Hy, I bought a new savage .243 2 yrs. ago, and have shot 2 nice buck's in the last 2 yr's with it. I used factory 100gr.super x ammo. I could not get the accuracy of the factory ammo with my 100gr. reloads.The question i have is, i want to load up 85gr. ammo. I was wondering if anyone has had any experience with hunting deer with the 85gr. bullet's. I will also be using this load for winter coyote hunting.Any info would be appreciated: Thank's, Rick.

Try 44 gns of h4350 or 42 gns of 760 gets 3150 app and very accurate with the old 85 gn solid base Nosler in the red and black box.

85gr TSX or 85gr Partition should be fine. But be careful, some other 85gr bullets might be a little fragile for deer. Which 85gr are you looking at?

An 85 grain TSX with 38 grains of Varget will be ball park. It will be reasonably fur friendly, making quarter sized hole in and out. +- 1/2 grain should be accurate and it will kill Bambi like nobody's business. Just don't expect to stop one inside a deer. The 80 grain TTSX is just as good. Keep the range under 300 and you'll be just fine.

Southtexas, your probably not wanting to here this, but i loaded up 85gr. sierra gameking's. I just read on site of bad performance form these.(to fragile, blow up)I may be just using these for coyote's then. I see Nosler has come out with the new "E" bullet for 6mm. in 90gr. That should take about a year to get them up here.I will shooting the game king's tomorrow.I am using H4350 powder. Rick.

As long as we are on this...I just worked up a load with 85gr. Speer Boattails for deer...Ive never used them...anyone had any experience on game with this boolit???
Ingwe

This load also works with Hornady 87 gr. bullets.

85gr. TSX's......full trottle.

I load the 85TSX in my sons' 6mm and 243. They work well of course. I use I4895 in the 243 and get 3200fps IIRC with good accuracy. This 243 shoots anything though. It regularly shoots less than .5 MOA groups.

RH

i have been messing with a remington youth mod7 243. the most consistant groups 1 1/4" come from factory 100gr remington corelocs. But the 18" barrel is cronographing them right at 2650fps. i'm loading the 85gr sierra GK's, CCI 250, H414 powder, ww brass. with the 85gr in the 18" barrel i'm getting 3050fps. same load in a 24" rifle was 3150fps. The issue with the tiny little barrel is it heats up so fast, but the 85gr can group under 1" after a lot of work. it still has 1000lb of energy at 300yds, the 100gr is under 800lb at 300yds

Ingwe, I shot this bullet for a few seasons when I first started handloading the .243. It's great for deer size animals as long as you keep it off bone. I don't remember any fragmentations or penetration problems, but that was before I paid attention to any such details. The real sleeper in Speer's 6mm line-up is the 90grn Hot-Cor. It was desingned for deer at 6mm Remington velocities, and the bullet holds up well. This bullet with R-19 has shown unbelievable accuracy out of several .243's that have digested it.

I know you didn't bring up energy numbers, but I take them with a grain of salt campared to bullet construction and load accuracy. Last season, I loaded for a friend's very finicky Model 7 .243. I ended up with IMR7828ssc and a 100grn Speer Grand Slam at just under 2700fps--all the 90gr Hot-Cors were loaded for my rifles, and I couldn't locate any on such short notice, and the Grand Slams were on the bench already--She took a huge blacktail buck at just over 410yds with one well-placed shot through the lungs. With a BC of only .351, I figure that the impact velocity was around 1750fps and the bullet carried around 680 Ft-Lbs of energy. It was a complete pass-through, and the wound channel showed good expansion with excellent terminal performance.

that pretty much sums up the long and short version of the story ...

Yessir. I've shot a number of deer with that setup and it worked every time

shot a mess of deer and antelope last year using a .243 w/ 85g TSX's ... and I'll be damned if all of them didn't die pretty much "DRT" with shots ranging from 85-415yds, and from all angles ...

crazy, huh? ... (grin)

Anyone loaded the 85g TSX with IMR 4350? I have 8# of it and would like to try it. The data on Hodgdon's & IMR's web site is for an 85g XLC bullet, which I figure would require some reduction if the TSX was used in it's place. Barnes loading data doesn't show IMR 4350 at all.

