Bad Luck With Bergers

[Moe02]

I have now shot a 6x6 bull at 600 yards and a 4x4 buck at 300 yards and on both animals i was not happy with how my 210 grain hunting berger bullet preformed. In both cases the bullet peirced through and I ended up shooting multiple times to kill the animals. All shots where placed right behind the front shoulder. I have never had this problem with Accubonds, in fact i have never had to shoot more than once to kill an animal. The exit wound was tiny like there was no expansion. I was just curious if anyone else has had this problem. I wish i had better luck with these because they sure shoot good.

 

[orkan]

This sure does seem to be a hotly debated topic. Frankly, one that has kept me from trying Bergers. This choice may be out of fear or ignorance... or perhaps a combination of the two. However, I find little lacking with my current choices of hornady, sierra, and nosler. As such I haven't really had a motivation to pay more to try out the Bergers. For every story I read of fantastic results with them, it seems there are as many with dismal results. Too bad there is no real way to know about all the variables for each shot.

I do enjoy options though. I hope that Berger is able to be competative and push innovation for our sport. I know Litz's work has propelled things forward quite a bit. I find it hard not to use his BC numbers!

 

[Moe02]

I was very dissapointed and will be switching back to accubonds. I will sacrifice some accuracy for 1 shot kills. I feel like its my responsibility to cleanly take an animal with the first shot or dont shoot, and for me these bullets do not do the job I want. Now on paper/metal targets I have been very impressed with the long range accuracy.

 

[Joe King]

shoot Eric Stecker with Beger bullets a PM. they'll do everything they can possibly do to correct it for you.

http://www.longrangehunting.com/forums/members/eric-stecker/

 

[orkan]

I'm willing to bet Berger will be wanting to work with you to identify the issue here. It's been my experience that they are always wanting to make their customers happy and believe in their product 100%.

Were you able to recover any of the bullets?

 

[Moe02]

Yes on the elk I recovered 3 jackets on the outside of the hide. On the deer nothing.

 

[Ridgerunner665]

Caliber? I gather its a 30...but which one?
Muzzle velocity?
Impact velocity?

 

[Moe02]

30-378
Mv-3000-3100
Not sure what the impact velocity would be.

 

[bigngreen]

What did the lungs look like?

 

[Ridgerunner665]

You said elk...so i'm gonna guess the altitude is at least 4,000 feet.

3,050 MV should be close to 2,285 fps at 600 yards (depending on conditions)


That should be plenty fast enough to expand...but I don't know...never killed anything with a Berger (yet)...thats why I'm here, doing my homework.

 

[Moe02]

Elk shot at 5000 feet and deer shot at 4000 feet

 

[Korhil78]

Would have been nice if you could have taken pictures of the entrance and exit wounds as well as what the chest cavity looked like when opened up. Pictures can say a lot. I am going to try to do this when I shoot my mule deer with the 115 gr Berger out of my 25-06.

 

[azgutpile]

Any chance they got mixed with their target bullets? I believe they have a thicker jacket. Ask them to see if there is a way to determine which ones you received.

 

[Moe02]

I have never shot the target bullet only the hunting vld and the bullets used on the elk where bought last year and the bullets for the deer where bought this year so it is not the same lot. Both cases had small enter and exit holes. I do wish I had taken pictures to share.