Basically your results mirror my tests from the 70's. The video is not a test. Its just an idiot shooting at a target with no control over if and what brush he hits. It hard to pack that much BS in 17.14 minutes.Originally Posted by KYCaster
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Basically your results mirror my tests from the 70's. The video is not a test. Its just an idiot shooting at a target with no control over if and what brush he hits. It hard to pack that much BS in 17.14 minutes.
Last edited by M-Tecs; 12-01-2016 at 10:48 PM.
I watched it, good enough video.
I thought the .223 was pretty instructive as was the .308.
Once he got up to the .35 rem I noticed there were no more wild shots, they were all within 8 inches, aimed for the breadbasket of a deer they would all have been fatal.
I think most misses after the .308 were the result of hard to see target not deflection.
I would liked to have seen what the .444 would have done with a load a bit slower, 310 gr cast lead boolit moving 1500-1600 fps. I think actually the last 3 were quite close.
I think you could add .44 mag and .45lc to that list and at 50 yards they would be just as effective.
I happened to get an education in what happens to a high velocity light weight bullet that hits a twig pencil sized or smaller. I was aiming at a crow in the tree's with my Rem 788 in .243.
Load was 30 grains of Dupont 3031 below a hornady 60 grain boat tailed hollow point jacketed bullet.
The crow died, but it was mostly wood that hit him. It looked like an explosion or a shotgun blast went off up in the tree's.
So I walked out there, judging by the shreds of wood and bark on the snow ititial impact of bullet on branch was about 15 feet in front of the crow.
Front of the crow had splinters of wood sticking out of its breast, and I saw a few shreds of copper gilding metal. Some part of the core may have gone into it, but nothing exited out the back side.
That was one dang fine varmint shooting gun, and man I loved busting crows 300 yards out and more. Especially if there was more than one.
But that was where my road started turning away from small and fast and headed down to big, slow and deadly country. It took me a lot of years to come to see that those big nasty recoil producing rifles could be downloaded, tamed, and still be deadly.
Chuck seems to agree for the most part with the guy in the video. Look at what he recommends and why.
I'm not sure anyone is saying that larger heavier bullets aren't impacted, but that they are impacted less. And this is shown each time in each article you linked.
The guy's video may not have been scientific as no two shots could be the same. We can only assume the brush was quite thick as he stated. However despite going through branches they still hit the target. That says quite a bit actually. Now we have no idea where his POA was to compare the POI. However we can be fairly certain he was indeed aiming at the steel plate.
To be clear I'm not advocating shooting through brush. I haven't as of yet but most of my medium game hunting has been from a blind where brush hasn't been an issue.
However it seems to me to be a bit prudent to use a heavy for caliber bullet in a brush gun, one carried in thick woods as unseen interference may happen.
Some bullets/calibers fair better than others but none give any predicable for anything past ten yards beyond the deflection point. Common sense is that slow and heavy would be best. That didn't hold true in my tests but my methods were different.
Everything was fired from a bench rest with the dowel holder 3 feet in front of the muzzle. Dowels varied in size from 1/8" to 1" and I could control how the dowel was hit. Targets were placed from 10 feet behind the dowel to fifty yards. Targets were 4' x 8' cardboard that were placed in a line so I could see the cork screw bullet yaw effect.
When I first started the testing I just used a bunch of brush. One shot would not hit any brush and the next would hit 10 branch's. Nothing predictable so I switched to the dowel holder
The 45/70 with 385 grain Lyman 457124 faired very poorly compare to the HV fast spun bullets. The 405 Remington bullets did much better not nearly as well as the 7mm with 175 grain bullets.
After hundred of rounds tested nothing proved to be a reliable brush buster.
My ideal of a Brush Gun is about the same as above,30-30 336 marlin fit that bill for many years,now I just pack a 44on my hip. My days of low crawling or over... to old and broken down these days.
I started out with nothing and I still have most of it left.
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Looking for a Hensly &Gibbs #258 any thing from a two cavity to a 10cavityI found a new one from a member here
It doesn't sound as though you could have been any more thorough. I like that you placed several sheets of cardboard so as to see the track. Slick!
I wouldn't purposely shoot through brush, but I wouldn't have thought grasses would do much of anything. This is a surprise to me. I could see being quite focused on a deer and not realizing something minimal in the way.
I started gun hunting for deer in 1970. That was 4 years before a could by a license but mom bought one and came with me. Those were the only four years she went out hunting.
Dad had hunted deer since 1950 but that was in open areas. In 1969 a friend purchase a river bottom ranch that was deer rich but very heavy woods/brush. We started with 30/06's using 220 round nose cause that was recommend for heavy woods. In the first couple of years we poked and hoped a lot and got some bad hits.
