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When I first started hunting Remington made Bronze tipped bullets, Winchester made silver tips, not to be confused with ballistic silver tips. Would someone give me the low down on these bullets? Thanks captdavid


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The Remington Bronze point had a tip of I guess bronze in the same manner as the current tipped cartridges like Noslers Ballistic tips and other current tipped bullets.
The Silver tip was just a thin cap over a normal lead point in place and said to protect the point. It always worked for me and killed deer just fine. Never used the Remington bullet (Bronze Point) but IIRC it was Jack O'Connor who said they either penciled though or blew up like a bomb. Never used them that I can recall so can't say if Jack was right.
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I have used both back in my teens. Both were "explosive" shattering in the game, but the Silver-tip was the worse of the two.
I used them in 30 cals and 270. Not what I like in either.

In the old 30-30 the 170 Gr Silver-tip did ok, and it also seemed to do fine with the 300 grain 375H&H, but I only killed 2 deer with the 170 gr silver-tips from my 30-30, and one large Idaho Elk with the 375, so my experience with those 2 bullets was very limited. Other reading this may have more info. Please chime in if you do.

I saw predictably bad results from the 130 gr 270 S.T. and the 150 and 180 gr ST from 30-06.
I killed about 6 deer with the 270 and the 130 Gr ST and about the same number of deer with the 30-06 with both 150 and 180 grain ST bullets. No good to say about them, other than they were quite accurate. In my old Winchester 270 the 130 gr STs were some of the most accurate bullet I ever shot.

The Bronze Points I used were also in 270 and 30-06. They came apart badly too, but not as violently as the S.Ts.

Both bullets were thinly jacketed and the tips are basically just "wind-screens"

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I still have almost a box of 30-03 Silver Tips.Back in the 50's that is about all anyone in the PA mountains used if they had 30-30.Most were 170gr,but some preferred the 150 gr.I don't remember them being all that explosive, but it has been awhile. I left home and moved to NM in1964 ,and only got that rifle 4-5 years ago when my father passed away,along with what ammunition was in the gun cabinett

In 1966 I killed my first elk with the Rem Bronze point, .308. I don't have notes as to the weight,but I suspect the powder was 4064.
I clearly remember he hunt though.

Opening day in NE NM south of the Latir Lakes region. First light,we came upon three bull elk.Flip of the coin,I had last shot.First kill was with an .06 , next with a .270 and then me.By that time the bull was heading down to the timber as we were above timberline. He was out there quite a ways and down at a fairly steep angle.First shot took him down thru the back, liver, angle forward I found the bullet in the hide down below the front knee.Looked like it came out his chest and then into the leg. It had little deformation on the point,but other than that the only marks were the rifling. When hit,the bull went about 50 yards and stopped in a small stand of trees.I went down,within 150 yards and shot it again in the neck, .It dropped. That bullet passed thru so I never found it. 3 bulls down in the first 15 minutes of the season.

I don't remember any other kills with that bullet, but I am sure it took several deer.

Another popular bullet back then was a Norma 130 gr in 30 cal.I loaded it for my 308. It had a silver color jacket on it, but I don't recall the material and it was boat tail. It was pretty explosive on deer,but very effective


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When I got my Remington 660 in 6mm, my Father bought all of the Remington and Peters 90 grain BP 244 ammo that he could find, around 40 boxes, 'cause he thought that it was the best 244/6mm factory deer load available. They worked fine until I started to load my own with 100 grain Partitions and no longer needed the factory ammo. I still have 20 or so boxes of the Peters brand ammo in a plastic tote box at the storage unit.

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I have fond memories of the Silver Tip's in both the 150gr. 30.06 and 130's in the .270. My first attempt at reloading was for my Rem.M721 in 30.06. My local gun shop in those days(1962) didn't have many bullets to choose from but they had 150gr Silver Tips. So that's what I used. Besides, I liked Winchester's adds in Outdoor Life. You might say I was buying the sizzle and not the steak. Compared to today those were innocent days. I shot jack rabbits by the hundreds and dozens of deer, the Lone Ranger bullets never let me down. In my innocence, I never thought they could. You see if a deer didn't go straight down, I thought it was because I had made a less than perfect shot. Almost forgot, I have had no experience with Remington's BP.

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I never used the Bronze Tip, but used the old SilverTips. I reloaded them in a 30-06. I thought they worked better as far as penatration, then say the old Fedral HI-Shoks.

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I believe that it is John B. who has pointed out that there were Silver Tips and then there were Silver Tips.


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Originally Posted by PJGunner
The Remington Bronze point had a tip of I guess bronze in the same manner as the current tipped cartridges like Noslers Ballistic tips and other current tipped bullets.
The Silver tip was just a thin cap over a normal lead point in place and said to protect the point. It always worked for me and killed deer just fine. Never used the Remington bullet (Bronze Point) but IIRC it was Jack O'Connor who said they either penciled though or blew up like a bomb. Never used them that I can recall so can't say if Jack was right.
Paul B.


Didn't Peter Hathaway Capstick write about prying the tip caps off of Winchester/Olin factory loads for shooting leopards with the 375 H&H?

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I've got a couple hundred Bronze Point projectiles I bought from Midway 10-15 years ago in 150gr .308 caliber. I shot one deer with them and they seem to work just about like the early Ballistic Tips did before Nosler started contouring the jackets.


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They worked fine, I used them back in the olden days

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I still have a bunch of 30/30's with ST ammo.. have killed deer & antelope with them no problem. Have some to load in my .270 and various.30 cal. rifles.. More on those later.


