Berger bullets

[243winman]

Hey guys and gals
New to sight problem hunting with 243 winchester 1-10 twist barrel shooting the 95 grain berger VLD HUNTING bullet? How did it perform for you? Me and my wife killed three mule deer doe's last year but performance was good enough for kills but not much internal damage. Anyone else have that problem? My load i have been shooing is 7828 SSC 43.0 fed 210 GM match thinking muzzle velocity is around 2950 fps. Coal 2.783 single shot half min of angle groups. Thanks everyone who want to give me some input

 

[WildRose]

Quite a few people have had similar issues.

http://www.longrangehunting.com/forums/f17/pics-berger-bullets-not-performing-103068/

Have you managed to recover any of the bullets?

How were the animals struck were you penetrating any dense bone or just through the ribs?

One reason I don't use hollow points at all for hunting game (as opposed to predator hunting) is because I've seen too many such problems of either not opening at all and punching straight through, pretty much exploding with little or no penetration, or having them basically turn inside out and poss through base first again, just punching straight through with little to no internal damage.

Read through that thread and you'll find that the folks at Berger are aware of the issues and working hard to resolve them.

 

[Broz]

Me and my wife killed three mule deer doe's last year but performance was good enough for kills but not much internal damage.

Please elaborate here. What distance? Did they exit ? We need to know what you didn't like about their performance before anyone could give advice.

You killed 3 deer, did you photo any entrance, exits or internal damage?

Jeff

 

[Joe King]

I tried them in my 243 this past season and I like em, my Gf shot her buck at about 200yrds, it performed exactly as Berger advertises, he went about 15ft and gave it up. The bullet exited so no recovery. Actually I used the 95gr Classic Hunter

If it killed em (I'm assuming reasonably quickly) what could possibly be an issue? Their still dead right?

 

[longrangefreek]

I agree with Broz. Need more info. Dead is a good thing and it sounds like that was the outcome for you. There has been a lot of negative talk about berger lately and I am not o e of those guys. I have nothing but praise for berger. I have used 52grain all the way to 300 grain bullets with fantastic results

 

[Buffalobob]

A 95 grain Berger bullet has too small of a sectional density for the animal you are shooting. You should move up to a higher sectional density such as would be present with a 105 or 115. You will still get adequate expansion and then there will be enough bullet mass left to provide for penetration.

 

[scsims]

I shot a buck last year at 80 yards with the same bullet. I think it worked like it was supposed to. The buck died after about a 100 yard run. The bullet entered a little high behind the shoulder. Slid in between 2 ribs and made jelly out of the lungs. All that was left of the bullet was fragments that were caught in the skin on the opposite side. I feel it did what it should have done with a deer sized animal, but there was no blood trail left what so ever which could have made for a bad hunt if the deer wasn't so easy to find. With that said I think I'm going to leave the .243 for smaller animals from now on.