Looking for opinions on whether to load 180gr Accubonds or 185gr Berger VLD's in a new rifle.

Rifle: Weatherby 30-06 (24" barrel)
Maximum Range: 500 yards
Intended Target: Elk

What would you pick (or not pick), and why?

Accubond.

In spite of all of the 24HCF love, I'm not a big fan of VLD H bullets, at least in my 7mag. They are accurate enough, but my kills with them on 1 whitetail deer and 20 or so hogs makes me never want to use them again.

Love the accubond, and have used the 7mm 160 version on about 30 head of African plains game, several the size of elk. Worked to perfection.

I like Bergers, the 140 grain VLD shoots great in my 270, and I've been using them for antelope in Wyoming. But for elk I'd go with the Accubond, as long as it shoots good in your rifle. You're much more likely to have an exit with the Nosler, and therefore a better blood trail, if needed.

AccuBond.

Its pretty well known here I'm not a fan of bullets that the manufacturer advertises to essentially go "poof" after contact.

AccuBonds have never let us down, from antelope to elk.

Accubonds every time

Accubonds all day long.

Bergers forever.

Have yet to see an accubomb that impressed me.

Partition.

I have maybe shot a dozen head with Accubonds.. Excellent.. I have used Bergers on maybe half a dozen antelope, nothing else.. They were used in a .25-06 and 7mm Rem. Mag. I loaded 50 rounds for the 7.. When I shoot the rest away at bottles of water or rocks, either Accubonds or BTBT will be my load for the 7.. Already shot mos t of the .25's away..

I shot animals with 168 bergers from a 280AI and 180 accubonds from a .308. They both kill just fine. But something about the Bergers keeps me going back. They just seem to shoot better and leave devastating wounds, at least in my experience.

Those devastating wounds flat bother me. But I too keep shooting bergers trying to find what I had in OLD bergers, caliber in, nickel size out, and messed up inside, very little waste, and very dead.

If I can't get back to that I'm going heavier, 210/215 in 308... if that doesn't work, back to old reliable perfection of the barnes bullets.

The accubombs I"ve never tried, I kept hearing them called this. Plus added to old ballistic tips were horrible at game wasting meat.... I just can't bring myself to try them.

BTW on bergers I"m about back to using the target version, a lot harder and the deer seem to die just as well. Lungs speckled with frags, and yet caliber in and not all that large on the exit. This with 185 bergers in 308.

The last hunting berger my wife used left an exit almost the size of a tangerine....ugh. Lucky we stay the heck away from shoulders when shooting.

YMMV.

I like the bergers in my 7mm mag

Hearsay is a poor substitute for actual experience.

You'll never see an "accubomb" do this.....

[img:left][/img]


or this......

[img:left][/img]



Never seen a modern era ballistic tip do that either FWIW.

What were the circumstances on those?

Average sized whitetail buck shot at just over 100 yds with my 7mmRemMag, 168 VLD H. The hogs I've shot most often run about 100 yards into wild plum thickets, leave no blood trail, and had I not been able to watch where they went I would have never found about half of them.

Antelope was actually shot with the a 7mmRemMag and 139g SST's, factory superformance ammo. Also around 100 yds.


This was typical AB performance on African game, 7mm 160's, impact distance of 100-160 yds.

[img:left][/img]

BT'S are a damn fine bullet.
And.meat damage is cured by not shooting them in the meat.

I'd take the AB'S or a 168 BT fwiw

JG,

How about a 130 Accubomb out of a pedestrian 270 at 200 yards. Here's the entrance:



And a closer up:

No clue. You tell me. I've never seen an AB do that. How many other antelope/deer have you shot with them? Did they all look like that?

I shoot heavy for caliber Berger VLDs at between 2820 and 2950 fps. I have been very happy with quick kills and minimal meat damage on over a dozen animals. Ranges from 35 yards to 600 yards.

For the OP, if you are shooting these around 2700-2800 in a 30-06, either bullet would do great. Good luck.

I had a 140 gr. SST out of a 6.5-284 do similar to a Pronghorn at 385 yds. I gave up SST's after some other less than consistent results.

Old NBT's were about as bad, the newer ones seem a LOT better.

