I have been trying to save a few dimes by gleening what I can concerning bullet performance, while trying to fill in the holes with my own testing and experience. For those of you who parallel me concerning loading your own, testing it, and finally bringing it to fruition with a ten ring group or a 'perfect' kill on a game animal, I'd like to hear, and see, your results.
I will try to round up some of my mushroom compilation and post with what media, what charge, how far and group size, gotta dig around for old data.
My new pet is a 3" 357 and my quest for suitable performance. I have tried hard cast, hornady xtp, speer GD-125/158 and jhp140's. The 125's open nice but with a mushroom of .445 I wasn't impressed. Seems like diameter is an issue, the xtp's fold back nice but not 'out' as well, barely touching .42-.44 diameter. Seems like xtps perform flawless in larger 41 &44 cal but not so much out of 357. Velocities are in the 1200-1290 range for 125's and around 1100-1180 for 158's. Suggestions?
Also love to hear about rifle bullet experience. Seems like few shooters test their bullets on anything other than paper and game, if it prints a hole and the animal doesn't get away they consider it successful. I like to dispense the maximum capability of a caliber within the intended game as possible. Love to hear about the big bores. 8mm being my main caliber of choice, also dabble with 416 and 30 cals. Thanks