Barnes Trpple Shock X-Bullet? I'll stick with the Accubond, thank you.

[Biggerhammer]

Here's a picture of two .243, 85gr TSX's(45grs RL-19) recovered from a Mulie buck. One shot at 240 yards and the other 320 yards. One was right in the pocket and went through part of the off side leg and stopped just under the hide. The other broke the last rib going in and stopped just under the hide on the off side. The first shot was in the pocket and the second to the last rib. Bad run, the stars weren't aligned, call it what you will. I call it crap! I'll slum Accubonds any day over these FMJ's. Maybe it was because they were shot from a Tikka.

[quadrafire]

WOW!!!
Well they at least retained their weight.

[Biggerhammer]

I've seen similar results with 180 TSX's recovered from Elk, shot by a .300 Win Mag. "Retained weight" is over rated.

[headshot5]

I've had similar results in a 7mag with 160's.  Pencil holes.  Not a fan.  I agree on accubonds.

[Biggerhammer]

I've had similar results in a 7mag with 160's.  Pencil holes.  Not a fan.  I agree on accubonds.

I can see the Tipped Tripple Shocks performing better due to the tip helping their expansion but then again I havent used either and won't.

[Bob33]

I enjoy stories of bullet failure...with pictures of the bullets recovered from dead animals.

[JohnVH]

weird, I shoot the tipped triple shocks out of my 7mag Tikka, the bear I hit at 400yds had a huge hole drilled all the way through him

[sirmissalot]

Wow, definitely not impressive for relatively short distance. I usually don't recover my bullets, shooting a 180 TTSX from a 300 weatherby they tend to go right through but never had an animal take more than a few steps. In 2010 I did recover a bullet from my blacktail which was shot at 375 yards, quartering toward me, oddly enough I found the bullet on the ground just laying next to where he fell... But it was mushroomed perfectly. Also found two bullets from my Wyoming bull elk that year and were mushroomed perfectly, one of them had lost a petal but that's it.

[bobcat]

I enjoy stories of bullet failure...with pictures of the bullets recovered from dead animals.

OK, we'll here's another bullet failure story...

Saturday I was helping my 14 year old cousin on a hunt for his first deer. I let him use my 30-06 and loaded it up with 150 grain Remington Core Lokt bullets, instead of the 165 grain hand loaded bullets that I normally use, trying to keep the recoil down a bit.

At 6:30 Saturday evening, he shot a 2 point blacktail buck high in the shoulder, and experienced a catastrophic bullet failure. That's right, the bullet came apart and did not exit the deer.

Here is the result of that bulley failure:

[Biggerhammer]

Here's another catastrophic bullet failure  , what is left of a 285gr Hornady Match .338 Bullet fired from a .338 Edge. Impact range was 376 yards. The largest piece of the bullet was found just under the hide on the off side, nothing exited. The buck was dead before he hit the ground.

I would have preferred a 300 Accubond but I didn't have time to do any load work with them and the 285's were shooting just under 1/2" at 300 yards, if I did my part.



Bullet failure result.

[b23]

But in all fairness to Hornady the 285 is a target bullet and isn't recommened for hunting. 

Some target bullets, especially in the 338cal, work very well as a hunting bullet.  Both, the 300 SMK and 300 Berger work well at killing animals but the 300gr Lapua Scenar acts like a FMJ and pencils straight thru.

The Accubond tries to give the best of both worlds.  Decent BC for extended ranges and good mushroom effect with good weight retention.  Up to 600ish yards the Accubond is a great Hunting bullet and would easily be a top pick but when the yardage starts getting into the 7-800+++ range the higher BC bullets like the Berger and SMK start to really shine.

[BULLBLASTER]

I agree with the accubonds. I killed a coyote with a 90 grain accubond from my 243 Saturday at about 110 yards. Shot it about last rib and when I found it there was 5+ feet of guts hanging out the hole. And another piece of guts 10 feet away. Not sure if that counts as failure or not... glad to see all the failed bullets killing the animals. 
definitely something to be said for bullets not holding together and causing massive damage! I like it.

[BULLBLASTER]

But in all fairness to Hornady the 285 is a target bullet and isn't recommened for hunting. 

sure looks like the "target bullet worked well enough in this case    Besides animals are targets while hunting right?

[Biggerhammer]

But in all fairness to Hornady the 285 is a target bullet and isn't recommened for hunting. 

sure looks like the "target bullet worked well enough in this case    Besides animals are targets while hunting right?

Yep, it got the job done.

[Bob33]

Most every hunting bullet works as designed the great majority of the time. Every bullet ever made in any quantity can also expect to have a "failure" as some point.

Google "bullet failure #bullet name#" and you will get thousands of hits, regardless of the bullet.

The beauty of America is that we can choose from a vast array of choices. I like Barnes but I've killed animals with bullets from nearly every major manufacturer: Barnes, Nosler, Hornady, Sierra, Swift, Remington Core-Lokt, Combined Technology, and others.

It's interesting to ponder how anyone would ever confirm a bullet failure: if the animal lives and gets away, you have no bullet to inspect. If you recover the bullet from a dead animal, well then the bullet accomplished its primary objective.

I like bullets that are designed to penetrate and create two holes. Some like bullets that enter the animal, turn into hand grenades, and "expend all their energy" inside an animal.

To each his own.