used to use, they were damned effective too. :tiphat:

ft
 
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Small & fast. The rifle can do that with 95 gr V max at 3300 fps for foxes but I do not have to eat them!
 
Rodkayak

The powder load for the 129g bullet seems too high? I don't use n560 but from what you say "out the barrel at 3060 fps AND LOTS OF NOISE & RECOIL" then I reckon you have over done it. 2700-2800 is pretty quick with RL19/N160/H4350.

Regards
 
Small & fast. The rifle can do that with 95 gr V max at 3300 fps for foxes but I do not have to eat them!

Rod, it's one of the reasons i like the 6.5, it's so versatile. But when loaded as it was designed for, it does little damage but kills damned effectively, although Brit says he had a bad experience with a 156gn/160gn round nose. But I think any make of bullet occassionally misbehaves.

ft
 
If you tink about it the classic Mannlicher Schoenauer used a 160 grain bullet at around 2400fps and it had an excellent reputation on even the biggest Reds. The 303 British of course although a heavier bullet at 174-180 grains had a velocity of 2440 fps so I am not surprised in the slightest :cool:.
 
The problem is not with slow and heavy loads, it's with bureaucrats that have no freaking knowledge of ballistics writing your laws. The 303 with a 180 is seriously mean deer medicine! (Almost as good as our 30-40 Krag!:p)~Muir
 
Hi Rob,

Glad you had an opportunity to compare results over a meaningful sample of carcasses. I completely agree with your findings and have loaded some of my rifles accordingly for years.

In these days of lazer range finders, a slow, heavy load with a sensible zero will do everything you could require.

The need for a 'Flat shooting' load doesn't actually apply in most of the UK stalking scenarios.

Rgds

Ian
 
My summer buck load is a 156 RN factory at a shade under 2,400. Ok for most summer bucks as they are well under 100m's. (Most under 40m's)
Just legal, a rainbow trajectory after 140m's but they will shoot through bracken should there be any, and don't spoil any meat.
The bucks rarely run anywhere.
 
The pet load for my 6.5x55 used 45grns of RL19, under either a 140grn Speer SP or a 130grn Barnes TSX. All the Deer I ever shot with it just fell over!

I'm a big fan of getting a large calibre and driving them gently. In my experience they're just so much more pleasant to use that way. Too many people chase velocity when in reality at stalking ranges the trajectory difference is minimal. My .338 Win Mag should be with me soon and the load I've got planned to try in that runs at about mid range .30-06 energy. The barrel should last for ages and the big hole will make sure things don't run far before dropping! You always have the option of winding them up if you need to but for every day shooting why waste the powder?
 
Sadly I have seen those photos before and it was nothing to do with Charlton Heston. I seem to recall it even had the owner in them who was a Militaia collector. Charlton had soem fine sportign arms as i recall.

equally sad is that Lincs won't allow me to use either my 8x57 nor the 9.3x57 as they say they're too big for deer :rolleyes: A 235 grain 9.3mm bullet would be wonderful for these summer Bucks.
 
Sorry guys am I missing something here, you shoot 4 roe bucks with a 140gn bullet producing almost 2000lbs of energy, then get a hard on:stir: because they fell over dead on the spot??????

If you had shot 40 rutting sika stags and they all fell over dead on the spot then much respect,:tiphat: I would have been impressed, even 40 roe without runners would have been good, after all none of the last 20/30 roe I have shot needed the dog (note to self I must not tempt fate) does that mean my fascist fast and flat round is 6 times better than the slow and loopy bullet.:smug:

The minimum muzzle energy up here is 1000fts of energy for roe, OK your southern roe are a few pound heavier but come on 2000fts is more than enough, before the deer act came in people shot loads with Hornets.

As to using the old 6.5X54 for deer before the minimum limits came in it is fair to mention that a 22-250 was seen as a first class “killer” on red hinds, the total opposite to the Manlicher caliber.

I hope that has given the thread some prospective, now await incoming from all of you, deep fox hole being dug and tin hat firmly on.:D

Muir, 25 303s you’re the man.:tiphat::british:

ATB

Tahr
 
Sadly I have seen those photos before and it was nothing to do with Charlton Heston. I seem to recall it even had the owner in them who was a Militaia collector. Charlton had soem fine sportign arms as i recall.

equally sad is that Lincs won't allow me to use either my 8x57 nor the 9.3x57 as they say they're too big for deer :rolleyes: A 235 grain 9.3mm bullet would be wonderful for these summer Bucks.

I had a similar problem with Cambs constabulary - wouldn't let me use my 9.5 x 57 MS (aka 375 Nitro Express in real money) for live quarry - too big! Pity, it's a nice little rifle, comes up into the shoulder like a shotgun. Needs scoping though.

Andrew
 
Thar: It's all in the hands of the person pulling the trigger. We have had this thread angle before so I won't beat on it, but I'd give a good hunter/marksman about any rifle (caliber) and assume they had a better than average chance of killing their deer cleanly. A Sioux indian I worked and hunted with for many years thought a 22-250 was the best deer cartridge around: Killed every deer he shot, dead on the spot. Then he got a 243 and did the same. Then he traded into a 30-30 and did the same. One weekend he borrowed a 30 M1 Carbine (tiny, pi$$-a$$ cartridge) from me and in return for the favor, brought me a nice mule deer doe neatly shot in the back of the head. You get my point. I kill deer with handguns and there are few rifle rounds as pitiful as the largest handgun caliber fired from a revolver. I get close and I choose my best shot for the gun I'm carrying. If the shot isn't right, I wait until it is. That's what hunting is about, not what gun you use.

As to the 303's. I love 'em. For a while (a couple of decades back) I could buy them for $25 each in full military dress and I spent my discretionary cash doing it. I have traded off my duplicates but have a core collection remaining. I have mostly military including No1 MkV and No1 MkVI models but have the aforementioned sporters as well.

This is me in 1983 at a military rifle shoot in New Mexico. All the guys were shooting M1 Garands, Springfields, and Mausers. I was the only .303 driver and took some guff about that. Adding to their scorn was the fact that I was using cast bullets. The target was a 24" steel plate at 200M. Those were fun times.~Muir (I still have that rifle in the pic!)

zia303shoot076.jpg

(Sorry for the hijack down memory lane!)
 
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Sorry guys am I missing something here, you shoot 4 roe bucks with a 140gn bullet producing almost 2000lbs of energy, then get a hard on:stir: because they fell over dead on the spot??????

Hi Thar, as you guessed - you are missing the point! :)

The deer fall over BUT do so with minimal meat damage and haematoma.

That is the point!

Rgds

Ian
 
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