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Rifles, Reloading, Optics, Equipment
Rifles, Bullets, Barrels & Ballistics
7mm mag and bergers for canadian game
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<blockquote data-quote="Fiftydriver" data-source="post: 483668" data-attributes="member: 10"><p>Lapua guy,</p><p> </p><p>I have used them as well and would disagree with what you say. The Accubond does not have the BC of the Berger. IT also does not have the 3300 fps velocity ceiling of the Berger either. Perhaps your not using chamberings that can drive them to this velocity. We are not talking about banded solids or stopping bullets, we are talking about big game hunting bullets that in some situations may be asked to do close range, heavy work, not long range match shooting type work.</p><p> </p><p>Its easy to develope an accurate drop chart for a bullet that has a slightly lower BC. ITs also easy to know when the wind is blowing to much to take a shot which is a key aspect of being a responsible long range hunter. Know your weapon and your limits as well as its limits.</p><p> </p><p>The Accubond will retain MUCH more bullet weight. On hard impacts, it will penetrate much better, it shoots plenty flat enough for 1/2 mile shooting and expands easily at that range as well from most magnum chamberings.</p><p> </p><p>it will not however blow up on a shoulder knuckle at close range. It will also not loose 60% of its bullet weight in the first 15" of penetration like the Bergers are DESIGNED to do.</p><p> </p><p>I fully admit the Berger is a better bullet ballistically but when the chips are down on an expensive northern hunt, I would put my money on the Accubond to get the work done in a bad situation FAR before I would the Berger.</p><p> </p><p>WE ARE TALKING ABOUT DANGEROUS GAME. AT least potentially dangerous. You ever run into a rutted up bull moose at 50 yards and see a match bullet fail on a shoulder.........</p><p> </p><p>You ever see a 400 lb black bear punched from a bad angle and see it dive into the scrub brush that is to thick to even see into only to find out that bullet did not penetrate enough to get the job done. Make that situation even worse with a Grizzly.........</p><p> </p><p>I can think of a dozen situations where the Accubond would be a better choice and I can not think of any situations under 1/2 mile that the Accubond would not easily get the job done. This is not opinion, simply factual results from first hand experience or first hand witnessing these things happening.</p><p> </p><p>Again, a 180 gr berger will act differently if your driving them at 2800 fps compared to 3000 fps. Up that to 3200 fps and the Berger turns into a varmint bullet at anything under 300 yards. Bump that up to 3300 fps and it will turn to vapor inside 400 yards. This is not opinion, its fact from testing these bullets for expansion at these velocities and ranges.</p><p> </p><p>I have also tested the 160 gr Accubond at the same ranges in same expansion media but at 3500 fps launch velocities and every time they fully passed the test.</p><p> </p><p>When we were developing bullets for my 7mm Allen Magnum. We started with the Berger 180 gr VLD but it failed badly right from the start as it could not handle velocities much over 3250 fps. The old Wildcat bullet company made my custom bullets and we went with a 200 gr ULD RBBT based on the same J-4 jacket design. No heavier then the 180 gr Berger but we designed it with much more bullet weight and also tightly closed the meplat so the bullet looked very similiar to a FMJ. THis was needed to ****** expansion of this bullet so that we could get acceptable penetration on big game animals.</p><p> </p><p>With an open tip, it opened up just as dramatically as the Berger 180 gr VLD which was unacceptable. We closed the Meplat and the bullet would start to expand after 5-6" of penetration instead of nearly instantly for the Berger bullet.</p><p> </p><p>Retained velocity also increased to around 50% which is not great but 50% of a 200 gr bullet is much better then 40% retained velocity of a 180 gr bullet.....</p><p> </p><p>I have also tested the 175 gr SMK and it will allow +3500 fps velocity with extreme accuracy. This bullet has a MUCH heavier jacket then the Berger and will outpenetrate the berger, and retain more weight then the Berger. </p><p> </p><p>With the added velocity potential, it also matches the 180 Ballistically as the actual BC of the 175 gr SMK is much closer to .68 then the reported .61. The only bad thing is that the SMK bullet will tend to have a bit of an odd expansion track. By that I mean it starts to expand by the nose caving in on itself. Then once the nose jacket material is compressed back to the lead core, it will then deform the nose of the bullet but not in a traditional mushroom pattern. For this, I like the SMK for heavier game then lighter game such as deer as it perform better when it needs to penetrate a bit more.</p><p> </p><p>The Accubond, does not matter. Expands easily at long range, holds together at close range , retains at least 60% of its weight at pretty much any impact velocity, generally shoots to match grade standards. No it does not have the ballistic numbers that the Berger does but in every other way you can compare a big game bullet, its superior when targeting heavy game at unknown possible ranges. By that I mean if there is a chance that a target animal may show up at ranges under 200 yards and a quick shot may need to be taken when you can not "SIT" for the ideal shot angle, there is no question, the Accubond is a superior design.</p><p> </p><p>If your sitting at a fixed ambush location and targeting animals at 500 yards or beyond and will have the time to allow a target animal to present a clean chest shot, I give you the Berger is a better choice, but that is a very specialized type of hunting that most new member of LRH.com simply are not doing.</p><p> </p><p>If I were to argue this post as I truely feel, the 7mm caliber should be passed up on for heavy game. Especially for long range hunting. My opinion is that long range hunting is at least 800 yards. If your hunting elk at ranges of 1000 yards I recommend only 338 magnum chamberings simply because they will get your rear out of trouble more often then a lighter caliber.</p><p> </p><p>No doubt the smaller calibers will kill big game at these ranges but you do not take a weapon that is only marginal for the hunting style you are planning on doing on that outting.</p><p> </p><p>This however was not the question posed. With the relatively small bore diameter of the 7mm, you are asking the bullet to do alot more work, in some situations, such as close range, bad angles and big critters your asking the bullet to do things that match bullets simply are not up to. Nothing against match bullets, for their perferred use they are amazing, for certain situations, they are very poor choices, that is my point and its a fact, not opinion. IF you can not agree with that, your simply taking this personally and not looking at it realistically.