Fur prices were high so when I got my drivers license at 15 (1975) I sold the 30/06 and purchased a Browning Sako barreled action in 243 for fox and coyote hunting. I put a 3.5 x 10 Leupold on it. From the tree stand I always had time to turn the scope up to 10 and pick a shot though the brush. I killed 40 or 50 deer with that rifle in very heavy brush. All but one was a one shot kill.
One of the jobs I had was I reloaded for a 7th Calvary re-enactment club. For the club I loaded 45 Colt and 45/70 however most of the members had me load for their hunting rifles. Same for my classmates so I got to play and test a large variety of rifles.
Shooting through grass is something that I have never tested. but, as I stated I shoot a lot of prairie dogs. When prone and shooting through grass I do get some wild shots. Calibers are 223, 22-250 AI, 220 Swift, 6mm BR, 6mm XC, 243 Win and 6.5 x 284. Grass in front of the muzzle will sometimes give shots way off call. It happens less than I would expect but it does happen.
It's been a long time since I did the test but nothing was predictable. With how I had the dowels setup I could test the same shot and hit over and over. Sometimes the bullet deflected very little yet the next shot they deflected greatly.
I have long since given up on looking for a magic brush busting caliber/bullet. Other than shooting prone at prairie dogs though grass if I can't pick a clear shooting lane I don't take the shot.
All I see in the OP's video is a clown trying to justify his beliefs without any repeatability or controls in his example. I won't call it a test because it is not.
His statement that if you can seeing it you can kill it is BS.
Last edited by M-Tecs; 12-02-2016 at 02:57 AM.
My brush gun, open/clearcut area gun for that matter, is a 25-06.
Most shots at deer here are under 100 yards.
I just don`t shoot at game through brush.....dale
The answer is pretty simple if you stop and think about it:
Q. What bullet do we choose to deliver straight-line, tissue-damaging penetration in meat? A. One that's heavy-for-caliber, with a large meplat.
Q. What bullets take the lest pressure on their sides when passing through paper targets? A. Wadcutters.
Q. In tactical/defensive shooting, what's the best angle for getting through barriers like auto glass, car doors, etc...? A. As close to 90 degrees as you can get.
A long, tapering ogive is more likely to catch a twig on the curve than the tip of the nose. This is likely to divert the round. A large meplat is more likely to give you something like a 90 degree, straight-on impact, cutting through the obstacle rather than bouncing. Extra weight behind the nose will incline it to keep on truckin'. One of my fun guns is a .455 Webley in which I shoot the original profile, 265 grain MKII bullet, which is pretty similar in shape to a lot of rifle spitzers:
I cast them out of really soft @40-1 that I render down from fired shotgun slugs, but it probably wouldn't matter if I cast them out of Play Dough. When shooting cans or water bottles, they penetrate, hit the hard packed dirt behind, and very reliably skip up to be found on the berm at chest to head height 10 to 20 yards behind. The WC's, Keiths, LFN's and WFN's are much more inclined to burrow.
Hard vs. soft is going to be more of a consideration for the game in question and local hunting laws, but the bullet that doesn't smudge on impact with a twig is more likely to proceed on the original path.
WWJMBD?
In the Land of Oz, we cast with wheel weight and 2% Tin, Man.
In the 60's in Texas we hunted right of ways that the Ranchers intentionally cut into their hill country ranches with elevated stands at intersections...that was great and my scoped 7mm Rem-mag was my choice.
When we would stalk into the woods, thick brushy woods, then find a clearing and sit there we carried a lever gun, didn't prefer a scope in the thicket. We didn't go thrashing around climbing through the bush and thicket so length of rifle was not of concern...we didn't relate 'brush gun' with thick woods in that respect as you would relate the length of a fishing rod to brush and trees.
Shots were clear and unmistakable but you never had any control over the bare twigs that lay in between.
For that reason we referred to them, as our elders did also as a brush gun...called that for the caliber and profile choice and because it had a better chance of defeating that twig you didn't see.
40 years later I was going to zero a .308W @ 200 yards after I had laddered and refined that load @ 100 yards.
I expected to see the first shot @ 200 to be about 4.5" low...instead I thought I saw several flies sitting on the target, small specks that looked like flies. I fired the second round after I didn't see the first and I got the hole exactly where I thought, low (didn't notice whether the flies took off or not). I go to fire a third and fourth before deciding on a scope adjustment and no hole...more flies on the target...WTH?
I walked to the target and discovered the flies were fragmentation of the rounds...10 yards in front of the backstop there was a skinny bare bush that I could not see in the 24X scope. Then it all came into perspective...
