Post by: slavenoid on December 18, 2022, 12:57:53 PM
Post by: Magnum_Willys on December 18, 2022, 01:20:02 PM
Anything .30 Cal gives you best choice for copper
Post by: slavenoid on December 18, 2022, 01:22:19 PM
Deer or Elk ?
Anything .30 Cal gives you best choice for copper
Ahh yes. Mostly deer but sometimes elk.
Post by: jrebel on December 18, 2022, 01:29:49 PM
Post by: kselkhunter on December 18, 2022, 01:38:20 PM
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.
Post by: GWP on December 18, 2022, 01:40:50 PM
Post by: jrebel on December 18, 2022, 01:50:24 PM
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.
Post by: highside74 on December 18, 2022, 02:22:52 PM
Post by: MountainWalk on December 18, 2022, 02:30:39 PM
Post by: Fidelk on December 18, 2022, 02:36:56 PM
Post by: Magnum_Willys on December 18, 2022, 02:56:15 PM
Post by: highside74 on December 18, 2022, 04:25:47 PM
Post by: Stein on December 18, 2022, 05:38:59 PM
Like any copper, make sure you keep the mfr recommended speed or they won't reliably open.
Post by: 92xj on December 18, 2022, 05:51:46 PM
Post by: CaNINE on December 18, 2022, 06:37:33 PM
Post by: jrebel on December 18, 2022, 06:54:40 PM
Post by: jasnt on December 18, 2022, 07:28:39 PM
Post by: highside74 on December 18, 2022, 07:36:15 PM
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
Post by: Sneaky on December 18, 2022, 07:41:00 PM
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?
Post by: highside74 on December 18, 2022, 08:08:19 PM
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
Post by: slavenoid on December 18, 2022, 09:03:16 PM
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.
Post by: CaNINE on December 19, 2022, 04:29:01 AM
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
:tup:
Post by: jasnt on December 19, 2022, 06:06:09 AM
some great terminal result pics on those 140’s over at long range huntingYou 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
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
Post by: elkboy on December 19, 2022, 08:06:06 AM
Post by: BigGoonTuna on December 19, 2022, 08:06:21 AM
Post by: Taco280AI on December 19, 2022, 08:09:07 AM
Post by: Sneaky on December 19, 2022, 02:04:40 PM
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
:tup:
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.
Post by: Stein on December 19, 2022, 02:44:54 PM
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.
Post by: jamesjett on December 19, 2022, 03:09:00 PM
Post by: Sneaky on December 19, 2022, 03:45:25 PM
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/
Post by: slavenoid on December 20, 2022, 05:16:51 PM
Taking faster twist rates into consideration Browning seems to have the most options in that department.