Best Cartridge for Copper

[slavenoid]

Wanting to commit to using copper bullets in a new backcountry rifle. Is there a consensus on what cartridges work best with sending copper towards game animals up to 400-500 yard ranges? I got to imagine some cartridges are just better at overcoming the challenges of effectively and accurately sending copper down range.

[Magnum_Willys]

Deer or Elk ?

Anything .30 Cal gives you best choice for copper

[slavenoid]

Deer or Elk ?

Anything .30 Cal gives you best choice for copper

Ahh yes. Mostly deer but sometimes elk.

[jrebel]

Once you shoot a good copper bullet you won’t want to go back to lead.  Only down side is the cost which is negligible if you’re not shooting thousands of rounds per year.  Hammer hunters for the win.  Shoot light for caliber bullet weight by 10-20% so you can push them fast to stabilize them. 

[kselkhunter]

I'm a fan of Hammer bullets.  Have them for 243Win, 25-06, 7mmRM, 356 Win, and 35 Whelen rifles.  Will be trying their 6.5mm next.  And Steve (the owner) is great to work with in terms of answering your questions.  I just contact Steve and tell him the cartridge and he makes a suggestion on which bullet for my application.   Hammer has lots of bullet options, so you're not really limited in which cartridge you select.   Obviously cartridges that are longer and designed to handle longer bullets are probably "better", but I'm shooting lever guns with copper bullets, LOL.   Hammer makes all kinds of bullets, matched to the intended velocity of the cartridge and application.  And are even getting into some pistol bullets now.  I'll be trying out his 150gr Jack Hammer in my 357 Magnum soon as I have that cartridge in both revolver and rifle. 

To answer your question, for deer or elk a 7mm or 30 cal is a good go-to all around caliber for copper bullets, up to 338 and bigger if more of your hunting is for elk than deer.  Pick a cartridge in those calibers that suit your fancy, with obviously the 7mmRM or 300WM being the most popular.   For a backcountry rifle a 280AI would be a good choice for trade off of rifle weight, barrel length, and option for copper bullet.  But so is a good old 308. 

[GWP]

Whatever they make them for that is designed for your fps in a caliber you own is the best one.

[jrebel]

Also…..don’t worry about going light for normal caliber weight bullets.  I would have no issues at all with shooting an elk with the 6.5 124 grain hammer.   The range I choose to shoot at would be based on ballistics and fps at said range.  You want a min 1800 fps for the bullet to perform perfectly.  I want to say my creedmoor is 500 yards. 

I also shoot a 101 grain HH in a 7-08 and would shoot deer sized game to 500 yards and elk / bear to 300 yards. 

[highside74]

My son shoots Barnes TTSX 140gr in his 7mm-08. He has killed a deer at 250 yards and an elk at 80 yards. Both were dead in less than 20 yards. They have 120, 140 and 150gr options in the .284 bullet. With handloads his rifle shoots them at 2950 fps and they are sub moa accurate out of his Savage rifle.

[MountainWalk]

338 win mag. I’m only a fan of copper for the over 30 cal crowd and for bigger stouter animals.

[Fidelk]

I'm shooting a .300 Win Mag that seems to really like Barnes VOR-TX 180 gr. factory ammo. I've read that copper bullets are less accurate than those with lead cores but the first time (and subsequent times) that I've sighted in at 300 yards, 3 shots have printed in at under 1 inch......so that is the load that I stick with. I wish I had an available range with 400 and 500 yard distances to see how that load performs at those longer distances.

[Magnum_Willys]

If Barnes TTSX/Vor-TX shoots in your rifle it tough to beat out to 400 yards.  Much better mushroom than the new Hammer types just lacks the extended range coefficient and expansion for 500+ yards. 

[highside74]

The Barnes LRX is 100% copper and designed for long range hunting. Heavier weights, longer bullets with better bc than the TTSX

[Stein]

I shoot TSX because the other ones are too long to fit in my magazine.  That said, the TSX is one of the more proven bullets out there.

Like any copper, make sure you keep the mfr recommended speed or they won't reliably open.

[92xj]

I’m enjoying 180gr HHs in my 300wm.   3140fps at muzzle.   I’m comfortable and confident in performance out to 500 easily. Right above 2000fps at 700 yds.   Killed 5 deer and a bear from 51yds to 296yds.  They died within steps of impact, farthest being 26 yds from impact.   

