28 Nosler - Best Hunting Bullets?

The 175 ELD-X will shoot in the same chamber as the 195 Burger

I'll be building custom a 28 Nosler with the new ARC Nucleus action for long range hunting. I'm leaning toward the ELD Match 180 bullet.
The Nucleus action will not work with BDL so I'll probably use a Stiller DBM and I'm trying to decide what magazine I'd need to use for the ELD Match loaded long in the 28 Nosler.
Does anyone have info or recommendations on the optimum COAL, preferred magazine and the chamber specs?

I would give the Berger 195 Elite Hunters a try, as well.

Optimum OAL is anything from .025 to .015" off the lands. As long as the internal magazine length is the same as a 700 LA, you should be fine. Also, for large game hunting, I prefer rifles with an internal BDL box magazine. As for what brands to recommend for DBM setups, I have no idea.

Chamber specs, I would just go with SAAMI standard .28 Nosler chamber specs, or else you'll be needing custom dies.

This will be my first custom rifle and custom chamber so I'm looking for any information that will help to educate me on the chamber (throat) specs and what length magazine I should be using.

The ARC Nucleus action needs to run a magazine so a BDL is not an option for this build. I've heard that some custom 28 Noslers with the 195 Berger EOL have a COAL of 3.750... much longer than the SAMMI spec.

I'd like to load the bullets out longer than the SAMMI specs and still have enough length in the magazine to load the bullets out longer to "chase the lands" as they erode.

I'd like to run the ELD Match 180 grain bullet and am looking for comments on the optimum Cartridge OverAll Length that others are using.

Some say that the throat erodes about .010" every 100 shots. With that in mind I'm looking for comments on how deep the bullets should be set into the case for a freshly chambered barrel knowing that the COAL will be increased over time as the throat erodes. Then I'll need to select a magazine that has enough extra length to allow for loading the bullets out longer to chase the lands.

I'm not sure that the Nucleus action will accept the AICS extra long mag with an interior length of 3.850".
The Berger 195 bullet has a length of 1.663" and it measures .838" from the tip to the ogive.
The ELD-M 180 has a bullet length of 1.550" and it measures .802" from the tip to the ogive.
This suggests that the COAL with the ELD-M 180 will be shorter than with the Berger 195.
I'm wondering if the AICS mag with the internal length of 3.775 will be long enough for the ELD-M 180 loaded out to optimum length and allowing for throat erosion over time.

I would run a hammer bullet to match your barrel twist. I'm using 143's in a 7mm STW at 3390 which isn't top velocity but it's extremely accurate there. Great performance on two elk and a nice whitetail this year. Been shooting them at distance and performing tracking test with them lately and they are shooting great.

I had 3 less than desirable 180 Berger bullet performances on animals to one performance as advertised and those were going 3060 fps. I don't always have a chance to wait for the perfect shot angle so that played into me decision. I was going to switch to 195 Bergers but the results are just waay too inconsistent and that's coming from some really reliable first hand experiences of people I know well and trust.

After hearing other reports of inconsistent terminal performance of the Bergers, I decided to avoid them regardless of their accuracy and High BC.
My barrel will have an 8 twist so I can run almost any weight bullet.

I looked very closely at the Hammer Hunter bullets in 143, 155 and 177 grain weights. I ran ballistic calculations on these Hammer bullets at muzzle velocities of 3600, 3450 and 3250 FPS respectively. These were my guesstimated maximum velocities and they could be wrong.

Here are the drops and wind drift figures in inches at 800 yards:
143 gn bullet: 98.6 34.7
155 gn bullet: 106.4 34.4
177 gn bullet: 116.2 32.1

If my muzzle velocity guesstimates were accurate, then the 143 grain Hammer Hunter bullet would be my choice of the Hunter bullets. The 143 with its higher velocity, shows less drop and almost the same drift as the heavier 177.

The ELD-M 180 has more drop but less wind drift. Since I can't read wind as well as distance, I'm leaning toward the ELD-M 180 because of its lower wind drift, thinking that it might aid in shot placement shooting across the valleys where I hunt.

I've heard that the Hunter bullets shoot well at almost any amount of jump.
This has me thinking that I can have the barrel chambered and the throat cut for the alternative bullet and I can still shoot the shorter Hammer bullets if I choose to.

