Many of you will have gathered that I like bullet expansion and terminal ballistics, and the relative differences between different types of bullet. And that I’ve got some pretty clear views on what works and what doesn’t for the kind of deer hunting that we do here.
My mate came across this channel, there’s been a few new bullet tests added since so it’s quite current, and I would expect quite a lot of new content over the coming months. What was interesting to us was these guys have tested the expansion of different types of bullets using the exact same methodology each time, so the relativity is good. I was pleased to see they have tested some of my favourite bullets, as well as the common Barnes bullets that I have been shooting recently along with a couple of mates.
The photos and graphs are informative and well worth checking out.
One main issue though. The choice of water as a capture medium is always debatable. In my experience, using water generates a uniformity of expansion that is unlikely to be repeatable in animals. We can argue about this until the cows come home, same with ballistic gel. But at the end of the day you’ve got to use something practical, and if you are doing it the same each time, then the relative comparison of one bullet to the other is acceptable to my mind.
There is a pattern in these tests that correlates very well with our field experiences, particularly with the Barnes bullets versus the cup & core copper / lead bullets such as ELD-X. Past a certain range, which varies according to the power of the cartridge and the calibre of the bullet, we’ve seen some very ordinary wounding and very long runners with Barnes TSX and LRX on red deer. This has led us to impose a 2,400fps minimum impact velocity for clean killing. This isn’t of much interest to those of you that only use these bullets at short range, but for us it is a critical performance factor. The photos of the Barnes bullets at extended ranges in these tests make perfect sense when I consider the narrow and ineffective wound channels on deer that ran on a long, long way.
There’s a couple of truly outstanding performers in these tests. The 180gr Norma Oryx in .300 Win Mag achieved an average expansion of 3x calibre at 100, 200, 300, 400 and 500 yards. That’s bloody awesome, and has challenged some of the historic assumptions I have made about bonded bullets which may be at least partially incorrect. The ELD-X did extremely well as I would expect as a user of that bullet on big deer at extended ranges, though I don’t think the guys necessarily understood what they were seeing (and measuring) with the closer range impacts (the shedding of petals, hence an apparant “narrower” expansion).
Anyway, for bullet nerds this may be of interest and is a nice way to spend an hour or two. (I admit I do not watch all the shooting and just scroll forward to the results.)
Frontline Rejects Channel
My mate came across this channel, there’s been a few new bullet tests added since so it’s quite current, and I would expect quite a lot of new content over the coming months. What was interesting to us was these guys have tested the expansion of different types of bullets using the exact same methodology each time, so the relativity is good. I was pleased to see they have tested some of my favourite bullets, as well as the common Barnes bullets that I have been shooting recently along with a couple of mates.
The photos and graphs are informative and well worth checking out.
One main issue though. The choice of water as a capture medium is always debatable. In my experience, using water generates a uniformity of expansion that is unlikely to be repeatable in animals. We can argue about this until the cows come home, same with ballistic gel. But at the end of the day you’ve got to use something practical, and if you are doing it the same each time, then the relative comparison of one bullet to the other is acceptable to my mind.
There is a pattern in these tests that correlates very well with our field experiences, particularly with the Barnes bullets versus the cup & core copper / lead bullets such as ELD-X. Past a certain range, which varies according to the power of the cartridge and the calibre of the bullet, we’ve seen some very ordinary wounding and very long runners with Barnes TSX and LRX on red deer. This has led us to impose a 2,400fps minimum impact velocity for clean killing. This isn’t of much interest to those of you that only use these bullets at short range, but for us it is a critical performance factor. The photos of the Barnes bullets at extended ranges in these tests make perfect sense when I consider the narrow and ineffective wound channels on deer that ran on a long, long way.
There’s a couple of truly outstanding performers in these tests. The 180gr Norma Oryx in .300 Win Mag achieved an average expansion of 3x calibre at 100, 200, 300, 400 and 500 yards. That’s bloody awesome, and has challenged some of the historic assumptions I have made about bonded bullets which may be at least partially incorrect. The ELD-X did extremely well as I would expect as a user of that bullet on big deer at extended ranges, though I don’t think the guys necessarily understood what they were seeing (and measuring) with the closer range impacts (the shedding of petals, hence an apparant “narrower” expansion).
Anyway, for bullet nerds this may be of interest and is a nice way to spend an hour or two. (I admit I do not watch all the shooting and just scroll forward to the results.)
Frontline Rejects Channel