[CaNINE]

Ive only taken a handful of critters with copper solids…but from my experience and the research I’ve done they perform best if you use light for caliber and run them hot. A 210 Barnes out of a 338 RUM did a number of a big Mt View bull at 500 yards.  140 grainer out of 280 Ackley works great on deer at reasonable ranges. Need to be mindful of bullet expansion limitations as ranges increase.

[jrebel]

My next rifle will be a 338 Lapua pushing 225 (+/-) grain HH.  That should be a killing machine to my hunting ranges.  Light for caliber bullet at im guessing 3300 fps.  Sounds like a hoot.

[jasnt]

You want a fast twist with plenty of mag room.  Personally I chose a 300wm 1:8 shooting badlands super bulldozers.  Best bc in the hunting mono world.  Great accuracy and amazing terminal performance.  I won’t use anything else on game

[highside74]

You want a fast twist with plenty of mag room.  Personally I chose a 300wm 1:8 shooting badlands super bulldozers.  Best bc in the hunting mono world.  Great accuracy and amazing terminal performance.  I won’t use anything else on game

Oh man they have a 150gr .277 bullet that would be killer in a 6.8 western. .710 BC wow

[Sneaky]

You can use solid bullets that are not "light for caliber" if your rifle has a fast enough twist to accomodate a long bullet. Since copper alloy weighs less than lead, a "standard" weight bullet will be longer when solid copper. The length of the bullet is what can cause issues if your rifling is not fast enough to stabilize the bullet. There is a ton of good info out there regarding ideal twist rates for what you want to accomplish. Many manufacturers are now producing barrels with more modern twist rates to accomodate longer bullets.

The 30 caliber advice is good advice as most of the big names in the bullet world make different weights. Many great options are widely available for purchase.

Jasnt, what do those badlands bullets weigh in at?

[highside74]

You can use solid bullets that are not "light for caliber" if your rifle has a fast enough twist to accomodate a long bullet. Since copper alloy weighs less than lead, a "standard" weight bullet will be longer when solid copper. The length of the bullet is what can cause issues if your rifling is not fast enough to stabilize the bullet. There is a ton of good info out there regarding ideal twist rates for what you want to accomplish. Many manufacturers are now producing barrels with more modern twist rates to accomodate longer bullets.

The 30 caliber advice is good advice as most of the big names in the bullet world make different weights. Many great options are widely available for purchase.

Jasnt, what do those badlands bullets weigh in at?

I think what he meant was if you normally would shoot a 180gr in a lead bullet if you go what would be considered light for that particular caliber going faster performs well in copper. Say like a  162 or 165

[slavenoid]

The Barnes LRX is 100% copper and designed for long range hunting. Heavier weights, longer bullets with better bc than the TTSX

I did some looking on the Barnes website. It looks like they have it all figured out with the factory loads with the LRX. Based on their ballistics and some minimum fps charts I found they have quite a few cartridges that should work. Maybe it's not all that complicated after all.

[CaNINE]

You can use solid bullets that are not "light for caliber" if your rifle has a fast enough twist to accomodate a long bullet. Since copper alloy weighs less than lead, a "standard" weight bullet will be longer when solid copper. The length of the bullet is what can cause issues if your rifling is not fast enough to stabilize the bullet. There is a ton of good info out there regarding ideal twist rates for what you want to accomplish. Many manufacturers are now producing barrels with more modern twist rates to accomodate longer bullets.

The 30 caliber advice is good advice as most of the big names in the bullet world make different weights. Many great options are widely available for purchase.

Jasnt, what do those badlands bullets weigh in at?

I think what he meant was if you normally would shoot a 180gr in a lead bullet if you go what would be considered light for that particular caliber going faster performs well in copper. Say like a  162 or 165

 

[jasnt]

You want a fast twist with plenty of mag room.  Personally I chose a 300wm 1:8 shooting badlands super bulldozers.  Best bc in the hunting mono world.  Great accuracy and amazing terminal performance.  I won’t use anything else on game

Oh man they have a 150gr .277 bullet that would be killer in a 6.8 western. .710 BC wow

some great terminal result pics on those 140’s over at long range hunting


The bulldozers I’m shooting are 205gr  verified my bc at .407 g7 out to a mile so far. 
I prefer to spin copper faster than recommended.  AIDS in terminal performance and helps bc stay consistent at much longer ranges than I shoot for critters.  Jme

[elkboy]

I have shot several whitetails with copper now. Great performance. Just took a whitetail buck at 60 yards (not long range, I know) with a handloaded Barnes LRX in 7mm-08. I'm a pretty average rifle shooter, but I can hit a 6" plate pretty consistently at 450-500 with those Barnes.

