WARNING! ABOUT HORNADY ELD-X BULLETS

[30 Hammer]

A couple guys in my group used to use Accubonds They were great on smaller animals like white tail and mule deer but caused more damaged meet than Partition or TSX. Please don't get offended by my terminology. In my part of the world we break down animals into small (like antelope), mid size (W/T & MD) and big game (elk starting and ending with moose)

The guys switched after a complete failure on a moose shoulder. After 2 shots by one hunter, another in the group dropped the moose on the spot with a TSX. We found both accubonds disintegrated on impact with the shoulder bone from a 30-378 at just under 200 yards. The 168 TSX passesd through leaving an exit would about the size of a quarter. Now both have switched to premium bullets as we always try to have an elk or moose hunt in the mix.

Accubonds are wonderfully accurate and if I limited my hunting to WT and MD they would be one of my top choices. Great BC for long range.

As stated in an earlier post, every bullet has a compromise. We just have to pick the combination most appropriate for the size of animal.

Again, we have such riches to choose from these days, we can pick and choose the best projectile for our application as there is no magic bullet for every animal, at any range, with every cartridge. Guys who have been hunting for nearly 50 years will remember what poor performing bullets we used to have to suffer with.

A good good friend of mine hit a Moose 3 times in the shoulder at 440 yards in BC last year with a Berger 215 from a .300 Ultra Mag and never found the moose, never knocked him down.

He's a terrific shot and has killed a lot of game. In that instance I say 1. He should have used a Barnes or 2. moved his shot behind the shoulder and let the Berger do what it does best and turn the vitals into jello.

People seem to think all bullets kill with the same method / physics which is incorrect as most on here realize.

If a guy is dead set on shoulders on Moose size game I think the solid coppers are the way to fly and now with the TTSX , Hammers , Cutting Edge and LRX we have a lot to choose from.

As for meat loss - this always baffles me. One animal = like 50 few pounds of extra meat damage. I've seen guys lose animals because they didn't take what ended up being a necessary follow up shot worried about meat. Shoot them in the neck but shoot them. Elk, Moose are two animals that can take a beating and keep pushing.

Worry about killing first , meat damage second. It's usually minimal if you control yourself and make good shots.

 

[JakeM300winnie]

Heres an idea. Everyone can carry two different loads when hunting. We will shoot the first shot through both shoulders with a Barnes bullet to slow them down. Then your second shot goes behind the shoulder with a Berger, vaporizing any of the organs that are left. If that doesn't work, I quit! Lol
But in all seriousness, we can't expect them all to drop in their tracks like in those great long range videos. It seems to be less than 50% for me. Usually the animal is dead on it's feet, going 30 yds. Or more. I shot an elk one time at about 250 yds. With a 190 Berger . The first shot I thought I missed. He didn't flinch, I didn't seen hair move or anything . He took off finally , then stopped and turned around to go the opposite direction with the herd. I shot 2 more times behind the shoulder, again no evidence that I was even hitting him. Then he tipped over finally after running another 50 yds. Upon inspection , I had made 3 perfectly placed shots.

 

[joep17]

Well said 30 Hammer.
One guy I know hit an elk in the shoulder with a Berger with a 300 Win Mag. Through our bimbos we could see the impact and it was well placed. We tracked it until it stopped bleeding and never found it. I am sure they work on deer sized medium game.

When I was in Namibia I took 7 animals with TSX and TTSX. My PH had never seen these bullets before. At the end of the hunt he said he has never seen animals killed so quickly as on my hunt. He asked for all the details so he could give advise to future clients on suggested loads.

 

[Catahoula]

Based on my with experience with Bergers,and others I have read about here, lunch may not taste that good. I just think the science of long range bullets has not been figure out by all manufacturers. Shooting steel is one thing, killing animals is another. It's almost like squeeze and pray the bullet does its job.

I have had terrible results with Berger's. I'll stick with my ELD-X's thank you.

 

[RockyMtnMT]

View attachment 91338 I've used the 208 Amax and the 212 eldx in my .300wm's and I've seen some of these same differences. I do check each new lot and I haven't had problems with pressure or accuracy, but I do not like the way they perform on southern whitetail. I shot three deer with the eldx this year. One at 490yds, one at 60yds, and one at about 20yds. Both the 490 and 60 yarder were behind the shoulder "ideal" shots but they ran nearly 100yds. The 20yd deer was high in the shoulder and it ran about 70yds before it dropped. These bullets just weren't expanding. The pic above is a 212 eldx shot through milk jugs full of water and into a dirt pile. Reminds me of the "magic" bullet from the JFK case. I should mention that I've got an avg muzzle velocity of 2880fps over my magnetospeed chronograph. I just thought the X stood for expanding.....

