Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game Recovered an Accubond

Shot a nice large doe at about 375 yards yesterday. I was using my 7mm Rem Mag loaded with 140gr Accubonds. MV with my load is 3220fps. She was quartering to me and up the hill from my position. The bullet hit a little higher than I wanted but entered the should and then broke about 4 vertebrate. When I skinned the deer I found the bullets stuck in the offside skin. It looks just like a partition. Peeled back to where it looks to be about 60% of the length and the rest mushroomed back. I took some pics of the bullet and will try to remember how to post them. I plan on putting it on the powder scale tonight.

Did you weight the bullet? Nosler told me they were designed to maintain 70%, same as the partition.

I have recovered quite a few and became bored with the consistency...

Rdd: I shot a large Whitetail Buck a week ago. I was shooting the wonderfully accurate and lethal 130 grain Nosler Ballistic Tip in my 270.
One shot kill at 275 yards.
Dead in seconds with the heart/lung hold/hit.
The recovered 130 grain Ballistic Tip weighed 71 grains.
I looked for more bullet fragments but found none - much of the bullets fragments probably were in the heart/lung tissue which I did not look through.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

How about a pic?

I've always wondered what a 130 would look like

Heres a 300 WSM With 150Gr AB. At 3188 FPS.552 Yds On a 300+ Muley.They Work..

I recovered two this year and the 70% is pretty much spot on. Both were .277 140's.

One came from a 320 yard buck quartering towards the shooter entering the front shoulder and lodging under the hide in the ham. 99 grains retained=70.7%.

The other was a 60 yard quartering towards the shooter WT buck and the bullet again entered the shoulder blade and was found in the front portion of the ham under hide. 96 grains retained=68.5%.

Put it on the scale and the weight was 97gr. That is right at the 70% mark. My photos look just like what Shrapnel posted. I think that I will continue to use them.

The 70% applies to AB's of .30 caliber and under, but will vary about 5% on either side of that.

Like bigger Partitions, most AccuBonds above .30 caliber are designed to retain a higher percentage of weight. The bigger recovered AccuBonds I have in my collection range from the 225-grain .338 to the 260-grain .375, and average 79% weight retention. The highest is 81%, a 250-grain 9.3mm recovered from an angling-away shot on a grizzly. The bullet entered the rear of the rib cage and was found under the neck skin on the far side.

This mirrors my experiences with the 260-grain .375 AB used on elk and African plains game, as well as with the 250-grain 9.3s on elk. I have never recovered any from .25, .27 or .30 caliber cartridges used on mule deer and pronghorns.

I have recovered two 35 cal Accubonds from game fired from a 35 Whelen.

225 gr Accubond

From a moose at under 50 yards so around 2675-2700 fps impact velocity, bullet travelled through the meaty part of the shoulders just grazing some heavy bone and a was found in the hide on the far side.

191 gr (84.9%) .710" diameter




200 gr Accubond

From a black bear this spring and again around 50 yards, hit bones in both shoulders and found in the hide on the far side

138 gr (69%) .660" diameter.





I'm a big fan of the 35 and 375 cal Accubonds that I have used don't have the 375 anymore but the 260 gr AB worked great too.

I've got a couple of boxes of 140 grain .284 to try in my 7mm-08 and 7mm RM...

This thread is useful and reassuring to my interests.

I have recovered two 180 Accubonds from downed animals. The first was a Burchells zebra shot in the left shoulder that ended up in the right shoulder just under the skin. The second was a 180 Accubond that was recovered from a blue Wildebeest shot in the chest, frontal shot, that ended up in the back of the beasts stomach. I weighed both and they each retain approx. 75-70% of original weight. I am a true fan of this bullet. I handload all of these for my 300WSM. Happy thanksgiving to all. MTG

Petro, I took a Scimtar Horned Oryx with my 280AI using a 140 Nosler Ballistic tip. One shot, down for the count. I would think the 140 Accubond would be even better. MTG

Hopefully I can get around to loading these soon.

Thanks for the info.

Here's what's left of that bullet after killing a 4x4 bull elk at 68 yards last year.







Broke the left scapula going in, destroyed both lungs, broke a rib going out and lodged under the hide. The bull took two steps forward, staggered backwards two steps, and died in the tracks where I shot him.

91 grains IIRC. Muzzle velocity 2843.



P

On a fluke I bought a Win Coyote Lite in .25 wssm, I loved the old grey box 120 gr PEP's, worked great on SW GA whitetails, I ran out and bought a few boxes of the Black box 110 gr accubonds. Almost as accurate as BT's and do a fantastic job on whitetails! I have recovered 3 so far, I have not weighed to check retained wt. but they hold together very well! I am sold on the accubond whatever cal. Im using the 160 gr in my 7STW and love the performance. I have not tried the LR version yet but no doubt my go to for any cal now! WinPoor

Just for kicks, last night I weighed the (7) .277 140 AB's that I have recovered from critters since I started using them in 2006. The average percent retained weight for those 7 bullets was 71%. This is from right around 24-26 animals killed over that time using the 140 AB. Mostly deer and elk. The majority exited, but probably one or two more were lost in animals.

When I first switched to the 140 AB, I did some dry newsprint bullet testing that JB (Muledeer)suggests is much like hitting heavy bone on an animal. Of the 8 bullets shot into dry newsprint at 50 yards, those bullets retained 63% of their original weight. Like MD mentioned on here a time or two, dry newsprint is often tougher on bullets than the real deal.

Hope to poke a buck Monday with a 130 gr AB in my 6.5 Swede. So far I have only killed antelope with it.

Not much holding that tip in there. Is there??

Here is one of many I have found

Interesting thread. This is one bullet that I wonder if I should try in the 270.

It kills with much authority

It is solidly in place even though it has been sectioned. I know there have been occasional problems in the past with tips coming out from several manufacturers but it has to be rare, I know I have never seen it.

I forgot to mention the impact velocity of the 200 gr AB on the bear this spring would have been around 2775 fps. This bullet it built noticeably lighter than the 225 gr version but obviously still is a stout bullet. I'm hoping to be putting one into a cow elk sometime after Christmas hopefully seconds after my wife shoots her first elk and big game animal with a 140 gr Partition from her 6.5x55

There were some AccuBonds with loose tips during the first year of manufacture, when demand was incredibly high. They were traced to one guy on the assembly line, who had decided on his own to speed up the process. The problem was quickly fixed and I haven't heard of any since (though anything is possible). During normal manufacture the jacket is crimped tightly around the "rod" projecting downward from the tip.

There is a reason that the front bumper of a car only has 2 bolts to hold it on and 6 bolts on the rear bumper. Velocity holds what is out front in place. Besides that what is behind is not really that important...

I used a 6.5x55 140 AB on a 220 class Red Stag. I shot it head on and he dropped in a heap right there. It was spectacular.

I've killed an even dozen deer and pronghorn, three feral hogs, and one nilgai with the 140 gr Accubond in my 270 WSM. I recovered the bullet I killed the nilgai with but all of the others were thru-and-thru shots. The bullet I recovered from the nilgai entered the right ribs (quartering away shot), traversed the chest cavity and shattered the opposite shoulder and lodged under the skin... about 25-28" of total penetration, I estimated at the time. Recovered weight was just under 90 grains (64% weight retention).

270, humm. Who dropped the elk?

Ingwe wants to know.

Shooter on a grassy knoll. The elk died in protest.