Are premium bullets really necessary?

[DrHenley]

I used GameKings in the same 30-06 load for decades. I was using Hodgdon H450 powder and when Hodgdon quit selling it I never found a powder that shot as well with the GameKings.

I ended up having to push them hard to get any accuracy, and then on a close range front quartering shot, one blew up in the shoulder and failed to penetrate to the vitals. When you shoot a deer in the shoulder from 25 yards with a 30-06, you don't expect it to just run off! That shook my confidence in them and I started hunting with a 25-06 and a 45-70 for several years until I could find a good load again for the 30-06. Accubonds were the ticket.

[RiverRider]

I remember your dismay over the demise of H450. My gosh. That was what, thirteen years ago? Some of our RLB ties go back a ways!!!

[DrHenley]

My last batch with H450 was in 1990. After shooting up those, I sold my 30-06 and wandered around lost in the wilderness for a decade, trying out different guns using factory loads in 30-30, 270, 250 Savage, 7mm-08, and 308.

Then I bought the 30-06 HighWall in 2003. That's when I started back reloading in earnest and joined the RLB. I used the GameKings initially and just tried to duplicate the H450 load, which proved elusive. With the powders I tried (you probably remember me trying Reloder 22), the HighWall seemed to shoot best in the Red Zone, and the H450 load had been pretty mild.

[RiverRider]

Aahhh. Yes, now I remember, and I opined that Re22 is too slow for the .30-06. I definitely recall you mentioning H450 though. I thought it was available into the middle or late 90s???

[RiverRider]

Now I am realizing just how poor my memory is. Ha!

Did we, at that time, talk about the possibility that the Hi Wall just wasn't going to behave as your original rifle did? Do you still have that rifle?

[DrHenley]

Still have the Highwall. It has taken a back seat to 264 RLB #7 in recent years. I lost the ability to practice at ranges past 300 a number of years ago, so I haven't tried to shoot any deer past 300 in a while. The 264 RLB is good out to 300. And I have a 45-70 for the woods. If I get back into longer range shooting, I'll use the 30-06.

[j1]

I can be sarcastic but it is often too much work. No I do not think that they are often required and have never yet used any. For your money you get to choose though. If I had a 257 Weatherby I might use them.

[versifier]

Maybe the operative question should be: Do I need performance from the bullet that the standard cup&core cannot give me?

For very large game and at longer ranges premium hunting bullets can make good sense. These days there are lots of choices, too, if your rifle doesn't shoot the old standby NPAR's very well, chances are pretty good it will like one of the others.

At the ranges we hunt here though, I'd shoot cast bullets even for moose. I don't need a premium bullet to shoot one within 50yds or even within 150. No one does. I just need to hit the moose lottery.

But if the ranges were really long I could easily justify the extra cost of testing premium and hunting with bullets. I would find something cheaper to practice with. Cup&cores aren't at their best launched at higher velocities (3500+MV) and they aren't really good at holding together when they hit large bones, either. With the largest game you need good penetration and weight retention and enough expansion to transfer as much of the bullet's energy to the game animal without fragmenting. Premium bullets are designed to do that much better than cup&cores.

[RiverRider]

I see an awful lot of stuff about long range hunting. It seems to me the participants waaaaay over-value BCs and ignore old school terminal performance. Theyre shooting VLDs and A-Maxes at big game and I think that it is foolish regardless of their claims that everything they shoot is DRT. Quite frankly I just dont believe them. I have to say it bugs the crap out of me and I find myself despising Remington 700s with tactical a styled stocks and big uglyass bolt knobs. A good bullet like a Partition may cost twice what an ordinary cup-n-core costs, but bullets are such a small part of the expense of hunting I don't see economizing as such a good idea. I don't like Chinese made wrenches in my toolbox either.

[DrHenley]

I don't need a premium bullet to shoot one within 50yds or even within 150. No one does.

I do...at 25...

When you shoot a deer at 25 yards in the shoulder with a 30-06, the last thing you expect is for him to just run off on three legs, like nothing happened. I was so flabbergasted, I missed a chance at a follow up shot because I didn't reload - I was expecting him to keel over any second, but he just kept going.

That's when I stopped using cup and cores and switched to Accubonds.