Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters The February 2024 issue of Rifle Loony News

is available to those Campfire members who subscribe on www.riflesandrecipes.com

Thanks again,
John

Just got done with a slow leisurely read of the latest RLN. I'm home sick from work and it was just what the doctor ordered! Nice job, you two. One of my favorite issues. Thanks!
Andy

As per usual.... excellent and enjoyable read. Especially enjoyed Eileen's lead story.

Thanks, guys!

Westman, Eileen also says thanks.

John

Great edition as always, John. I was especially interested in your comments on how you've migrated mostly towards monolithic bullets. I have a question: I've read in many of your articles that 2700 fps is about perfect for most C&C bullets, but have you found any issue with the performance of monolithics in moderate velocity cartridges? Everyone says that they thrive on velocity, but what about a cartridge, like the 7x57, that was designed when moderate velocities were the norm? Do you find that monolithics perform equally well as C&Cs at more moderate velocities?

BTW, I'm mostly a dietary carnivore, paleo at best, but I might have to make an exception for Eileen's biscotti.

Thanks

Mike

Mike,

Today's monolithics tend to do better at moderate muzzle velocities than some of the early ones ones, with plastic tips made a noticeable difference. We had a few not-so-hot experiences with the original TSXs at muzzle velocities over 3000 fps, even at shorter ranges. But since then we've used not just TTSXs, LRXs, and Nosler E-Tips at muzzle velocities down to 2700, some at ranges beyond 300 yards. Barnes LRXs, in particular, are designed to open up at lower impact velocities. The other thing we've noticed (as other people have) is that monos tend to ruin less meat than lead-cores--even when started pretty fast.

Another interesting bullet that isn't quite a monlithic is the North Fork, which instead of a plastic tip essentially is a hollow-point with a tiny bit of lead in the "hollow," which helps it expand. Have used the 160-grain North Fork in the 7x57 in North America and Africa at a muzzle velocity of around 2700 fps on animals from around 100 pounds to around 1000, and it always both expanded and penetrated well.

Will tell Eileen your biscotti comment! We've both been have a small one each day (well, maybe two) since she experimented with the recipe for RLN!

John

Have shot the NF’s on elk since 2014. Nasty bullets for sure! The ones I’ve recovered looked picture perfect.

I haven't killed a real deer with the copper bullets, and I'd be the first to agree my 'testing' is unscientific, but poor people have poor ways. Wet sawdust boxes in summer and compacted snow boxes in winter have revealed that most copper bullets are too tough for modest velocities. I have fooled with 6.5 Swede, 7x57, 7.65 Mauser and 8x57...and the early coppers acted a lot like solids. The 'control/comparison bullet was Rem CoreLokt. 150 yd impact velocities roughly 2,250fps to 2,550 fps. Unimpressive result with very small frontal area expansion. I just bought a kings ransom in Hammer Bullets of various calibers, the style is the Shock Hammer...designed for lower velocities, testing will resume when the weather lets up. If nothing else the Shock Hammers are easy peasy to work with accuracy-wise...no chasing seating depth.

John, as always enjoyed reading both your and Eileen’s writing.
Thanks, Norman

Congrats on the latest RLN. An excellent read, as it usually is. The last paragraph or so of page one brought me back to late November of this past season when I ALMOST got the small buck that was seen regularly on trail cams. In the fading light of a late November afternoon on a big hill in the Finger Lakes region of western NY state, less than 150 yards into the woods around my old High School buddies place. The recent snow had melted and the wet leaves on the ground made for almost silent walking conditions. So silent, that he snuck in on me. To quote your piece; "Then I heard a noise over my right shoulder, I tried to look without turning my head, but couldn't see". Then I made the mistake of movement, just twisted my wrist a little to prepare to thumb the hammer on the CVA Scout in 444 Marlin that was laying in my lap as I sat against a tree. By this time I could see him in the corner of my eye and he froze the instant he saw my wrist move ever so slightly. He stared at me for a long time before proceeding by me at no more than 15 yards. Just when he was by me and I began to raise the rifle I felt that light breeze going right by me headed right for him. Then he; as you eloquently described it, " Stopped and stiffened. And then ran as if I had shot". Thanks for letting me relive that hunt. Wish that I were articulate enough to express myself so well. Still wound up with meat after a South Carolina hunt in September and for gutting my buddies big doe he got Jan 1st, on the last day of late muzzleloader season, so all is not lost, as I also focus on freezer filling as I age.

