Never understood the cost argument for a hunting bullet. The bullet is the cheapest thing on your hunt. Gas costs more, food, clothing, tag, every single piece of gear... why fuss over the cost of a bullet?
Partition
So, by your logic, you must go out of your way to find the gas station charging the most for gas, and fill up your vehicle there. Good job?
HuntnShoot –
Your conclusion is illogical. Choosing a more expensive bullet makes sense only if it provides an advantage. Paying more for an item that provides no advantage is just foolish.
Last Sunday I got back from a 3-day Wyoming antelope hunt. Here is a quick rundown of my costs:
$1.39 Bullets (Barnes 140g TTSX, Qty 2)
$12.50 Conservation Stamp
$39.00 License and application fee
$113.28 Food
$117.66 Fuel
$170.00 Processing
$421.20 Lodging
==============================
$875.03 Total
Granted, I could have reduced the hunt cost by about $0.80 by handloading Hornady 139g SST bullets or Remington Core-Lokt or other cup-and-core bullets, but that cost “saving” would be far more than offset by the added expense of buying a second bullet type and the time and expense of developing a second load.
For a different perspective, I could shoot factory ammo. I was using a .280 Remington with 140g TTSX bullets. By comparison, using today’s midwayusa.com’s standard prices:
$18.54 140g TTSX handloads
$30.40 Hornady 139g SST
$30.49 Federal 140g Spitzer Boat-Tail Fusion
$30.99 Federal 150g Power-Shok
$33.99 Remington 140g Core-Lokt
$43.49 Barnes 140g TTSX VOR-TX
So even if using factory ammo (Barnes VOR-TX vs Hornady SST) the most I could have saved would have been less than $1.31. (Whoopee, break out the champagne!)
OK, I was hunting antelope, and doe antelope at that. Where is the advantage of shooting a bullet like the TTSX (or AB, the other hunting bullet I use in that rifle), when just about any bullet will do for even the largest antelope? Just this – the rifle will be used for elk as well and the bullets I use are selected with that in mind. Using the same load for everything reduces costs and increases my familiarity with those loads.
If I could get the same advantages out of cup-and-core bullets for less money, I would be happy to do so. Those advantages include excellent accuracy, reliable but controlled expansion over a wide range of velocities and high weight retention for deep penetration. TTSX, for example, have been very accurate in every rifle I have tried them in and most animals, including elk, have either dropped straight-down or taken no more than a few steps before dropping. I trust them to reach the vitals from almost any angle, even on elk, as they have proven they can provide exit holes even when shooting lengthwise through mule deer.
The only real downside would be if the premium bullets I select (mostly Barnes TTSX, Nosler AB and North Fork SS) performed worse than cheaper alternatives, but I have seen no evidence of that, even on light animals like antelope and coyotes. My hunting partners and I have yet to recover a TTSX rom any animal and in the years we have been using TTSX we have seen no indications of failure to expand, bullets coming apart or failure to penetrate. By contrast, I have seen multiple instances where standard cup-and-core bullets failed to perform as I want.
While premium bullets will not always provide better results (DRT is DRT regardless of the bullet used), I am also well aware that things do not always go as planned. If an animal takes off after the first shot I want a bullet in the chamber that provides the best chance of reaching the vitals when all I can see is the back end of the animal as it heads away. For that I will gladly pay a little extra for my hunting loads. The $0.80 I could have saved on this trip by shooting the Remington Core-Lokt or Hornady SST handloads instead of Barnes TTSX would have been less than 1/10 of 1% of the overall expenses (0.091%).
Bullets may or may not be the least expensive part of a hunt but their cost is minimal compared to the total cost of my hunts. For myself and many others the little added insurance that premium bullets can provide is worth the slight extra cost.
