Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters .243 Bullet opinion

Back to the OP's question, the .243 isn't picky about killing deer. My boys have used Hornadys, Noslers (bt & NPT), Barnes tsx and couldn't tell the difference at all.

One of my friends wives uses a .243 exclusively and has taken Mulies, caribou, pronghorn, and yes even elk with it without fanfare. She usually buys one box of shells a year and either Winchester PP or Rem CL in 100gr. Other than taking a Texas heart shot it rarely matters what you shoot an animal with, as much as where you hit them with whatever it is.

Wow, that's really handy! I'll be saving that to my Favorites. Thanks bcraig.

Thanks everyone for the great feedback!

To answer your question, with my load? Velcity drops to 1800 fps at 510 yards.

I'm going to run my normal thing, look to Barnes or a mono bullet. Barnes does theirs really well.

I've shot lots with 243 over years of use. That was prior to Barnes mono bullets.

Why Barnes?

I did taxidermy as a living for 20 years or so.

Cup and core were found seperated in a LOT of heads that came in from neck shots.

Dead yes. But coming apart on the neck of our small whitetails? Would likely leave something on the table if you had to take a tough shot on one. I prefer the insurance. By far.

I've even had the partition 180 stop by the neck of a large S Texas buck from my 300.

Once I went to Barnes you didn't have to worry about that anymore.

Fast 85ish Barnes would trump anything out there plus give added insurance. Cheap enough too, how many deer tags do you get a year? 5 for us unless we buy extras... a 50 round box of barnes would last at least 5 years.

Hill country has come a long way. We shoot bucks that have live weights of 160 to 170 every fall. Between Marble Falls and Johnson City.

Used to not be that way but finally shot the numbers down enough and let the bucks get old enough...

200 would be BIG... I've only shot one over 200 and that was south.... But on the right place the hill country sure could come close.

Update:

I shot that load into milk jugs of water today.

Now, it was the 100gr Hornady FlatBase, not the boattail, because I had those loaded.

Same velocity, 2800 fps MV. Shot into them at 100 yards, so impact velcoity was about 2550 fps

VERY IMPRESSIVE. Penetrated 5 jugs and was stuck halfway out of the back of the 5th jug. 27.5 inches of penetration overall, in water.


I then shot the 6.5x55, 140 grain Hornady Interlock into coffee cans full of water (out of milk jugs)Impact velocity 2400 fps.
It came to rest in the 4th can.

21 inches of penetration. Core and jacket seprated but wer found together in the 4th can.



Not quite comparing apples to apples, but very close.


That 100 grain Interlock impressed the heck outta me!

Sample of one deer here, but after seeing how the boat tail 100 grain hornady performed on a mule deer at 280 some yards out of a short barreled .243 I went with the 95 grain BT and don't see any reason to change. Was too fragile for my taste. Was plenty accurate though. Works good on coyotes!

I don't know, never used the TSX.

I would be more inclined if I could run them REAL fast.

I would use them on moose or elk if I ever used a .243 on them, or my kids did.


This doesn't speak well for them though

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tcs4w6VArIg&index=9&list=WL

If you want to be really impressed at a bullet's performance, try the 95g Nosler partition with about 43g of H4350 CCI200 primer, bullet seated near the lands.

You will think you are shooting a 30/06 when you skin the deer.

I hunted cow elk in Az with this load, none traveled more than 30 feet!

Thats the problem. People don't understand how bullets work. If you want big holes and lots of damage you have to shoot a frangible bullet. It gives you a bit better chance of DRT. Better blood trail. More damage to vitals and meat and hides. And less odds on an angling shot.

But if you want 2 holes you have to shoot a stouter bullet. The mono. It won't put big holes. It does enough damage. It usually exits. Its a heck of a deal for me.

But you also might not get as much blood trail and the animal might go a bit further.

Bottom line is you have to know what works for you.

I laugh at most folks that say they don't expand... ask about the hole and they'll tell you a 6mm left a caliber tiny entry and a dime exit.... well if it didn't expand wouldn't it be a 6mm exit....

I've NEVER seen a barnes not work. I've seen other bullets fail IMHO, including almost all sierra game kings, and the nosler solid base and partitions. I refused to shoot ballistic tips after almost literally blowing the head totally off a doe from the first one I ever used... WAY to much destruction.

I've seen barnes work from maybe as close as 20-30 steps, out past 800 ranged yards.

So if you need lots of blood and DRT, then do NOT choose a barnes. Go to a different bullet. But if you want one that kills in almost any circumstance and exits almost every time, then Barnes is what you are after IMHO.

