Are cast bullets supposed to grenade when hunting? WARNING: graphic pics

So, I shot my first animal with a cast bullet yesterday. Smoked a hog at about 50 yards with a powder coated 280gr NOE HP mold for my 358 Winchester. I am shooting it at about 1000 FPS through a suppressor. Dropped the hog in its tracks.

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4703/...eabf76d6_h.jpg
https://youtu.be/Lz_d1gJIgMg

Today, I shot a doe in the neck where the neck meets the chest at about 60 yards. She ran 20 yards and dropped. When I dress the doe, there is damage everywhere.

Bullet entrance
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4668/...23de43f7_z.jpg

Entrance side upper shoulder- broken ribs
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4711/...09a4efba_z.jpg

Entrance side front of the spine- broken ribs and vertebrae
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4741/...cb86b6a0_z.jpg

Entrance side mid spine- broken ribs
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4755/...de217520_z.jpg

Entrance side back of the spine- broken vertebrae
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4672/...a56db58b_z.jpg

Exit wound in shoulder- big hole
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4707/...5c8343e7_z.jpg
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4650/...7cd98cca_z.jpg

Exit front of the spine- broken ribs and vertebrae
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4704/...f2697feb_k.jpg

Exit back of the spine- broken vertebrae, back is pretty broken
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4648/...b5be485a_k.jpg

You're bad about getting hair every where like me. Use a blow torch to singe it off. That aside, congrats on a nice harvest.

What is your alloy? Hard bullets will fragment and explode. Softer is better. Toughening bullets via certain allows or heat treating helps aswell. CWW or softer is supposed to be about right. Neck shot most likely hit the veribraes and shattered the bullet. Play with your alloy or try not to hit bones.

its a good shot. it looks to be 30:1 - 40:1, but i could be wrong[smilie=l:

what is your alloy?

Well your speed does not sound unreasonable, so that points to a too hard alloy as mentioned above.

Myself I have been using 50% Clip on wheel weights and 50% soft lead or range scrap with 1-2% tin/pewter added. Gives you great fill out and nice shiny bullets.

Sometimes when you hit bone like that things do happen. Even with the best of alloys.

was the video yours if so what scope was that thanks rrh

My alloy is 2% antimony and 1% tin. Air cooled

Redriverhunter, yes. The video is mine and was taken with an ATN X-sight

With that alloy at that velocity, I'd have figured they'd have held together real nicely. I'm at a loss to figure it out.

Looks like it killed well though, so not sure I'd call it a bullet failure. Interesting post, by the way.

Did you find bullet fragments? Given the damage it appears the expansion was violent yet was through and through on both animals?

Could we have a picture of the bullet HP and the mould with HP pin?

While there seems to be a lot of trauma, if you didn't find a lot of small lead fragments, I don't theink the grenaded, but expanded thoroughly. I didnt see a lot of bloodshot meat, just broken bones and a fair sized exit. Since you are subsonic, I'd take that over a pencil through wound. If you'd made a different shot, through the chest, then you'd want a bullet more likely to expand due to less mass and resistance.

I have the 360-310 thumper waiting on my 358 for same purpose.

Nice writeup.
Brad

Attachment 213563

Middle boolit is the 358 one I used

How deep is the HP?

Nice boolit! Nice shot!

At 1000 fps MV, BHN 10-11 is all you want. Hollow point and hard alloy are what got you your fragmentation grenade.

The first thing that came to mind is "hard alloy." That hollow point just makes matters worse. Good kills though and congrats!

Lose the hollow point.

With the damage done to her spine I'm surprised she ran 20 yards.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by RPRNY

Nice boolit! Nice shot!

At 1000 fps MV, BHN 10-11 is all you want. Hollow point and hard alloy are what got you your fragmentation grenade.

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I would agree. If the boolit fragmented, it's too hard.

If you don't find any fragments, maybee you just got rapid expansion, and it magic-boollited all the bones in the area from shockwave.

The exit would is a good sign. All depends on if you find fragments. If yes, possibly too hard.

Personally I think there are two things in play here, shot placement & hollow point, hitting that particular spot with a substantial amount of bone mass, that hollow point did the only thing could have, it came apart. Hit that same deer in the ribs breaking one light bone and that bullet will probably do exactly what you want (especialy at 1000 fps)...facilitating eating right up to the hole...on both sides.

