Sierra Match King Vs Game

[7mmRemMag]

Hi guys,

I am new to this forum, but have been hunting for over 17 years. I have been reloading now for a couple years for most of my rifles. I recently decide to try a 150gr. Sierra Match King for my Rem 700 7mm Rem Mag. The accuracy is incredable. My friend who intruduced me to this forum filled me in on the pros and cons concerning the match king bullet when used for hunting. I would like to fill you all in with my experience.

So far I have killed 3 Bucks, Two Coyotes, One Javelina. My sister shot a buck with my rifle as well. All the shots were about 110 yards or so, exept the coyote at 260 yards and the javelina at about 200 yards. All the animals had an enterance and exit wound, with the exit wound fairly large. The bullet blew out a chunk of lung from the buck I shot yesterday and the exit on the coyote did the same. Bottom line I am impressed with the results I have had so far. I am curious if some one else has hand loaded the SMK in 7mm Rem Mag and any experience using them, because I plan on starting to shoot Long Range with this combination.

Thanks- Jay

 

[albertakid]

Jay,

I have shot several elk and deer using a 168 smk from a 7mm rem mag and from distances of 25-300+ yards and have good luck in general from this combo. I noticed some rather large exit wounds on a few of the critters, but had good expansion etc....hope this helps the only thing I ever shot at a real long range was a coyote at 650 and they worked real well on him!

I am currently shooting a 308 at this time and killed an elk and a deer this year with the 168 smks and had good performance on both animals..I am gonna try the berger vlds though as they have a higher bc and I have heard nothing, but good reports on them.

Jordan

 

[Michael Eichele]

Sooner or later the SMK will loose enough velocity to reliably and predictably expand. They typically work great to a point and then pencil through at longer ranges unless you hit bone. Then kiss alot of meat good bye.

I used to buy into the thought that the only thing that mattered when we hunted was raw accuracy. Then I saw what happened to a few animals after being hit with the SMK at longer ranges. I personally do not wish to put any more critters through that. Despite the fact that I have never lost an animal to the SMK I feel things could have been quicker and more humane. Now instead of buying into accuracy first, I buy into quick and humane first. Accuracy second. I typically get very close in the accuracy department with hunting bullets VS match bullets.

Just my opinion.

 

[royinidaho]

Thanks for posting the SMK results.

Your experience is pretty much the same as others. They're quite effective. And continue proving it with more shooters using them.

 

[7mmRemMag]

Thanks Guys for all the info. My 7mm Rem Mag has had its fair share of tests. I am going to start testing out my 300win mag because I have some 175gr. SMK loaded for it. If I get the same results I will probably load SMK for my 300wsm and my 300wby. I'm shooting 200gr. nosler accubond out of the 300wby, and 180gr. Nosler Accubond for my 300wsm. I did make one special load for a ram hunt i went on last month. I loaded the 180gr. SMK for the 300 wby Mag and dropped that Corsican Ram dead in his tracks from one ridge to the other. I got the shot on video, it was pretty cool. Shot him in the chest and the bullet still exited!

-Jay

 

[huntinco]

+1 on what meichele said.

 

[stric9]

meichele, i'm far from a ballistics expert but you need to explain to me how at longer ranges the smk doesn't expand. I thought that as a bullet slows down it has more time to perform the way it's supposed to ie. expand or fragment.I can see your point if you are talking about close ranges 100 200 yrds. but longer ranges i don't see that.
The smk so far has been every bit as good a hunting bullet as my AB.
Everything from jackrabbits to whitetail have been humanely killed on my ranch using the smk.
What people are missing here is that just because a bullet is not designed for a certain app. doesn't mean it can not get the job done.In this case smk get's the job done even though it is not for hunting app.

 

[7mmRemMag]

Here are some pictures of some game that I have taken with the SMK over the last few months...

Corsican Ram 300wby Mag 180gr. SMK (90 yards)

10 Point Buck 7mm Rem. Mag 150gr. SMK (110 yards)

My Little Sister's Buck 7MM Rem. Mag 150gr. SMK (130 yards)

 

[7mmRemMag]

A few more...

