Whitetail bullets

[cjmac]

Sierra 125g jsp does the job perfectly.
125yd neck shot, whitetail buck drop on the spot. 165yd whitetail doe, neck shot, drop on the spot
365yd antelope shoulder shot, down on the spot.
308 win, savage rifle

Sounds like my favorite old rem core lokt lol drops em ! I have a good load for the 150gr sierra gameking in both mine and wifes hunt guns . But I have a new rifle i just got done with . Sako action , m24 contour barrel bedded in a bell and Carlson m40 stock. Want to try a new bullet on deer ... but sounds like the old fashioned nosler ballistic tip and regular old soft point working great still till this day

 

[S Miller]

My old man has killed a bunch with the Sierra 150 pro hunter, myself the 165 Sierra spitzer. See what your gun likes. Good luck!

 

[cjmac]

My old man has killed a bunch with the Sierra 150 pro hunter, myself the 165 Sierra spitzer. See what your gun likes. Good luck!

Both mine and wifes gun likes the Sierra btsp gameking 150gr... just never shot a deer with one of them

 

[JFrank]

Anyone have any real world experience with performance on different 30 cal soft point bullets ? Such as the Sierra gameking btsp , nosler ballistic tip , winchester power point ?
remington discontinued, there core lokt bullet which was the best performing bullet for white tail In florida that i've used.
I'm looking for a bullet that will perform similar to it. Winchester has their powerpoint available now in 150 grain .
Our average shot is about a hundred to a hundred and twenty yards.If that we always make a neck shot. So I need preforms like the old core lokt bullet , fast and big . I am leaning more towards the winchester.Powerpoint, and the sierra gameking.
i'll be loading for a 308.

Soft point is about all I use for white tail.
Deer are not hard to kill, most any bullet will do the job, if a guy has game run off then maybe the aim was poor.

 

[cjmac]

Any idea what bullet federal uses in there blue box power shock 308 ?

 

[CaptainMal]

Hornady SST and Sierra TGK's both expand quickly and drive through.

 

[S Miller]

Both mine and wifes gun likes the Sierra btsp gameking 150gr... just never shot a deer with one of them

Put that bullet in the boiler room and you’ll be good.

 

[Lefty2506]

A 308 Win is a huge gun for deer that only weigh 125 lb. For neck shots, any expanding bullet should drop them in their tracks. I'm personally not a big fan of NBTs for deer hunting because I like an exit wound, and our deer are a little bigger. For FL deer, however, I think they would be a fantastic option primarily because I've always found them to be exceptionally accurate in everything I've ever tried to load them for. On neck shots, they should produce some impressive carnage.

 

[cjmac]

A 308 Win is a huge gun for deer that only weigh 125 lb. For neck shots, any expanding bullet should drop them in their tracks. I'm personally not a big fan of NBTs for deer hunting because I like an exit wound, and our deer are a little bigger. For FL deer, however, I think they would be a fantastic option primarily because I've always found them to be exceptionally accurate in everything I've ever tried to load them for. On neck shots, they should produce some impressive carnage.

I agree 308 is big but we also have so.e HUGE hogs here and shoot a lot of them also .
Im wondering about the speer hot cor in the 150gr . Thay make a flat point one that I can get from Midway usa

 

[cjmac]

A 308 Win is a huge gun for deer that only weigh 125 lb. For neck shots, any expanding bullet should drop them in their tracks. I'm personally not a big fan of NBTs for deer hunting because I like an exit wound, and our deer are a little bigger. For FL deer, however, I think they would be a fantastic option primarily because I've always found them to be exceptionally accurate in everything I've ever tried to load them for. On neck shots, they should produce some impressive carnage.

Wonder if theres a difference in the 2 from speer ? They make a flat point Spitzer and a btsp

 

[Lefty2506]

Wonder if theres a difference in the 2 from speer ? They make a flat point Spitzer and a btsp

I'm not familiar with Speer's offerings, but it sounds like yes, there's a difference. The BTSP should be more of a spire point with an exposed lead tip. Either should work. Either way, I think your focus should be on finding an accurate bullet so that you're assured of being able to work up an accurate load for it relatively quickly.

Then again, 120ish yards is a chip shot with a high powered rifle. Any decent quality bullet from a decent rifle should be plenty capable of the accuracy needed for neck shots at those distances. I've not shot hogs (yet), but I understand that they can be pretty tough. If you're wanting a bullet that would work for both, you might want to go with something a little tougher than a NBT. A good hog bullet probably won't expand as much on a chest shot on your deer, but should still expand enough to do a good job.

 

[mmcu]

Wonder if theres a difference in the 2 from speer ? They make a flat point Spitzer and a btsp

The BTSP is a faster expanding bullet than the Hot-Cor bullet (both FN and SP versions).

 

[cjmac]

I'm not familiar with Speer's offerings, but it sounds like yes, there's a difference. The BTSP should be more of a spire point with an exposed lead tip. Either should work. Either way, I think your focus should be on finding an accurate bullet so that you're assured of being able to work up an accurate load for it relatively quickly.