If you need that DRT stuff, I'd suggest Berger hunting bullets. I won't use them because they destroy to much stuff, I still am back to Berger target bullets if I feel the need to use cup and core. Caliber entry and nickel to quarter exits.

FWIW I've run quite a few barnes dang slow.... 6mm 85 tsx at about 2700 or so MV, maybe a hair less... never a failure. And some of the impacts have to be way slow from other rounds as the impacts have been on the far side of 500 quite often.

Being a bowhunter at heart, I'm used to deer going a ways and leave em alone to die for a time. Sometimes thats a long time, you'd be amazed how long a deer can live with a vital bullet or arrow if you actually have teh luxury of watching.

I shot the largest deer I've ever shot this past fall. 100 ttsx from a 257 wtby, no clue at MV. At the shot I lost the deer. In this day and time we get texts as soon as the next guy shoots... I got the same. Going to hunt for 2-3 more hours. I never even moved from the stand. Never saw where the deer went or if I hit it. There was zero need to go and rush anything so 2 hours later my buddy calls and says lets go find it and head in. Ok. It wasn't hard to find as it was less than 20 steps away behind a tree dead.

Point was though, folks demand to much IMHO, when they should be patient. Had I missed time doesn't matter. Had I wounded it, time might have helped. Time never hurt.

Sorry about the mini/major rant but it aggravates me, and I often wonder how folks back in the day learned to deal with round balls and such, having no energy/knockdown etc....

My mentor told me long ago his dad in the depression shot the deer with a 22 long. And then had a sandwich, rolled a smoke and often even at an apple or orange and that was what they felt was required to make sure the deer had died,then went and got it.

Here I"ve shot deer and snuck away to do other things and come back a couple hours later to go look or get them.

In the end you can't have that varmint type bullet blowing up and killing much quicker than others, AND a bullet capable of a long "texas heart shot" and exiting after killing with the same bullet. I choose the bullet thats capable of doing it all, not doing one thing best. Just me.

You have to make the choice according to those lines.

I have 75 of those too. Haven't loaded them yet. Was kinda saving them for if my son ever used it on bigger game.

cdb,

I just now saw your post,,

I probably over estimated the size of that one deer. Most deer we shoot were typical hill country,,, 80 lbs. field dressed etc.

That one deer was killed years ago. We didn't weigh him but figured he weighed 140 field dressed. Pretty sure he stayed in a peanut field most of the time. This was in San Saba county in the 80's, no high fence.

Not to highjack the thread, but Shooters Pro Shop has 95gr BTs on sale for $9.95/50......

Shooters Pro Shop

FWIW,

Our bucks here can go to 300 lbs live weight.....after seeing that 27.5" of penetration in water from the Hornady, I have renewed confidence in it. My son HAS shot 5 deer with this load, 2 of them decent bucks .......

Steve...I just used Gale Roots 95NBT on a couple more critters...excellent performance and Im just starting to get the impression that he designed it to expend all its energy within the target, because I have yet to have one exit.
Last critter was a 200lb + Axis buck...perfect.


That said Im a big fan of Hornady interlock and would tell the OP what you did...either is a good choice.

I don't have as much experience with that particular Interlock as you do. In my more limited data, primarily with the boat tail version of the Hornady, I find the Ballistic Tip to be the tougher bullet.

I would agree math man...my fave is the flat base, and I have a ton of experience on game with it. I tried the Boattail and found it to be comparatively fragile as well.

Hey, nice to see your back, hope you had a great hunt!!

I bought another 500 hundred 95 grain bt from SPS yesterday have not killed with them yet . been using 85 grain partitions for everything.

I went through a 243/6MM phase a couple of years ago. First bullet I used this time around was the 100 gr, Nosler Solid base, had a few hundred laying around so I used them. Liked it, 1 inch exits and deer went down in the usual 75 yards or less with lung hits. Left a good blood trail too. Next up was the 85 gr. Partition which killed just like the solid base bullets with the exception the exit holes were around 1/2 inch and blood trails a bit thinner. This year I am going to use the 95 gr. BT again. I have used it before and the first 2 deer I shot with it went down on the spot. One did exit on a 50 yard shot through the ribs high leaving a nice 1 inch exit hole. The other also a high ribcage hit just under the shoulder blade on one side and ended up in the shoulder blade just behind the ball joint on the other. Nicely mushroomed and mostly intact. These were all shot out of a 20 inch barrel and velocity at the muzzle was no more than 2900 fps for the 100/95 gr. bullets and 3100 fps with the 85.