Looks like an under stability issue. Under stabilized bullets can shoot very well but do not perform terminally.

 

[BEEMAN]

Sorry to hear about the poor Berger 215 performance. Were the tips checked to see if they were open? They have always performed well for me. I would like to try some ELD-X in my 280AI.

 

[RockyMtnMT]

I'll add one more comment. We have gone to great lengths to make sure all the issues in this thread do not happen with Hammer Bullets. They are the same within .0002" and a few tenths of a grain regardless of tool change or date of manufacture. The amount of shine on the surface will vary depending on sharpness of tooling. That is all. It took thousands of pounds of copper to find one that does what we want from muzzle to to as far as you can shoot to our minimum advertised vel of 1800fps. All of our bullets are tested to work properly at 1800fps impact vel or below. Our meplat is always perfect, the hollow point is always the same depth, our hollow point is alway open, and always centered. If you like sorting bullets you can sort ours into groups from high to low with a difference of 3 tenths of a grain. Pointless but good therapy.

I know our bullets are more expensive at the point of purchase, but in the end I don't think they are. All the loading hassles are quite frankly foreign to me since we started making bullets.

I know there is no magic bullet. Our bullets are made from materials that are man made and we the designers and producers are flawed humans as well, but I don't worry about any of the issues in this thread.

Steve

 

[JakeM300winnie]

I'll add one more comment. We have gone to great lengths to make sure all the issues in this thread do not happen with Hammer Bullets. They are the same within .0002" and a few tenths of a grain regardless of tool change or date of manufacture. The amount of shine on the surface will vary depending on sharpness of tooling. That is all. It took thousands of pounds of copper to find one that does what we want from muzzle to to as far as you can shoot to our minimum advertised vel of 1800fps. All of our bullets are tested to work properly at 1800fps impact vel or below. Our meplat is always perfect, the hollow point is always the same depth, our hollow point is alway open, and always centered. If you like sorting bullets you can sort ours into groups from high to low with a difference of 3 tenths of a grain. Pointless but good therapy.

I know our bullets are more expensive at the point of purchase, but in the end I don't think they are. All the loading hassles are quite frankly foreign to me since we started making bullets.

I know there is no magic bullet. Our bullets are made from materials that are man made and we the designers and producers are flawed humans as well, but I don't worry about any of the issues in this thread.

Steve

Thanks Steve for chiming in on this subject, I would like to try your bullets.It is a recently rebarreled Christensen/ A-bolt ll 300 win mag.,24" barrel ,1:10 twist , would you suggest the 181 or 199 Hunter for best accuracy and performance out to 1000 yds.

 

[RockyMtnMT]

Thanks Steve for chiming in on this subject, I would like to try your bullets.It is a recently rebarreled Christensen/ A-bolt ll 300 win mag.,24" barrel ,1:10 twist , would you suggest the 181 or 199 Hunter for best accuracy and performance out to 1000 yds.

With your 10" twist to get full stability you would want to go with the 181g Hammer Hunter. We have done well with IMR7828 getting 3100+ fps.

Steve

 

[N2TRKYS]

Bergers have proven to give me the worst weight variation in a box of bullets than any of my Nosler's(seconds and blemished bullets included).

 

[brentc]

I just thought everyone checked each load for accuracy.

Never assume the obvious.

This topic is a classic example of user error. Specs change between lots all the time and it's not just bullets. It's all components, brass, powder, primers, bullets, etc. My most recent batch of Norma 300 WSM brass weighs 15 grains more than my last batch. That's a huge difference in same headstamp brass, but since I measured the difference and I already know my load specs will change it really isn't a big deal. It happens. Measure everything.

 

[shaughn]

I have had ..outside custom lathe turned bullets...variations in every single brand of bullet you can mention from lot to lot...and treat every new lot of bullets accordingly...sure the basic recipe developed with the old lot may be the yardstick I am measuring against...but otherwise..start over to a degree...bullet failures are a fact of life..have quite few pristine bullets in a glass jar somewhere....sort the bullet/brass and even know a shooter who competes for money that weighs his primers and inspects them under a magnifying glass...he makes money....so I am not going to say he is wrong...

I mean we have to understand that we are expecting a whole lot out of a mass produced product (for the most part) that is trying to do several things at the same time..

