Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Building an Extreme Weather in 260

Got a spring bear hunt around your parts? If so, you think the rifle will be ready to go for a bear hunt? A good way to break it in, imo.

RDW - I really like the 130AB, the 120BT is a good bullet. The TTSX in 120 and 129 SPs also are great all around bullets. I have a box of 130 Bergers but not tried yet - maybe next year.

Not many 'bad' bullets for 6.5s but here are some comments by someone who has done alot of 'R&D' in the field...

mudvayne
Manbearpig

Registered: 02/23/11
Posts: 173
Loc: Washington TX Better late than never...

I have killed no less than 500 deer with my x47. I am running a 130 Berger at 2940 fps in mine. My brother clones deer so we kill a crap load of doe every year for their overies.

I have shot a few pigs in my day as well with this round. I have used several bullets trying to figure out the best killing combo and here is MY opinion on what I have experienced. It is not holy nor sacred, just what happened and I observed. So take anything you read with a grain of salt as it may not turn out the same for you.

My rifles specs:
Rem 700 left hand
Lawton 1-8" twist finished at 29.5"
Fat bastard break
McMillan A3 with 3 way butt plate and adj cheek piece
Hubor concepts 2 stage trigger
Premier Ret 5-25x56
130 Berger VLD @2940 fps

123 Scenar- this bullet shoots great on paper with my rifle. consistant .3" groups. Even at 500 and 1000 it would print an occasional half min group. That is with three shots mind you. On game I was less than impressed. They have a bit thicker jacket and didnt expand too well. I actually never dropped a deer once with a shoulder shot. Head shots didnt show to do too much damage either. IMO this is not a great projectile for hunting.

123 SMK- This bullet shot absolutely lights out in my rifle. I had to shoot this round for the first thousand rounds or so because 130 bergers were rare as hens teeth. This round shot in the .1's-.2s all day long for 5 shots. At 600 yards this round printed a 3.4" 10 shot group shot prone. I had some interesting results with its terminal effects. The very first deer I shot was a cull 6 pt and he was 606 yards. I put a high shoulder shot on him and he folded up. The next few doe I shot I put shoulder shots just to see bullet performance. One was DRT and 4 ran off a good 100 yards before dying. Not what I like for the amount of deer I shoot. On the head shots again I didnt see consistant enough trama to use this as my go to bullet.

130 JLK- This is the best long range target bullet I have ever used. I have shot some groups that yall would flat out call BS on so I wont even say what it can do on paper. On critters...TERRIBLE! I never once dropped a deer with this bullet. Last month I was wanting to test it on a coyote. While waiting 800 yards from a gut pile, a BIG boar walked into the field at 660 yards. Dead calm wind. I fire up the video camera and zoom in on him. dial up and send the shot. I hear the bullet smack him and actually see it through my scope. Well he just absorbs the bullet and runs off without a limp. I maybe thought I missed..rewind the camera and you can see trace go down range and his upper shoulder ripple. He just absorbed it and trotted off. I even shot a crap load of prarie dogs this summer with the JLK and it just penciled through all of them. Only popped em if they were within 200 yards and thats off kinetic energy alone.

130 Berger- this is THE bullet for hunting for what I have found. I literally have not had a deer take a step yet from the hunting VLD. This bullet shoots very well on paper and shoots very well on critters. Wound cavities are unreal. It looks like a grenade goes off inside the deer. I almost took a does head off this last weekend! A few months back I shot a yote at 1230 yards and he folded up.

That is very interesting information, thanks for posting!

I'm not clear on what you meant.

MOA is an angular measurement, so 1 MOA at 300 is 1 MOA at 200 or 100 or 500 or any other distance.

mathman, sometimes I just type some goofy stuff, I expect the rifle to be more accurate than my ability to shoot.

I hope the rifle is capable of 1/2" three shot groups at 100.

If the rifle is capable, I hope to shoot less than 1" groups at 200 and 3" groups at 300; and 6"-8" at 500 would make me happy.

MOD, minute of deer <<< poor attempt at being funny.