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Originally Posted by PJGunner
The Remington Bronze point had a tip of I guess bronze in the same manner as the current tipped cartridges like Noslers Ballistic tips and other current tipped bullets.
The Silver tip was just a thin cap over a normal lead point in place and said to protect the point. It always worked for me and killed deer just fine. Never used the Remington bullet (Bronze Point) but IIRC it was Jack O'Connor who said they either penciled though or blew up like a bomb. Never used them that I can recall so can't say if Jack was right.
Paul B.


I may be able to add some to this discussion.

As a boy being raised on an Adirondack farm I saw the Rem Bronze points. My Dad hunted with a 300 Savage and there were four 300Sav Bronze Points laying in the "Cartridge Drawer" in the kitchen where Dad kept his ammo. I used to hold these mysterious things and imagine what they could do. They had, as you said, a Ballistic Tip type pointed bronze insert. It protruded about a quarter inch from the front of the bullet - Ballistic Tip like.

My dad wasn't particularly impressed with them for deer ammo. He said that the tip would separate from the lead and pass on through the deer and sometimes you could hear them ricocheting through the brush beyond. I'm attempting to recall them and his stories from the mid to late 1940's. His stories always proved to be accurate and I have a clear visual memory of the Bronze Points.

Dad's stories about shooting deer with them tend to support the Jack O'Connor accounts about them blowing up and/or penciling through. I remember his disfavor for them emanated from the meat destruction, separation, and the bronze point "penciling through."

Jim

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I've heard more than a few natives from out in bush Alaska come looking for Bronze Points because they are "bone breakers".

I shot a few deer with 180 STs in 30/06 factory loads. Had all kinds of various performances from excellent to piss poor.

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In the "olden days," J O'C and Elmer Keith used to brag about the Western Tool and Copper Works bullets in their favorite caliber, '06, 270, and 7mm. It's dependability was largely due to the large amount of lead exposed, but only because of the lower velocities in those cartridges. When faster cartridges came out, the bullets "exploded" and lost the ability to penetrate.
The BP and ST were to compete them. The jacket of the BP wasn't tapered and tended to thicken when drawn, so penetrated deeply, and needed to have the bronze wedge to initiate expansion so it wouldn't "pencil through." Often it wouldn't work, so would go on through, as with large bones.
STs were the large exposed tips with an aluminum cover, to retard expansion. It was difficult to manufacture a small tipped bullet with the little cover, so as velocities went up, the ST wasn't effective, so fell to the wayside.
In the '06 180 grain, .270 150 grain, 7x57 with 175 grain, and 7mm/06 with 160 and 175 grain, there were few combination that were as good for large deer, Elk, and Moose. That is where thse cartridges got their reps.
The last to go was the .30-30 with 170 grain STs. It was never expected to go fast, therefore worked very well. It was just too expensive to produce for only one loading.
In my "collection," I still have a 1/2 box or so of 180 STs, and a few less of 150 and 180 BPs, and several boxes of loaded .30/30 170 grainers, just in case I get to go hunting deer again, and decide to carry one of the old rifles, instead of a newer magnum.
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My dad used both of them in his 30-06 when he went out west for elk every fall. He always brought meat home. He used core lokts for deer hunting locally.

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these are pretty much varmint bullets at .300 WM speeds...

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Originally Posted by Hogwild7
My dad used both of them in his 30-06 when he went out west for elk every fall. He always brought meat home. He used core lokts for deer hunting locally.


Although my Father wasn't much of a game hunter, he was primarily a 'chuck shooter, Bearrr264's Father did the same thing that your Father did when I knew him. He shot 180 grain BT Remington factory loads in his elk rifle, a pre-'64 Winchester 70, and 180 grain RNCL Remington factory loads in his deer, black bear, and moose rifle, a Remington 760 with the barrel chopped off at 17".

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My only experience with Silver Tips has been round nose 190's in .303 Savage. They've killed deer and caribou wonderfully for me.

When I was a kid, I had two rounds of.30-06 with 150 grain Bronze Points. I used them to kill two woodchucks. One was standing up facing me at about 20 feet. I hit it square in the center chest, it fell forward and commenced to run furiously in about a thirty foot circle, got back to where it started, realized it was dead, and collapsed. The second one was running straight away at about fifty yards when I fired. When I got up to it the head and a strip of belly skin were the only things that hadn't completely disintegrated.


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As 5sdad already pointed out about one of my previous posts stating "there were Silvertips and there were Silvertips," they could act in very different ways, not just due to velocity but manufacturing differences from lot to lot. Some batches apparently had pretty thick jackets, and some did not.

Among my Montana friends is a guy who had quite a collection of perfectly mushroomed 130-grain .270 Silvertips pulled from dead deer and elk. His father had purchased a batch of 1000 many years ago and those always worked well.

At the other extreme was my late friend Walter White, who killed a brown bear with a 30+ inch skull on Kodiak Island, as I recall in the early 1950's (it's listed in the B&C records if anybody cares to look it up). He used a .375 H&H with 300-grain Silvertips and had to top off the magazine at least twice before one of the bullets got inside the big bear's chest and killed it. Luckily the bear was across a small river and couldn't charge easily.

I shot my last big game animal with Silvertips in the mid-1980's, when a 150-grain bullet from a .30-06 factory load (muzzle velocity about 2850 fps from my rifle) came apart on the shoulder of a forkhorn mule deer at about 200 yards. It broke the shoulder but the empty jacket then flattened against the deer's ribs. I had to track it for half a mile before putting another behind the shoulder, which killed the buck. Haven't used them since.

Have no experience with the Bronze Points, since nobody I ever knew used them.


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