Info on new Hornady bonded bullets

[Ian M]

I talked to an exec at Hornady and he told me that one of the design objectives of the new .30 cal bonded bullet is to have it open quite quickly, within three inches or so, to get maximum performance on deer sized game. No doubt the bonding will retain bullet weight for good penetration. He told me that initial test have indicated that the bonded bullets are slightly more accurate than similar non-bonded bullets - the engineers have some speculation as to why, stuff involving the method of inserting and holding the cores etc.
I have shot some of the other bonded bullets and they penetrated seven to nine inches before really opening up, jugdging by the wound cavities in our test medium. I expect that Hornady is right-on designing this bullet with deer in mind as no doubt more deer are shot at than any other big game species. Fact is, many hunters are wasting money and bullet performance by choosing relatively tough, deep penetrating premium bullets for whitetails.
They are doing 150 and 165 .30 cal bullets right now, expect they will be out very soon.
Minus 24 this morning, little cold for shooting at the range.

 

[Brent]

I expect that Hornady is right-on designing this bullet with deer in mind as no doubt more deer are shot at than any other big game species. Fact is, many hunters are wasting money and bullet performance by choosing relatively tough, deep penetrating premium bullets for whitetails

I agree with you completely. I think this bullet will work perfect for LR moose too, the bullets just pass through (on a weel plced shot) without much damage to the first half if they don't open up quick enough. The bonded core will keep the penitration up, and still do as much internal damage as possible most of the way through. The exact opposite would be true if a Barnes X bullet is used and NOT needed.

Ian, I feel for ya bud, it was +20 degrees for a couple days and is about 24 now, supposed to be 30 tomarrow. I went shooting yesterday and it was 27-30 midday, overcast. The cronograph quit reading at 6pm on the dot for lack of light. Perfect overcast sky for crony work.

My 178 A-Max loads in my Ultra shot pretty much under 1 moa at 93, 94 and 95gr RL25 all three. Shot 3 groups with each load, smallest was .48 moa at 200 yards. I shot one group of each load on each of three targets, finishing one target then going to the next. I also shot them in a "round robin" type way, one at 93, one at 94, one at 95 then 93 again and so forth, all in their own group of course.

I'm not so sure what I think of this method, but thought I'd try it again using this gun. I was able to tell that after about 25rds the last two shots were getting wild and hitting about 2" high. Barrel fouling was probably fine to only 20-25 rds with this combination.

They do shoot real consistant but I did have POI shift an inch or so on some groups at the same load, this gives me pause and makes me wonder how representative even the 3 groups at 3 shots each are compared to just a ten shot group. Oh well, more shooting will tell, but I think I'll be fine with this bullet. I can move up another grain or two and still be just under or at max load, so I'll check and see if things get real tight or real wild at 96 and 97 first.

Stay warm over there! We have even less snow and ice now than a couple weeks ago, it's almost dusty out! It's warm though!