Gee, Eileen and I and several companions have now taken around 100 "real" deer and other animals with "copper bullets," mostly Barnes Xs of various types, but also Hornady GMXs and Nosler E-Tips. There are also a couple of others that work the same way--the discontinued Combined Technology Fail Safe, which had a hollow-point front end that acted exactly like the original Barnes X's, and steel-capped lead core in the rear end, and the North Fork, which is essentially a hollow-point monolithic with a tiny sliver of lead in the hollow-point to enhance initial expansion.

I have used a bunch of stuff to test bullet expansion over the decades, starting in the late 1980s, including ballistic gelatin, the Test Tube which used a variety of wax, and various home-made stuff like Bob Hagel's 50/50 mixture of damp sawdust and sand, and stacks of wet newspapers and dry newspapers. Have even placed larger bones of freshly killed big game animals or domestic animals including beef cattle and elk in front or inside various kinds of media.

While I have found expanded bullets on the ground after the snow melted on a private range I used for several years, have never considered using only sawdust, as it Hagel's mix was considerably tougher.

During all this I recovered enough expanded bullets, which killed and and other animals up to 1500+ pounds, that they're stored in an over-sized tackle box. They vary from .224 bullets weighing 40 grains to .416 bullets weighing 400--and muzzle velocities and ranges varied enough that several impacted at around 2000 fps. One example would be an original Barnes X-Bullet, a 120-grain 6.5mm that grouped very well in a Ruger 77 Mark II I owned and hunted with quite a bit for several years around 2000, at a muzzle velocity a little over 2900 fps.

In 2003 I used it to take a Colorado pronghorn buck at a lasered 371 yards, with a broadside shot behind the shoulder. Back then stories about how Xs sometimes didn't expand at lower velocities were not uncommon, especially if they didn't hit substantial bone. Now, pronghorns aren't very big (the heaviest field-dressed buck we've ever weighed went 93 pounds) so there isn't much resistance to cause bullets to expand, so I was both interested and nervous about the result--but at the shot the buck stumbled forward about 10 feet and fell dead, because there was a good-sized hole through both lungs.

I still have a copy of the very first Barnes Reloading Manual, which lists the G1 ballistic coefficient of that bullet as .441--which it may have been, given the usual method many bullet manufacturers used back then, chronographing both at the muzzle and 100 yards, or maybe 200. But BC tends to drop with velocity, which is why that method really doesn't work with today's high-BC bullets beyond about 200 yards.

Anyway, the listed BC indicates that bullet hit the pronghorn at around 2100 fps, where according to your "tests" it shouldn't have expanded. But have also used TSX bullets at muzzle velocities as low as 2200 to shoot feral pigs, and they worked fine too, at ranges out to 200+ yards.

The test I really trust most for hunting-bullet expansion is shooting "real live" animals, whether deer or anything else. And the test I eventually came up with that tended to reflect actual result from bullets recovered from game was stacks of dry newspaper, which were the closest match in both penetration and weight retention. Have used it a number of times when a new bullet appears on the market, before I hunt with the bullet. Might even post a photo of the results from a line-up of several 7mm bullets in the 160-grain weight range later, which I did for a book titled Rifle Bullets for the Hunter, A Definitive Study, compiled, edited and partly written by my fellow writer Richard Mann, the guy who developed the Test Tube, which was published almost 20 years ago. Several other writers contributed chapters, including Craig Boddington, one reason that copies now sometimes go for over $200.

There's plenty of information out there about how expanding bullets actually work on game--and what pre-hunting tests actually work pretty well.

John, will RLN 2024 be coming out in printed book form? Thanks, John

We're planning to publish the book Rifle Loony News, the Third Five Years, within the next few months. This was the issue that completed those five years. (Hard to believe it's been 15 years since we started RLN!)

Just finished your Back Burner piece. It really resonated with me as I’ve always pretty much been a meat hunter, due to the limited time I had to hunt when I was younger, and also because most of my hunting has been in places where you don’t typically find Hank and his kin. Almost always the first legal deer that gives me a chance has been taken; the few times I’ve resisted that impulse usually resulted in tag soup. The WV county I live in now has generous limits and long seasons, so the smart strategy for me is to make meat at the first opportunity, then think about getting something nicer, although shooting a dink puts me under the Earn-a-Buck restriction, requiring that I take an antlerless deer before any more antlered bucks. That occurred this past season, though the buck was actually not bad for that WMA, and of good size. I didn’t hunt again until the second week of the rifle season, and was lucky enough that my required doe showed up just minutes after I sat down, with a decent buck in tow. I was able to pop her, and in a moment he reappeared and got his as well.