If you are one of those hunters that choose to shoot for a neck shot, and I'm not implying that there is anything wrong with that, lots of guys do, then I would throw that hollow point pin away and use the same alloy with the round nose boolit. If your next kill might very well be a rib shot placement then I would trust the hollow point again.

I think a lot of that damage was secondary fragments from the broken bone fragments.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by fingers284

Personally I think there are two things in play here, shot placement & hollow point, hitting that particular spot with a substantial amount of bone mass, that hollow point did the only thing could have, it came apart. Hit that same deer in the ribs breaking one light bone and that bullet will probably do exactly what you want (especialy at 1000 fps)...facilitating eating right up to the hole...on both sides.

If you are one of those hunters that choose to shoot for a neck shot, and I'm not implying that there is anything wrong with that, lots of guys do, then I would throw that hollow point pin away and use the same alloy with the round nose boolit. If your next kill might very well be a rib shot placement then I would trust the hollow point again.

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I tend to prefer wide meplats to hollowpoints. Less tendency for the boolit to peel or fragment vs just flattening and blunt force trauma'ing thru.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rick Hodges

I think a lot of that damage was secondary fragments from the broken bone fragments.

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agreed. when the pressure wave went thru.. lotsa stuff moved out of the way, his shot put it where most of that stuff that moved was bone.

All the extra damage was probably done by chunks of bone from the initial neck impact! Looks like the bullet worked well, as said above, thru the ribs would have been different. It exited, you are eating tasty animal, its not broken so I wouldn't fix it without more data from tasty animals :)

looks to me like your bullet did what it was supposed to
hit bone and most every bullet is going to leave not so pretty holes
job well done

Yep, LOSE THAT HOLLOW POINT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Your bullet shown to the right, what appears to be a Wide Flat Nose cast is a much better choice!

A 50/50 - Wheel Weights/Lead water quenched give great results in my 45/70 with a 465gr WFN (deer and elk) and a 280gr WFN of quenched WW gave great results on two deer fired from my .44 mag. rifle this past Fall.

1650fps with the 45/70 and 1750fps with the .44.

Your not over driving your bullet at 1000fps, the bullet is just doing what it is designed for, RAPID AND MAYBE EXPLOSIVE EXPANSION!

Great for fuzzy little ground vermin, not great for eating critters!

Crusty Deary Ol'Coot

yup, definetly a lot of that damage was bone fragments, usually if a boolit is hard enough to "explode", most of the time you will find some granular pieces of lead, so while your boolit might have come apart at the "petals" I don't think it fragged, you were right though, it did make quite a mess of those animals!!! shows that speed is not everything!

Try the cup-point pins that came with that mould and see if anything tastes different. ;)

if you did not find a good amount of lead fragments I would say exploding bones are the cause not the bullet
IE if the bullet exploded it would not likely have been a thru and thru
looks to me like it did what it was supposed to .. shot placement

Check out this thread;

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...e-in-the-world

Wide Flat Nose does better for me on game I want to eat. That said, I think it was bone not bullet, that fragmented. I'd use up what you have but I'd not make/buy any more hollow points. Look at it this way. Ever seen a hammer with a "cup" on it? Of course, someone on here is probably a collector of hammers and is going to show me a pic of a hollow point hammer.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by waksupi

Check out this thread;

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...e-in-the-world

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I am very familiar with goodsteel's thread. I've read it more than once. I think 1000fps vs 2050fps is sort of apples to oranges.

I would be curious how a wound with a WFN would look, same area and same fps. I'm sure the damage would be less, but I don't think it would be that much less.

I'm still if the opinion that the hollowpoint in and of itself didn't cause the entirety of the damage, but rather the secondary projectiles from impact with large bones.

Still waiting to hear about recovery of lead fragments and /or sheared petals that indicate the hollowpoint did in fact fragment.

The alloy is basically a wheelweight alloy equivalent, which are not know to be prone to shattering. I think a 50/50 ww/pure or range lead at 9-10 BHN might be more a appropriate alloy, but a dead deer is a dead deer.

Put the same bullet through the ribs at 950-1000fps and the expansion won't be there, especially with a WFN. Still a dead deer but how far will it run with just a 35 caliber hole? In a 44 or 45 , a WFN is what a 35 caliber hollowpoint wants to be and in the larger calibers I'd use a WFN or cup point.