Then again, 120ish yards is a chip shot with a high powered rifle. Any decent quality bullet from a decent rifle should be plenty capable of the accuracy needed for neck shots at those distances. I've not shot hogs (yet), but I understand that they can be pretty tough. If you're wanting a bullet that would work for both, you might want to go with something a little tougher than a NBT. A good hog bullet probably won't expand as much on a chest shot on your deer, but should still expand enough to do a good job.

Hogs are extremely tough . We have shot at them with magnum 00 buck , 243 and never found them . Hit one with a 9mm 2 times that wouldn't leave from under the stand , he ran off on the 2nd shot first one just pissed him off something terrible..
We started carrying 45acp after that lol

 

[cjmac]

The BTSP is a faster expanding bullet than the Hot-Cor bullet (both FN and SP versions).

So the btsp is more for thin skin deer type game than the hot cor is ?
It maby similar to the Sierra gameking btsp then ? I have some of the game king . I will try the nosler ballistic also . Hopefully one of tham will act like the old core lokt im looking to replace

 

[rockhound78]

I have loaded for this years hunt, the 130gr Speer FP hot core, in the 308win. Max. range of 200yds. Downloaded it to about 2700fps. 2 inches high at 100yds and 220yds its 2" low. Should be on at about 180yds. Either a neck shot or head shot.

 

[Walt Krafft]

My 30 caliber goto hunting bullet is the Sierra 165gr HPBT Gameking #2140. Excellent results out to 300 yards on both deer and varmints.

 

[dthomas]

Any soft point cup and core bullet will work fine. I've been using berger elite hunters the last couple of years and have been impressed. Everything I've shot with them has also had a complete pass through.

 

[std7mag]

So the nosler ballistic tip sounds a lot like the Remington core lokt bullet..
We always try to shoot for the base of the neck like you were saying we really need to drop them where they stand we are surrounded by a swamp.

No. The Corelokt has nothing on the Ballistic Tip.

Put in the boiler room, I haven't had a deer go more than 20 yards, no matter what caliber or cartridge.

I watched a friend put (5) 150gr Corelokts from his 300 Savage in a deer that was already gut shot before she finally died.

My neighbor came home with a buck that he shot 6 times before it went down with his 30-06 and 150gr Corelokts. All 6 shots were in the chest cavity.

A 308 Win is a huge gun for deer that only weigh 125 lb. For neck shots, any expanding bullet should drop them in their tracks. I'm personally not a big fan of NBTs for deer hunting because I like an exit wound, and our deer are a little bigger. For FL deer, however, I think they would be a fantastic option primarily because I've always found them to be exceptionally accurate in everything I've ever tried to load them for. On neck shots, they should produce some impressive carnage.

How are you not getting an exit wound from a Ballistic Tip?

30+ years multiple calibers and cartridges and I have yet to recover a Ballistic Tip from a deer.
Even my 250 Savage with the 100gr NBT gave me an exit.

 

[Lefty2506]

No. The Corelokt has nothing on the Ballistic Tip.

Put in the boiler room, I haven't had a deer go more than 20 yards, no matter what caliber or cartridge.

I watched a friend put (5) 150gr Corelokts from his 300 Savage in a deer that was already gut shot before she finally died.

My neighbor came home with a buck that he shot 6 times before it went down with his 30-06 and 150gr Corelokts. All 6 shots were in the chest cavity.

How are you not getting an exit wound from a Ballistic Tip?

30+ years multiple calibers and cartridges and I have yet to recover a Ballistic Tip from a deer.
Even my 250 Savage with the 100gr NBT gave me an exit.

I used to run a 140gr in my 7-08, and a 115gr in my 25-06. I didn't run those very long, but probably killed a dozen or so deer with them. Never had an exit wound. They were always laying under the skin on the opposite side. The jacket usually separated, but it was normally laying right beside what was left of the core. I used a Savage Muzzleloader for both ML season and our Firearms season pretty much exclusively for over a decade. The first 5 years I ran a 250gr SST at 2600 fps and had the exact same experience on roughly 20-25 deer. From 60lb, to +200lb, and from 15 yds to 200 yds, I never had one exit on a heart/lung shot. On the Savage ML I went to a 300gr SST at 2450, and have always had (very large) exit wounds from it. I switched because I was seeing the 250gr SST veer to the side once in a while. The expanded bullet was always flat as a dime, so I theorized that there wasn't enough trunk left to keep it stable and penetrating in a straight path. I did some shooting into some gel, and the curvature happened more frequently in that test medium. I tried every 250gr bullet I could find (never tested the Barnes copper stuff back then, but they would have probably done fine). Everything in that weight range that I tried would frequently curve about half way along the wound cavity. Everything that I tried that was in the 300gr weight class penetrated in a straight line so I switched to the heavier bullet.

 

[cjmac]

Im gonna try a ballistic tip for sure