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Fiftydriver, post: 483668, member: 10"] Lapua guy, I have used them as well and would disagree with what you say. The Accubond does not have the BC of the Berger. IT also does not have the 3300 fps velocity ceiling of the Berger either. Perhaps your not using chamberings that can drive them to this velocity. We are not talking about banded solids or stopping bullets, we are talking about big game hunting bullets that in some situations may be asked to do close range, heavy work, not long range match shooting type work. Its easy to develope an accurate drop chart for a bullet that has a slightly lower BC. ITs also easy to know when the wind is blowing to much to take a shot which is a key aspect of being a responsible long range hunter. Know your weapon and your limits as well as its limits. The Accubond will retain MUCH more bullet weight. On hard impacts, it will penetrate much better, it shoots plenty flat enough for 1/2 mile shooting and expands easily at that range as well from most magnum chamberings. it will not however blow up on a shoulder knuckle at close range. It will also not loose 60% of its bullet weight in the first 15" of penetration like the Bergers are DESIGNED to do. I fully admit the Berger is a better bullet ballistically but when the chips are down on an expensive northern hunt, I would put my money on the Accubond to get the work done in a bad situation FAR before I would the Berger. WE ARE TALKING ABOUT DANGEROUS GAME. AT least potentially dangerous. You ever run into a rutted up bull moose at 50 yards and see a match bullet fail on a shoulder......... You ever see a 400 lb black bear punched from a bad angle and see it dive into the scrub brush that is to thick to even see into only to find out that bullet did not penetrate enough to get the job done. Make that situation even worse with a Grizzly......... I can think of a dozen situations where the Accubond would be a better choice and I can not think of any situations under 1/2 mile that the Accubond would not easily get the job done. This is not opinion, simply factual results from first hand experience or first hand witnessing these things happening. Again, a 180 gr berger will act differently if your driving them at 2800 fps compared to 3000 fps. Up that to 3200 fps and the Berger turns into a varmint bullet at anything under 300 yards. Bump that up to 3300 fps and it will turn to vapor inside 400 yards. This is not opinion, its fact from testing these bullets for expansion at these velocities and ranges. I have also tested the 160 gr Accubond at the same ranges in same expansion media but at 3500 fps launch velocities and every time they fully passed the test. When we were developing bullets for my 7mm Allen Magnum. We started with the Berger 180 gr VLD but it failed badly right from the start as it could not handle velocities much over 3250 fps. The old Wildcat bullet company made my custom bullets and we went with a 200 gr ULD RBBT based on the same J-4 jacket design. No heavier then the 180 gr Berger but we designed it with much more bullet weight and also tightly closed the meplat so the bullet looked very similiar to a FMJ. THis was needed to ****** expansion of this bullet so that we could get acceptable penetration on big game animals. With an open tip, it opened up just as dramatically as the Berger 180 gr VLD which was unacceptable. We closed the Meplat and the bullet would start to expand after 5-6" of penetration instead of nearly instantly for the Berger bullet. Retained velocity also increased to around 50% which is not great but 50% of a 200 gr bullet is much better then 40% retained velocity of a 180 gr bullet..... I have also tested the 175 gr SMK and it will allow +3500 fps velocity with extreme accuracy. This bullet has a MUCH heavier jacket then the Berger and will outpenetrate the berger, and retain more weight then the Berger. With the added velocity potential, it also matches the 180 Ballistically as the actual BC of the 175 gr SMK is much closer to .68 then the reported .61. The only bad thing is that the SMK bullet will tend to have a bit of an odd expansion track. By that I mean it starts to expand by the nose caving in on itself. Then once the nose jacket material is compressed back to the lead core, it will then deform the nose of the bullet but not in a traditional mushroom pattern. For this, I like the SMK for heavier game then lighter game such as deer as it perform better when it needs to penetrate a bit more. The Accubond, does not matter. Expands easily at long range, holds together at close range , retains at least 60% of its weight at pretty much any impact velocity, generally shoots to match grade standards. No it does not have the ballistic numbers that the Berger does but in every other way you can compare a big game bullet, its superior when targeting heavy game at unknown possible ranges. By that I mean if there is a chance that a target animal may show up at ranges under 200 yards and a quick shot may need to be taken when you can not "SIT" for the ideal shot angle, there is no question, the Accubond is a superior design. If your sitting at a fixed ambush location and targeting animals at 500 yards or beyond and will have the time to allow a target animal to present a clean chest shot, I give you the Berger is a better choice, but that is a very specialized type of hunting that most new member of LRH.com simply are not doing. If I were to argue this post as I truely feel, the 7mm caliber should be passed up on for heavy game. Especially for long range hunting. My opinion is that long range hunting is at least 800 yards. If your hunting elk at ranges of 1000 yards I recommend only 338 magnum chamberings simply because they will get your rear out of trouble more often then a lighter caliber. No doubt the smaller calibers will kill big game at these ranges but you do not take a weapon that is only marginal for the hunting style you are planning on doing on that outting. This however was not the question posed. With the relatively small bore diameter of the 7mm, you are asking the bullet to do alot more work, in some situations, such as close range, bad angles and big critters your asking the bullet to do things that match bullets simply are not up to. Nothing against match bullets, for their perferred use they are amazing, for certain situations, they are very poor choices, that is my point and its a fact, not opinion. IF you can not agree with that, your simply taking this personally and not looking at it realistically. [/QUOTE]
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7mm mag and bergers for canadian game
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