Regardless, congrats on your harvest.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by kobeinu

Wide Flat Nose does better for me on game I want to eat. That said, I think it was bone not bullet, that fragmented. I'd use up what you have but I'd not make/buy any more hollow points. Look at it this way. Ever seen a hammer with a "cup" on it? Of course, someone on here is probably a collector of hammers and is going to show me a pic of a hollow point hammer.

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I love a super wide meplat on 35 REM For hog hunting here in Florida. Gas checked if pushed to 1200fps

Is it possible that because of the lower velocity and striking bone that the bullet tumbled rather than fragmented ?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Soundguy

I tend to prefer wide meplats to hollowpoints. Less tendency for the boolit to peel or fragment vs just flattening and blunt force trauma'ing thru.

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Second that and a BHN 11-14 works for me !

Agreed, I use 12ish, or Lyman #2 and a gas check if its booking

Still a dead deer but how far will it run with just a 35 caliber hole?

50-70 yards depending how you measure it
deer alot of time have to get the news that they are dead
that far down the trail
shot one this past season that made a bit of tracking necessary
358 win 260 gr non hp 16-1 alloy covered in smokes pc bout 2100 fps
staggered at the shot but managed a bit of a run

Quote:

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Originally Posted by white eagle

Still a dead deer but how far will it run with just a 35 caliber hole?

50-70 yards depending how you measure it
deer alot of time have to get the news that they are dead
that far down the trail
shot one this past season that made a bit of tracking necessary
358 win 260 gr non hp 16-1 alloy covered in smokes pc bout 2100 fps
staggered at the shot but managed a bit of a run

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I can tell you hogs fall over DRT and kick a second or so..

Agree with all of the last 7-8 posters. HP not needed, probably working against you.

A nice flat meplat with that alloy should give you good expansion even in the chest cavity without blowing up.

If you really feel you want to keep the hollow point I would go a bit softer.
And read up on adding some copper to your alloy to make it tougher. Hang together better.

And I suspect most of that damage was caused by exploding bone.

Would not call that a failure, little extra work cleaning yes, but not a failure.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by BK7saum

I am very familiar with goodsteel's thread. I've read it more than once. I think 1000fps vs 2050fps is sort of apples to oranges.

I would be curious how a wound with a WFN would look, same area and same fps. I'm sure the damage would be less, but I don't think it would be that much less.

I'm still if the opinion that the hollowpoint in and of itself didn't cause the entirety of the damage, but rather the secondary projectiles from impact with large bones.

Still waiting to hear about recovery of lead fragments and /or sheared petals that indicate the hollowpoint did in fact fragment.

The alloy is basically a wheelweight alloy equivalent, which are not know to be prone to shattering. I think a 50/50 ww/pure or range lead at 9-10 BHN might be more a appropriate alloy, but a dead deer is a dead deer.

Put the same bullet through the ribs at 950-1000fps and the expansion won't be there, especially with a WFN. Still a dead deer but how far will it run with just a 35 caliber hole? In a 44 or 45 , a WFN is what a 35 caliber hollowpoint wants to be and in the larger calibers I'd use a WFN or cup point.

Regardless, congrats on your harvest.

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I've shot deer and antelope with revolvers in that speed range, .44 magnum. Small entrance, exit around 3/4".

I did not recover any lead fragments. I assume the bullet did what I wanted it to do. I wanted subsonic expansion. I would have to assume that it was bone fragments. I just did not expect that much damage from the bone. I dropped a buck with my 300wsm pushing 165gr HPBT gamekings at 3200fps. It was a longish shot so I decided to shoot him in the shoulder to anchor him. Lots of bone fragments but less than the 358 cast. My best guess is the HP on the cast bullet peeled off and the solid base plowed on through. I’m ok with that. I was just surprised at the damage. This is my first deer with the bullet so I don’t know how it will be next time. I don’t plan on changing a thing until I have more experience with it. For the record, these loads were meant for hogs and not deer. I’m curious what a shoulder shot on a hog would look like.

Well by golly you got sub sonic smash if not expansion.
Wouldn't it be interesting to test that hollow point on a representative medium without the bones!

I may shoot it into water jugs and see. May also put a piece of plywood in front for a different test. Just to see if I can recover the bullets.