I was using 168 grain match HPBT's at 2650 FPS through a 1:12" stock barrel...nothing exotic but they were fast enough that they fragmented.
These twigs were about the size of a kitchen match some were almost twice the size...I went to break them off and they were tough little buggers, I had to get the pocket knife out and cut them. Don't know what the bush was named but it was tough enough to frag my rounds.
This is all Iraqveteran8888 was trying to point out, nothing more. It wasn't a science lab experiment...I had no idea this simple principal would rile the experts so...very amusing!
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Is not so amusing to spend the better half of a day looking for an injured but very much alive deer or hog. "Brush Gun" is a very general term which carries different meaning to every reader. The picture below is "open country" in my neighborhood.
This might be considered "brushy":
Rifles make poor brush guns. Shotguns and buckshot are much more reliable. What's in your backyard probably maybe is different and you have a different perspective.
I have danced with the Devil. She had excellent attorneys.
When Hunting kentucky this year I slipped crossing a creek and whacked my 30-06 pretty hard. Not wanting to shoot and confirm the scope. I switched to my 338 win mag that was in my rifle case from my alaska trip . 5 th day of the hunt from a tree stand I shot at an 8 pointer at 70 yards the 250 grain hornady interlock hit a twig about half way and Deflected hitting a doe about 10 feet away from the buck right at the head neck junction the bullet then hit another yearling doe beside her in the head. Bottom line is if you hit a stick built it's going off course. Just depends alot how far are that the stick was from the target I f you have a hit or not
The concept of a "Brush Gun" has been tossed around and argued for many years. The best analysis of what calibers "get through brush" best was one written by Jack O'Connor many years ago in Outdoor Life when he was shooting editor. He actually set up some targets and shot through hardwood dowels and measured and quantified the different results. The '06 and .270 and .30/30 didn't fare very well. Bullets, when driven fast, heat up CONSIDERABLY via simple friction with the air at Mach II plus. This softens the cores, and lets the bullets become misshapen when they strike any sort of real resistance, like even a blade of grass, broomsage, small limbs, etc. This throws the bullet out of balance, and at the RPM's it's rotating, inaccuracy results, and in direct proportion to how badly it's misshapenn. And how badly it's misshapen depends on how squarely or at an angle the bullet strikes its intervening brush.
The .375 H&H did better than the 3 above, and the .458 did fairly well. Can't recall whether he used solids or not, but IIRC, he did in the .458. The 12 ga. slug fared the best of them all (plain, Foster type slugs). IIRC, I believe he said he's heard from good, reliable sources that the Brenneke slugs were even better, but you'd need to check that due to my faulty memory.
The surprise of the lot was the 6.5 calibers with long 156 gr. bullets in fast twist barrels. They did the best of all the more common "deer caliibers," and it seems their stability after striking intervening obstructions wass due to their RPM rate, and their bullet length. That was the theory, anyway. I know my FIL who fought in the Pacific during WWII said the Japs created their 6.5, or ".25 as he called it," was so they could shoot through the palm trees on some of the island campaigns and get the American soldier hiding behind it. And he said it worked pretty darn good for the Japs, too, and bad for our GI's.
Mostly, though, I think of the "Brush Gun" as being a short, light, very quick handling rifle that you can bring to bear on your target BEFORE it disappears into the brush, which is always just a hop, skip or jump away in real brushy areas. If you're quick, you get to shoot at an unobstructed target. If you dawdle or fumble, all you can do is have a "brush shot," or shoot where he went, and THAT can be VERY dangerous! Other hunters have been killed by guys taking "brush shots!" DON'T DO IT!!! Deer just aren't that important to put someone else's life on the line to take one!
Guys who hunt from stands generally have the latitude of waiting for a good broadside or gently angling shot, if they simply control their impulses. And if they raise their rifles very slowly, it won't usually spook most deer. Big bucks are a law unto themselves, though, and generally notice ANY movement at other than a molasses in winter's pace. And like in turkey hunting, the best time to raise your gun is when they're looking away from you and focusing on something in that direction. You still need to move slowly, though. Experience will teach you HOW slowly in your area with your deer population. Those populations DO differ from area to area.
