More problems with Hornady bullets

[Area51]

I am the guy that discovered the problem when they first came out, tried to work with Hornday at no cost to them as a qualified engineer,
There were actually three of us, three engineers, oh dear, anyway we know what the problems are and investigated thoroughly with several lots and sizes.
The bullets were a bad design then and still are, they have no intention of fixing the jacket problem.
They deny any wrong doing or design issues, say we shoot to hot of loads, we have to use radius cut barrels every excuse and trick, its a bad design unless you just want to shoot a few.
This wont change until they change the jacket design.
They frag down range, we even have a piece.

looks like i threw the pic out with the inferior design bullets last year

 

[dolek]

Imagine all the great bullets that could be built by the internet wizards...instead of sitting behind the keyboard they could be putting Hornady out of business.

 

[Brians356]

Q: What's the optimum twist rate for the 147 ELD Match at 2900 fps?
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[Milo 2.0]

Imagine all the great bullets that could be built by the internet wizards...instead of sitting behind the keyboard they could be putting Hornady out of business.

Good interject here pal. It doesn't take a bullet maker or a ballistician to figure out if a bullet will work for you. I've witnessed more nosler custom comps come apart than any other bullet, I do not shoot nosler, I do shoot Hornady 75gr 223 bullets, that's it.
I shoot for fun and results, not to solve issues, if it costs me 25 bucks more per 500 for bullets for satisfaction, the checkbook is coming out. Life can be simple, why complicate it?

 

[dolek]

Good interject here pal. It doesn't take a bullet maker or a ballistician to figure out if a bullet will work for you. I've witnessed more nosler custom comps come apart than any other bullet, I do not shoot nosler, I do shoot Hornady 75gr 223 bullets, that's it.
I shoot for fun and results, not to solve issues, if it costs me 25 bucks more per 500 for bullets for satisfaction, the checkbook is coming out. Life can be simple, why complicate it?

 

[dreever]

I am the guy that discovered the problem when they first came out, tried to work with Hornday at no cost to them as a qualified engineer,
There were actually three of us, three engineers, oh dear, anyway we know what the problems are and investigated thoroughly with several lots and sizes.
The bullets were a bad design then and still are, they have no intention of fixing the jacket problem.
They deny any wrong doing or design issues, say we shoot to hot of loads, we have to use radius cut barrels every excuse and trick, its a bad design unless you just want to shoot a few.
This wont change until they change the jacket design.
They frag down range, we even have a piece.

looks like i threw the pic out with the inferior design bullets last year

Man don't throw them in the garbage I'll take em! I'll even pay the shipping! I'm using them and never had a problem.

 

[Milo 2.0]

2 summers ago I got on a SLR kick, built a 6.5 and 6mm, I decided to give the 140 eldm a try. I asked around on seat depth, .020" jump was the consensus. I did my chrono test, a combo ocw-ladder test at 500 and had a load in 35 shots. I settled on .015" off my lands. So I'm pumped, went to banging steel plate, and immediately ran it out to 1600 yards, about where the bullet was going to go subsonic. Never before have I had a bullet match a dope chart like this, I had center hits the whole way.
Then around with 150 rds down the barrel, I lost my wind reading skills, left-right, left-right. Checked grouping at 100 and now I have 1 1/4" horizontal spread, vertical was holding. Back to town, powder 30 cases with bullets seated long, throw my coax, die and caliper in the pickup. Found a suitable seat depth at .032"off. Ok, I'm set, then again at 300 rds down the barrel it happened again. I re-find my seat depth, this time .022" off, back in business.
Then around 450, the same thing happened, I scraped the project, barrel and brass in the trash can, I'm done. Now I realize one test subject isn't enough to draw conclusions, but in this instance it was for me. Yup, I got over my "I'm not paying Berger prices" real quick, lol

 

[Geno C]

Years ago when all bullets were hard to get, I had a lot of 140amax that wouldn't shoot inside 2" at 100 no matter what I did. I contacted Hornady and explained the problem. They wanted me to ship all the suspect bullets for testing. They turned out to be out for spec of some sort. They replaced all my bullets even that ones I used in testing during the next production batch. I was pretty happy with their service.