I use H4350, and it works great ... IMR4350 is very close to the same burn rate, so should work fine ...

Just start low and work up ... chances are you'll find a great formula rather quickly ...

might I also suggest NOT seating at the recommended 0.050" off the lands ... start with the bullet INTO the lands, and work backwards from there if necessary ...

I like H414 with the 85TSX......

It's not a 243, but I got fine accuracy and perfectly suitable results on mule deer with 85 gain slugs in our 6-mm Rem. I say "our" because it was my first new rifle as a kid, and the wife has since taken it away from me for pronghorn and deer.

Does a great job of scrambling internal organs.

Wilds, what loads are you running with H414? I have a 243AI and just picked up an #8der of H414. I've got the trinity of 85 to try vmax, tsx and gameking. Looking at the load manuals h414 is pretty much tops for speed.

In my sons .243, a max charge of H-4350 does the trick with the 85 tsx. He has yet to get a chance to chase any critters, but I have no doubt it'll do the job.

I dig the way the stuff meters....

I'm using 42.5 grains and the 87gr Vmax, moly'd, to fireform for my 20" barreled 243AI, a mildish load but still smacks the hell outta stuff. Load development soon with this powder and the 85 TSX, got enough FF'd cases now to start.

My son's .243 Win, 22" barrel:

45.1, 45.2, 45.3, 45.4, 45.5, 45.6 and 45.7 grains all fall into about a 1 1/8" group at 250 yards, prone off bipods, with 85 grain moly'd TSX's. 45.4 grains is his load and it shoots bug holes when the powder is weighed for each round. With that range of tolerance tho' we can just drop his charges and hunt. I don't know what it chrono's, but the way it shoots I don't really care.

Roy et. al. (for reference):

my 26" barreled .243 will tie knots shooting the moly coated 85g TSX's at nearly 3400fps using Lapua brass, WLR primers, and about 46g H4350...

H4350 meters very well, provides about a 95% load density, and is temp. insensitive ...

What's not to like about all of that? ... (grin)

WGM,

When you say meters very well do you mean well enough to load straight from the measure?

m

that's precisely what I mean ...

Excellent. I haven't loaded it for large numbers of cartridges, but I may ramp up the volume for 243, 270 and 30-06 sometime.

MagPro 52gr + 85gr TSX in 22" barrel = 3380 avg velocity and 1.25" groups at 200 yds.

The Sierra 85gr HPBT is a wonderful bullet. I have used it for over 30 years in a 6mm Rem and now in a 6mmX284. It is my go to bullet for everything. I did not even try a different bullet in two 6mmX284 rifles.

I have used it on targets, ground hogs, deer, fox, and elk.

It will make a bit of a mess on the smaller animals.

Thank's for all the info guy's, i think i have finally found a recipe this gun like's. This is what i did yesterday= 42gr. h-4350, 3004 fps., 43gr. H-4350,3040 fps., 44gr. H-4350, 3139fps. 45gr. MAX- 3167fps. I found the 44gr. shot the best group. OAL was 2.640", 85gr. sierra GK,bthp. Rem.9.5 primer(never again, had 2 miss fire's, hmmm?)Win. brass. I also had my freind's new Rem. 300win. mag at range, that is a horror story,could have been a bad scene(physical)will start a new topic on this one. Thank's again Rick.

I am a big fan of H414 in several calibers like the 250 Savage, the 7x57 where it really shines and even in the 30-06..

If I was to use a 85 gr. bullet in the 243 it would be one of the monolithics such as GS Customs or Barnes..

The cup and core 85 gr. bullets kill like lightening in the rib cage as a rule, but therein lies the problem, you cannot depend on it time after time, sooner or later you get a failure.