I didn't get on the Barnes band wagon until the TSX came out because I'd read about the pressure and copper fouling with the early X bullets. I thought that my deer deserved to be shot with a premium bullet, but I had my own reservations about the all copper and small diameter cavity up front. A 140 TSX from my 7mm-08 broke the neck on the first deer and I noted the smaller exit, but chalked it up to how narrow a deer's neck is. Then the next year I shot another deer with the TSX broadside and it ran the usual 40 yards. That should have told me something with the quarter size hole through both lungs instead of the usual lung mush I got from conventional Core-Lokts or Interlocks. A nice tidy carcass with minimal blood shot tissue. The next year a very nice 10 point gave me a broadside shot, but it was in high brush, so I held high to avoid brush deflection. He took off too and dropped exactly five drops of blood where he'd stopped, then ran off and left absolutely no blood trail to follow. First deer that I ever couldn't find after two days of looking. Am I trying another Barnes anything? Nope, not after DRT results from BT's ever since. I want a deer bullet that does lots of damage with a less than perfect shot so I can recover that animal. I'm getting too old for playing hide and seek to find the whitetail I've shot.