For my own use, I consider my .44 and .45/70 carbines to be my "best brush guns," but I still don't trust them to shoot straight after hitting intervening vegetation. I once had a deer at 65 yds. in front of me, and its whole chest was blocked by the tip of a pine limb. It was less than 6 ft. behind that limb, and I was using an '06 with 165 PSP's at good velocity. I figured it'd shoot straight enough after hitting that soft, white tip on that pine bough, that I could just aim for the center of the chest, and if it went left, it'd hit a shoulder, up and it'd hit the spine, down and it's hit the bottom of the heart, and right and it'd hit both lungs. Well .... I was WRONG! I held on the tip of the limb, steadied by a hasty sling, and squeezed one off. There was no reaction from the deer at all, except it cocked its ears badk and then forward, trying to locate the source of all that noise. It never moved even a fraction of an inch. It was about a 15" spread 8-pt. buck, and this surprised me. Being in plain sight of the buck, I was now faced with a problem. Work the bolt and he'd be gone before I could get another rd. chambered and get on him again. So I reasoned that the only thing I COULD try was to just do it so S-L-O-W-L-Y that it'd be quiet enough and slow enough to not draw his attention. A couple of times, it did look straight at me, and I just froze like I was part of the tree until he heard something else and turned his attention in that direction. Then I resumed the painfully slow process of extracting the spent rd. As i got the bolt open nearly the length of the spent case, I eased the middle finger of my left hand to catch the case and prevent the ejector from making it hit and ring as it hit the front action ring. That, thankfully, worked that time, and I eased the bolt back, keeping the left hand middle finger on it so it didn't make a "ding" sound on ejection, and reached in with left forefinger and thumb and picked it off the extractor, placed the empty in my breast coat pocket so it didn't fall and make a noise, and eased the bolt forward just as slowly as I'd pulled it back, and finally chambered another round. By that time, the buck has stepped forward @ 1 1/2 ft., and his chest was now a clean shot. That round put him down where he stood.
Have you ever gone "Whew!" in the woods, and felt like a huge weight had been lifted off of you? That's how I felt at that moment!
So IMO, it's more important that we think rationally in the woods, than that we try to buy some "Brush Buster" and shoot willy-nilly through brush at deer. They're magnificent creatures, and deserve better than that, and hunting is NOT an "ego trip." It's a very pleasant pursuit, and it's about "becoming one with the woods," and hoping for merited success, or an occasional episode of plain ol' good luck. Trying to dominate Nature ain't much of a path to success. We get a lot further a lot faster if we adapt ourselves to the woods, rather than depending on "brush busing" guns and ammo. That's been my own personal experience, at least. A "plains and beanfield rifle" like my old '06 in this instance isn't really a "brush gun" at all. However, it CAN be used to great effect, IF we accept the simple fact that pretty much ALL "deer calibers" are NOT good "brush buckers," INCLUDING those with a reputation as being "brush busters." Someone shooting through brush and hitting a deer is really luck, and does NOT a "brush bucker" make! Most shots through brush will NOT hit the deer, even when well placed, and those that do, will likely be wounding shots, and not good, sportsmanlike quick killing shots.
Deer deserve more respect than we sometimes give them. Accept when they win with a little grace, and learn from the experience so the NEXT time, you can kill it cleanly. That's just plain ol' good hunting ethics. I know we don't see that everywhere and in all instances in the woods, but it's still vital to a truly good outdoor experience. Let the other "slob hunters" do what they habitually tend to do. Just watch out that they don't shoot you. They generally aren't that observant, so you should be able to see them first. And be careful out there!
This is relatively open where I'm hunting.
This is what I came away with after watching the video, it is not a proponent of reckless hunting. It only takes a slight breeze to move a branch into the line when hunting in the woods. He used the heavy brush to make sure he encountered limbs in the flight path. Not something he endorsed.
Nice write up Dennis.
One of the best ways I know of, to be excluded from the deer camp in following seasons was to make wild running shots or shoot into thickets where at best...and if you hit at all, then involved the entire camp tracking your wounded animal. The old timers considered this season a time of harvest not Jack and Coke and big bonfires at night or any thing else. Deer camp was quiet and so was all the individual blinds...if a shot rang through the woods there would be venison for dinner.
If you were a goof...well, you never returned.
a m e r i c a n p r a v d a
Be a Patriot . . . expose their lies!
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It's the internet, you should have known. LOL
I sometimes catch myself being a internet Richard, it is easy, but I try to resist. Some don't have much resistance.
You and I must have watched a different video. At around the 9 minute mark he clearly states with a rifle like this (35 Rem) if you can see it you can kill it. That and his later statements seems like an endorsement for reckless hunting.
Last edited by M-Tecs; 12-02-2016 at 06:51 PM.
Dunno it's relevant but I have a suggestion for a "brush rifle" except it isn't a rifle in the classic sense. Straight up smoothbore it is and air conditioned to boot. Dunno if they still make beehive rounds for these things, but....
I have danced with the Devil. She had excellent attorneys.
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