 

[STOMP442]

I am the guy that discovered the problem when they first came out, tried to work with Hornday at no cost to them as a qualified engineer,
There were actually three of us, three engineers, oh dear, anyway we know what the problems are and investigated thoroughly with several lots and sizes.
The bullets were a bad design then and still are, they have no intention of fixing the jacket problem.
They deny any wrong doing or design issues, say we shoot to hot of loads, we have to use radius cut barrels every excuse and trick, its a bad design unless you just want to shoot a few.
This wont change until they change the jacket design.
They frag down range, we even have a piece.

looks like i threw the pic out with the inferior design bullets last year

Thats what my trash can looked like as well.

 

[Milo 2.0]

Thats what my trash can looked like as well.

LMAO, I at least sold mine to the next fool. How I roll.

 

[Rob01]

Q: What's the optimum twist rate for the 147 ELD Match at 2900 fps?
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8 twist works great at slower velocities so nothing faster is needed with the faster velocity. I shoot them at 2820fps from my Creedmoor in an 8 twist.

 

[STOMP442]

Man, I am just having terrible luck with bullets lately. This just came out of a brand new box of 7mm 160gr Accubonds.

 

[hogpatrol]

 

[Brians356]

Man, I am just having terrible luck with bullets lately. This just came out of a brand new box of 7mm 160gr Accubonds.

Good help is hard to find.

Here's a .277 150-gr BT that was in a box some years ago.


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[ballisticdaddy]

I believe all manufacturers have some growing pains with new offerings but the way they handle the customer base is where they differ. Hornady wanted me to send them the balance of my bullets without mention of helping to replace this "lot" of bullets. On the other hand Berger was kind enough to not only send me a replacement in a different lot but included a prepaid shipping label to send back the bullets in question for their review. Is it just me or do you all see a major difference in how this issue was handled?

 

[LA50SHOOTER]

Interesting posts so far & also some confirmation of what I've thought for a while.

- I'm not here to run anyone's product(s) into the ground but here's my take on bullets plain & simple and I realize that my situation doesn't apply to all shooters & gun owners. - If I'm going to spend the money to build a high quality rifle, why should I feed it anything but the best bullets ? - I go through a lot of steps in my reloading process with brass preparation & sorting of components including the bullets that get shot down the barrel(s). - The financial cost of the difference in boxes of bullets is small potato's in comparison to the lack of performance & satisfaction from shooting and obtaining good results at the target.

My .02

 

[STOMP442]

Don't get me wrong. I will buy a box Berger's no problem and gladly pay their asking price. But I'm not going to lie and say that when I tried the Hornady 147s and had exceptional results with them the extra $20 per box I saved felt pretty nice.

 

[ballisticdaddy]

Don't get me wrong. I will buy a box Berger's no problem and gladly pay their asking price. But I'm not going to lie and say that when I tried the Hornady 147s and had exceptional results with them the extra $20 per box I saved felt pretty nice.

I had the same experience until I had one blow up during a match, then the $20 per box did not seem like it was worth it!

 

[284winner]

I've fired thousands elds across a few different calibers, with at least 2/3rds at distances over 750 yards and never experienced one blowing up. I don't think this is a amax vs eld issue. Maybe something is going on with recent batches. If there is an issue, its probably a manufacture issue as opposed to a design flaw. ELDs have been out for awhile now and a lot of people have been shooting them. If the general design were prone to flying apart I would have expected to see it personally by now.

No that wasn't my meaning. My meaning was the Amax bullets had tons of users that were completely happy. Hornady needing heat shield tips wasn't for US the shooters, it was for Hornadys marketing and selling more bullets. I can only say why fix what's not broken. Going to the ELDs has caused these issues because the Amax had no issues. Not from the new tips but from building what they call a new better ballistically efficient bullet. Again tho in Hornadys defense, it's really not huge numbers of bullets with issues but The ones that have them are ELDS.

 

[K22]

Most of the serious target and precision varmint shooters I know use Sierra and Nosler bullets. I like the Hornady XTP pistol bullets but in rifle I've had my best success with Sierra and Nosler Rifle bullets.