[BigGoonTuna]

The 110gr TTSX from a .270 is a poor man’s .257 weatherby…

[Taco280AI]

145 LRX is the only thing I run in my AI now. Sub half MOA, I think 7 deer with it and one elk. Most never went anywhere, the farthest anything went was maybe 40 yards, other than the buck that rolled over 100 yards down the hill. Sub 50 yards, the buck simply dropped. 510 yards, same. My bull was trying to get up so hit him twice. Have yet to recover a bullet.

[Sneaky]

You can use solid bullets that are not "light for caliber" if your rifle has a fast enough twist to accomodate a long bullet. Since copper alloy weighs less than lead, a "standard" weight bullet will be longer when solid copper. The length of the bullet is what can cause issues if your rifling is not fast enough to stabilize the bullet. There is a ton of good info out there regarding ideal twist rates for what you want to accomplish. Many manufacturers are now producing barrels with more modern twist rates to accomodate longer bullets.

The 30 caliber advice is good advice as most of the big names in the bullet world make different weights. Many great options are widely available for purchase.

Jasnt, what do those badlands bullets weigh in at?

I think what he meant was if you normally would shoot a 180gr in a lead bullet if you go what would be considered light for that particular caliber going faster performs well in copper. Say like a  162 or 165

 

Yeah thats true that copper performs better with speed generally, but is a lighter bullet "the best" option in copper? Its all about what you like, but take .300 win mag for example. Per Barnes website the 190gr long range bullets in their factory loaded ammo are above 2000FPS (safe expansion threshold) at 500 yards....The same is true in factory loaded ammunition with 180 GR nosler E-tips and 180 gr hornady CX. I would consider 180gr pretty standard for a .30cal magnum. You just need to remember like Jasnt said to select a bullet that jives with the twist rate needed to stabilize the longer bullets if thats what you choose.

[Stein]

I wouldn't shoot a lighter bullet just because it goes faster.  I would start by shooting different weights and see what is more accurate in my rifle and go from there.  If that weight happened to be heavy AND went below the recommended velocity before it got to the max range I wanted I might lighten it up.

I'm not sure a bullet going 2,300 fps at impact is any more lethal than one going 2,000.  In my mind, it's binary, not linear.  It opens reliably or it doesn't, it doesn't open more the faster it goes.

The biggest difference in my mind is that lead bullets will open at lower speeds so you just have to watch the terminal velocity.

I could be wrong, that's what Barnes led me to believe when I talked with them about velocity.  I also recovered bullets from a 60 yard hit and a 360 yard hit and they looked the exact same.

[jamesjett]

My 7MM REM MAG loves Barnes 150gr. TTSX’s.   If you reload start them .070 off the lands and work back.  They like to be seated deep.  I almost gave up on them until I spoke with a tech at Barnes and he was spot on.  I have taken several black bears with them and two were VERY large bears.  DRT!

[Sneaky]

I wouldn't shoot a lighter bullet just because it goes faster.  I would start by shooting different weights and see what is more accurate in my rifle and go from there.  If that weight happened to be heavy AND went below the recommended velocity before it got to the max range I wanted I might lighten it up.

I'm not sure a bullet going 2,300 fps at impact is any more lethal than one going 2,000.  In my mind, it's binary, not linear.  It opens reliably or it doesn't, it doesn't open more the faster it goes.

The biggest difference in my mind is that lead bullets will open at lower speeds so you just have to watch the terminal velocity.

I could be wrong, that's what Barnes led me to believe when I talked with them about velocity.  I also recovered bullets from a 60 yard hit and a 360 yard hit and they looked the exact same.

Its definitely linear in the physical change in the bullet at different velocities as well as what the bullet encounters during penetration.

The binary part of it has more to do with defining what "reliable expansion" is. Generally this means caliber and a half expansion or 1.5X the original caliber measurement. At lower velocities you can actually see  bullets that are moving slower expand deeper due to a lack of expansion. Did it achieve enough expansion to cause enough damage to ethically take the animal? Thats more of the yes or no part as I understand it.


heres a link that shows the differences in expansion based on velocity in a test medium:

https://forum.nosler.com/threads/monometal-expansion.29316/

[slavenoid]

After the insight and online sleuthing im leaning towards 7mm Rem. The way I understand it 300 win might be best case scenario for reloading but I'm limited to factory loads currently.

Taking faster twist rates into consideration Browning seems to have the most options in that department.