It seems like some people (pardon the generality).... want bullets that have a fabulous BC and consistent weight shape and accurate ..shoot as flat as a lazer...but oh..can you make them expand from muzzle to 1600 yds without blowing up or damaging too much meat and still penetrate the shoulder of an elk at 500 yards ...and I need to get 3200 fps.....oh can you market them for $50 a hundred...maybe less...please ...seriously?

If you don't want to sort and expect X performance on every shot and a large envelop in which to work....then lay out the $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ because it is going to cost and it most likely means some variation of a lathe turned projectile or a by hand operation where you are going to pay thru the nose for that perfect lot....

 

[Dolphin]

I'll start by saying, I've been reading posts for a long time on here and always get great information from everyone here on the forum. It's time I share, what I consider crucial information on the eld-x bullet.There has been a few threads on here about the inconsistency between lots of bullets in their base to ogive lengths and weight variances. And WOW! They weren't exaggerating! I've been loading 200 gr. Eld-x for my 300 win mag. I bought the very first box I could get my hands on when they first hit the shelves a couple yrs ago. Some of you may have noticed the first run of these bullets had a red translucent tip. I started as you should by establishing my Max length to rifling using an overall length gauge and comparator. It took me a while to get a load worked up but eventually found a combo that worked.H-1000 78.5 gr. .018 off the lands.5/8 " 5 shot group a big ragged hole basically. By now I'm nearly out of bullets and have search around to find another box. Breaking into the new box ,and just continued on loading with my recipe, suddenly accuracy goes away. Well a couple of tight bolts ,loose primer pockets and a case separation later, I shot through the Chrono and my velocities were a higher and sparatic, I dropped my charge down 1.5 gr and it came back in pretty good but not like it was shooting. Now I was thinking maybe weather , temp.pressure , different lot of powder?something changed. Well you guessed it! I thought I had better recheck my distance to lands again just for kicks. Come to find out , this lot of bullets ended up being longer by .023 tho. So I was jamming my bullets .005 in the lands. That's a problem! Since then I have bought a couple more boxes and they are all different, I know I should be buying several boxes of the same lots, but finding more than box or 2 is still difficult. I called hornady, and Tim there told me that all bullet manufacturers have this much variances in their bullets ,and all theirs all meet specs.Well I told Him "BS! I've never seen any bullets this far out."He was no help, was not nice about anything he said, and basically said it's my problem and my job to measure every individual bullet.Then tells me that if I want to be that picky, I should use the eld-match, that they have much better tolerances.So I asked him how well those work on elk. Lol.The conversation ended there by me hanging up. Now as far as the eld-x being a good bullet, I believe it is. It performs as advertised, but the quality control and customer service is BS. Their sales are still sky high from all the hype and commercials about Doppler radar and magic tips that don't melt, so no need to give 2 ***** about it now! I'm going to give you guys some actual solid numbers to look at here, and you can decide if this acceptable. I'm sensing my gun might smell bergers for lunch!
Measurements are with calipers and Hornady comparator
First batch of bullets translucent tip:
To the lands 3.900 length of bullet 1.866
Lot 2161170 dtl3.877 1.866
Lot 2170162 dtl3.882 1.869
Lot 2170254 dtl3.900. 1.851
Lot 2170148 dtl3.908 . 1.853
Thanks all for reading my rant ,and pass this information on as it could potentially be a dangerous situation.

I shoot a lot of rifles and reload for most. I live in nosler country but I have found that hornady ELD-X bullets are consistently more accurate. The last 5 kills ranging from Moose, Elk and deer have all been 1 shot kills ranging from 47 yards to 400. If I can't get my rifles to shoot under 1/2 moa they are gone. I do extensive ladder testing to develop my favorite load. The only rifle I don't load for is a Fierce 1n 28 nosler. I wasn't having good luck with accuracy during ladder testing with this rifle. I bought 2 boxes of 175 gr eld'x from Dallas Custom reloads and can keep it under .25 using a lead sled. I don't know what this guy does but it works

 

[Stiltsville]

You don't shoot large animals in the shoulder with a quasi varmint bullet.
You shoot them in the shoulder to "break them down". As big bears, Cape Buffalo or to avoid trailing.
Of you shoot in the heart/lungs almost any bullet will work.
I generally like shoulder shots as trailing is minimal. I use monometals.
Learned this back East with deer slugs. If you lung shot a Whitetail it could run 100 yards or more. When you got to it you might find some yahoo claiming it as his. Shoulder shots avoided that !