Now for the Geezer part….

I’m a bit older than you, and on top of the general, expected decline in my strength and endurance, I’d been nursing a bone-on-bone left knee for about a year. The wife, besides “making” me wear a satellite tracker (so they can find the body) had insisted that I return home for her so she could help me bring out any deer I killed, and I did that with the first one, killed in the early morning, just over a half-mile from the truck. We used a plastic “boat” to haul him out. These two were somewhat farther back, and it was late afternoon. I returned home, ate, then loaded two boats, rope, a hoist, and my wife into the Ranger, and we headed out in the dark for the WMA, about 20 minutes away. We hoisted the doe off the ground and left one boat and my sweaty hat there to discourage yotes and foxes, then dragged the buck out in the other boat, getting home about 11. Next morning we went back for the doe, which was undisturbed. I have to say I’m really glad I didn’t try and tough that out alone, though I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have died in the attempt. My wife is only in her mid 50s and fit and pretty tough, and she really enjoyed both adventures, especially sharing the stories and pics with her relatives back in China, where such goings-on are unheard of. Anyway, in the future I won’t be so reluctant to accept some help, although I will have a new knee by Fall and should be much more able-bodied.

BTW, those last two deer were taken very neatly with 95gr LRXs from my 6mm Fieldcraft, the first ones for me with copper bullets from a CF rifle. I’m sold.

JB, Thanks for the informative reply, using my hokey methods is obviously faulty...but I think my main mistake was to assume when a bullet escaped the test media and was lost, which copper does frequently, I automatically presumed it hadn't expanded much. Actually the steep timbered country I hunt in I'm pretty sure a .303 or .30-40 with round noses would fill the freezer. LOL. I need to concentrate on bein' the best Injun instead of fussing over which arrow is the best.

Pappy,

Interesting story. Glad to hear you have an able and willing helper!

I do have a younger friend who lives a few blocks away, is in his mid-30s, and is 6-4 and around 265 fit pounds, who's very willing to help me get out an elk. But he's also very busy, working three jobs to support his young family, and is not only out hunting a lot with his two oldest kids (which are 11 and 13 now), but his father is getting older and lives in another part of the state. His dad likes to hunt too, and my young friend also loves hunting (often with his kids) in that part of the state as well. In fact I knew he'd be hunting over there the last week of our general rifle season--another factor in my decision about the late cow-elk season.

Have probably told you this already, but we've hunted deer in West Virginia with my old friend and fellow writer Richard Mann and his family. They have a piece of getaway property with an old house on it that borders both other private land and some public. I got to know him before he became a writer, but he'd submitted a few hunting/gun articles to Wolfe Publishing and while editor Dave Scovill didn't buy any, he though Richard had potential and wondered if I'd we willing to give him some pointers.

After talking some on the phone, I eventually advised Richard that he should hunt other places than WV to give his articles more perspective. Turned out he'd always wanted a black bear, but had never run into one there. So I invited him to hunt the spring season with me in Montana, where non-resident tags can be purchased over the counter. You can't bait or use dogs here, so we mostly hunt mountain areas, where they graze on the first green grass after they come out of their dens, usually around Mother's Day. He got a good boar after 2-3 days of hunting--and along the way we saw elk, mule deer, and a couple of moose, and in the time he had left, before his flight home, we took him to Yellowstone Park, where he also saw bighorn sheep and a grizzly bear. So he and his family eventually invited us to their "cabin." I got a doe and Eileen got a young buck, and we had a great time.

Have also spent considerable time there fishing with my old friend Melvin Forbes, who sold New Ultra Light Arms a couple years ago. If I ever decide to move east of the Mississippi, West Virginia would be on my short list!

Got the signed edition of Mann’s book. Great read!

By the way, fantastic issue of RLN this time.

It's great to be a gun looney. I say gun looney as I'm equally obsessed with SXS shotguns and old S&W revolvers. The company is excellent, the adventures unlimited and the topics of conversation endless.

As I mentioned earlier, Eileen and I use more and more monolithic bullets these days partly because they ruin less meat, whether at short or longer ranges. (=Though we are by no means "long-range hunters," our hunting country varies from no more than 50 yards to much further.

Have taken quite a bit of game with both the .303 British and .30-40 , both with RN and spitzer bullets, and yep they work very well!

John

Was just asked on another website if there's such a thing as a "shotgun loony." I wrote "YESSSSS!" Because I'm one--and so is Eileen.

In fact as I've started selling off my centerfire rifle collection over the past year or two, have spent quite a bit of the money acquiring more shotguns....