This is maybe the only case Im glad Hornady bullets have such a long bearing surface. The 180 eldm, 175 eldx, and 180 vld will work in a throat spec'd for the 195. A lot of the guys I built 28s for have went to the elds and reports have been good on terminal performance. I have used the 195 on elk and had good luck, but also have seen pictures of extreme blow ups and also reports of penciling. The nice think about going to the 180 class is you can run h1000 or retumbo

kai said:

After hearing other reports of inconsistent terminal performance of the Bergers, I decided to avoid them regardless of their accuracy and High BC.
My barrel will have an 8 twist so I can run almost any weight bullet.

I looked very closely at the Hammer Hunter bullets in 143, 155 and 177 grain weights. I ran ballistic calculations on these Hammer bullets at muzzle velocities of 3600, 3450 and 3250 FPS respectively. These were my guesstimated maximum velocities and they could be wrong.

Here are the drops and wind drift figures in inches at 800 yards:
143 gn bullet: 98.6 34.7
155 gn bullet: 106.4 34.4
177 gn bullet: 116.2 32.1

If my muzzle velocity guesstimates were accurate, then the 143 grain Hammer Hunter bullet would be my choice of the Hunter bullets. The 143 with its higher velocity, shows less drop and almost the same drift as the heavier 177.

The ELD-M 180 has more drop but less wind drift. Since I can't read wind as well as distance, I'm leaning toward the ELD-M 180 because of its lower wind drift, thinking that it might aid in shot placement shooting across the valleys where I hunt.

I've heard that the Hunter bullets shoot well at almost any amount of jump.
This has me thinking that I can have the barrel chambered and the throat cut for the alternative bullet and I can still shoot the shorter Hammer bullets if I choose to.

Click to expand...

Kai
You should be able to hit 3600 with the 143 HH. I did in my STW which seems to show pressure sooner than most. Hammer recommended I run it there but it was so accurate at 3390 I elected for the extra confidence knowing that bullet will go where I put it.

doverpack12 said:

Kai
You should be able to hit 3600 with the 143 HH. I did in my STW which seems to show pressure sooner than most. Hammer recommended I run it there but it was so accurate at 3390 I elected for the extra confidence knowing that bullet will go where I put it.

Click to expand...

How was your accuracy with the 143 at 3600fps? And is your rifle a 26" barrel?

westcoasthunter said:

How was your accuracy with the 143 at 3600fps? And is your rifle a 26" barrel?

Click to expand...

I never shot a group there. Steve thought they would do well but I'm almost one hole groups every time I shoot with my load just under 3400 now. Tried one higher node at around 3450 and it did alright at 300 but wasn't as good as I was looking for. My two ladder shots at 3595 and 3640 were vertically separated probably 6" and the 3595 was a obove the rest of my group by a few inches.

My question for the people who have had poor bullet performance is twofold (no matter what bullet). 1) Where was shot placement and 2) what was impact velocity?

I know guys had bad terminal performance with the Hornady SST and I had bad bullet performance with a NBT. Those results were due to pushing the bullet fast and with bullet impacting at faster than designed velocity.

My single experience with a Berger 180g 7mm was good. Cow elk dropped at the shot. 708 yds, impact velocity 2500 fps. give or take a few fps. Broadside shot, exit hole about silver dollar size.

Figure this is a good place to put it. Our 155g Hammer Hunter is available again. We had a bc issue that had to get ironed out. We had an error in the the program at the shoulder of the bullet that caused the bc to tank. Shot the revised program last night out at 830y and it was spot on from a 200y zero with the published bc. The change to the bullet will make no diff as to load data to anyone who has been using them previously. The change in bullet form is too small to visually see.

Sorry to anyone who has been waiting for us to get this taken care of. Been difficult to get out and shoot.

Steve

If I were shooting a 28 Nosler, I'd go with the ELD-M 180gr bullets from Hornady. It seems to be a "sweet spot" for the 28 Nosler.

there is at least one tread here and multiple on accurate shooter about the 180 ELD-M blowing up at velocities above 3000 fps mostly because of worn barrels. seems to show up past 400 yds but I have not seen it happen on any of my barrels yet.