Coyote 7mm Rem Mag 150gr. SMK (230 yards) Exit wound

Javelina 300Win Mag 175gr. SMK (180 yards)

Exit Wound

Coyote #2 7mm Rem. Mag 150gr. SMK (260 yards) Enterance wound

Exit Wound

 

[jeff 300]

A few more...

Coyote 7mm Rem Mag 150gr. SMK (230 yards) Exit wound

That the same kind of exit wound i have all ways got over the last 25 are so years using them. just shot two hogs last night with the same kind of exit wound one of the pig weighed maybe 15# and about 6/7inches thick. the exit wound was soft ball size and most every thing in the pig was on the out side of him what was left anyway.

NO THEY DON"T WORK!!!!!!!!!! WELL TELL THAT TO THAT PIG

Here's what i think people try them After seeing or hearing how well they shoot and most of the time reading about or hearing about the hole story of how they don't work on game either before or after they make a bad shot. but they try them any way and make a bad shot and it's ezer to blame the bullet because of the story they have heard about than admit you made a bad shot. It's an eze way out of looking bad. the fact is you put the bullet where it needs to be in the heart,lungs and not 8" behind them in there guts and there done............ I have shot well over 200 hogs this year my self most with SMK or berger vlds from a 223,243,308,30-06, and 338edge and i have not lost one that was hit right. i have wounded some that i hit to far back. but i found most of them and it was my fault for making a bad shot.

hell i had a military guy (army ranger) come on a hog hunt with me two years ago shooting a 308. every thing he shot (6 hogs) from 25yrd out to about 145-150yrds all either piled up right there are ran about 60-80yrd and piled up some head shots and some heart,lung shots. at the end of there hunt we where cleaning the pigs and i could see there wasn't much of a exit wound on any of them that he shot. so i ask him what kind of bullets he was using. And he said (hell i don't know it's what the guy that sold me the gun three day ago said to shot) after going and getting one

(IT WAS WOLF FMJ)

but he hit the right spot on all 6 hogs. He got dam lucky yes!!!!!!!! but six dead hogs do to a dam WOLF FMJ and hitting the right spot. And no i do not let people hunt with that kind of junk ammo on my hunts. i now check every one's ammo before they get to hunt even on hog hunts.

 

[jwp475]

Sooner or later the SMK will loose enough velocity to reliably and predictably expand. They typically work great to a point and then pencil through at longer ranges unless you hit bone. Then kiss alot of meat good bye.

.

Round nose solids will yaw,and/or tumble, pointer non-expanding bullets are notorious for tumbling. I doubt that any pointed bullet that does not expand dimply"pencils through".

The SMK is a simple "Cup&Core" bullet.

 

[buffalorancher]

I have shot probably 25-30 whitetails in the last couple years with 6-284 shooting a 107 SMK at 3200 fps. I've tried different bullets but they wouldn't shoot or they blow up so I stayed with this. They work well with entrance and exit up to probably 400? yards. Between 400 and say 600 yards they start blowing up inside which makes for a bang flop. After that they will just pencil through or whatever you want to call it. There is a 6mm hole all the way through but it will kill them if you hit them right. I killed one at 1007 yards and it went through the front shoulder at an angle but still only left a 6mm hole even in the bone. It will blow the hell out of coyotes but I've never killed one past 400 yards. We can get a lot of antlerless tags here and I get tired of dealing with people coming to shoot does so I donate a lot of meat. This year I upgraded to one of Kirby's 300 Allen Express' and a 240 gr. SMK. I've killed 12 does so far up to something like 812 yards and they have all ran at least some distance. Fifty yards is about as far as any have run and they were all dead on their feet but about half of them had pretty poor blood trails and the other half had large exits but a couple were fawns. Our rifle antlerless season opens again on Jan. 1 so I might try some further out but the bucks are shedding so you have to be careful. I don't have any strong opinions one way or the other and these are only my experiences. I'm sure different calibers and weights work differently but I can say for sure a 107 grain SMK performs very poorly after 6 or 700 yards at whatever velocity that would be and the 240 SMK isn't quite what I thought but very accurate and so far effective.

 

[MuleHunter]

well put!

 

[7mmRemMag]

Thanks for all the information guys.