Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting 260 bullet- Accubond or SST

I've been looking for some 130 grain Accubonds to play with for some whitetail hunting. I did get ahold of some 129 grain Hornady SST. They were cheaper, they were available and the BC is almost identical (.485 vs .488).

Will the SST work out to 350 yds for whitetails?

It will certainly work for you. It will tend to be more explosive than the AB and could result in more meat damage depending on where you hit the animal and the actual distance.

If that's what you have, I'd use them.

They'll work, but if you shoot at 50-100 yards stay off bone. SST's are one of the most fragile "game" bullets I've ever seen. I'm not a fan, but that's based on a small sample (less than 10 deer). I shot a buck with one at 45 yards then watched the deer run and run ( no chance for a second shot). He did go down, but I found the jacket under the skin on the entrance side, the core fragmented in the chest cavity. Convinced me I was asking for trouble.

Ditto above


i would use the accubond and not worry about it

IMO, BC is moot when staying inside of 350 yards or so. If you can get standard Hornady Interlocks I would take those over SST's every time.

Small sample but I shot a nice big doe through the slats at 80 yards and got perfect result. a 1 inch exit and a quickly dead deer. This was with a 150 gr. 30 caliber bullet at 3000fps. Manufacturers are always tweaking their new offerings till most are pleased so a problem one year may not be there next year. The Ballistic tips from Nosler are a good example.

I shot a medium size mule deer buck at 230 yards with my .260 rem. using the berger 120 gr. target bullet. The deer dropped in its tracks and the exit hole was the size of a half dollar. I was impressed by the bullets performance although that was the only big game I've shot with this bullet so far, I hope to shoot a whitetail with it this year also.
Joe

I have only shot 2 deer at brush distance with the 129 SST. Massive damage and shed core. The second was a neck shot and almost decapicated a doe. Couldn't hang her up by her head it was that bad.

I would think farther out it would be okay but we all know they usually show up close when expecting longish shots.

Seen a few coues bucks drop to 260s slinging 6.5/120 accutip blems from midway, which are SSTs with a different colored tip... cut one in half lengthwise to confirm that suspicion. Haven't seen a failure yet with impact velocities of 2000-2500 fps... well placed shots have resulted in very dead bucks pronto.

Only recovered one, under the hide in the base of the throat, which entered high on the second rib on the other side at about 2150. Jacket stopped and core went about 1/2" further to the hide. Buck was dead before his head hit the dirt.

I favor the merits of massive trauma to the vitals and quick results without having to aim for bone. I'd not hesitate for a second to use the 129 SST for cow elk, but I've never shot an eastern WT.

YMMV.

130 AB is my GO to 6.5 .
Near or far, I'd punch coyote to elk.

I mostly use the 100 gr Nosler BT's in my 260 as an allaround bullet - coyote to small Texas whitetails. Prior to that I used the 120 grain version and it killed as well as my 270 with 130 grainers. I shoot em in the lungs.

In the interest of science, we tried the combo I mentioned earlier on an elk... It's a rink, and I admittedly have no clue how it compares to eastern WT.



120 grain SST/accutip blem recovered from under the off side hide...



Past experience tells me terminal results, other than a recovered slug, would have been much the same using many different flavors of 140...