I don't have much experience with NAB's.

DF

Marty,
Broadside or raking shot?
Sumpin's not right there.

Those goats are fragile, tear up like tissue paper and bullets blow big gobs of hollow hair all over the landscape. Looks to me like that shot was high, caught some bone which blew out and made it worse.

Seen lots with holes like that and it's hard to nail down what works without tearing them up. High velocity numbers like 270-140,7x57-140,30/0-150 will make big holes. A 7 mag 160 Partition will behave one time and next shot cut one in two it seems. depends.

The "best" behaved pronghorn bullet ( if I had to pick one)IME would be 100 gr Partition from the 257 Roberts. It kills them quick without a lot of mangling.

Thanks for all the input gentlemen. The goal of this project is to give me that little extra "umphh" at open country elk that are 350-500 yards out. Otherwise, I'd stick with my 308 win. with 165gr Accubonds (which I have been rather pleased with).

It appears that there's a near split in opinions, and I honestly expected that. As stated, I've had good luck with Accubonds in my 308, but I've not had any experience with the Bergers. I will likely just figure out which of the two shoots the best out of my rifle and run with it.

Never had consistent wound channels nor exits with Accubonds and give up BC in the process.

Just between those two, I'll take the much more consistent and dramatic wound channels and the increased BC of the Berger....

No arguing I've not tried them. But why mess with perfection of the TTSX BArnes since they are available? Any other bullet is a lesser bullet.

When taking less, I still lean to Bergers because they have NOT done what you show at all. Ever. Worst one was not nearly that bad...

But it seems everyones mileage can vary and as most well know, wife or i never shoot bones... there is no need to. Especially with the bergers...

TTSX are far from perfect. All bullets have inherent trade offs and THE TTSX isn't special in this regard.

Just a general comment, but have seen TTSX's produce the same sort of damage as on that pronghorn when they hit bone. In fact saw one do it this fall when it hit the big shoulder joint of a doe pronghorn, and probably lost 75-80% of the shoulder meat.

Yes, hat was a slightly quartering away shot and hit the spine. Goat was at about a 30-45 degree angle (I wasn't the shooter, just the spotter).

I just put it in the category of bullets do funny stuff sometimes.

Here's some 130 VLD's out of 6.5's:

300 yards, laying in his bed slightly quartering toward me, above me. Hit him in neck with 6.5 SAUM/130 VLD/62.5 H1000 combo. You can see entry, small quarter sized exit on opposite side that I didn't take picture of:



260 Rem/130 VLD/43.5 H4350 at 235 yards, ground level, quartering toward me. Hit right shoulder and blew a nice exit on other side:

And a 6.5 SAUM/136 Scenar L/61.0 H1000 at 235 yards, broadside:
Entry:



Exit side:



136 Scenar L made a nice hole, he dropped like a bag of rocks.

Scenars are for stunt shooters. You should try a good roundnose in that round.

Here is last weeks 165 gr Accubond from a .308 Win. moving at 2700fps. The cow was 95 yards away and the entrance has minimal blood shot meat.


Here is the bullet found on the off side under the hide.

This is going to probably draw fire, but here goes:

But in my opinion there is no worse bullet for hunting anything over 50 pounds made anywhere in the world than those made by Burger.

They are accurate.
But they are NOT hunting bullets.

Burger got it's start making dedicated target bullets and did well. They they realized that there are 1000 deer hunters out there for every dedicated formal target shooter so they re-labeled some of their target bullets and call them "hunting bullets".

Hillary Clinton could take lying lessons from them on that account.

Calling them hunting bullets is like calling Obama staunchly pro Constitution.

Always easy to tell who actually shoots...

Or goes outside....

szihn,

You don't know what you're talking about:

1) It's Berger, not Burger.
2) Berger did not spontaneously decide to "re-label" their target bullets. Instead many deer hunters (and other hunters) tried Berger bullets on big game and found out they worked very well, partly because the long, essentially closed "hollow-point" doesn't start expanding the instant it touches hide. Instead the bullets penetrated a couple inches before even starting to expand.
3) After hearing more and more about the success of their bullets, they decided to thoroughly test them, at first using various kinds of "media." The bullets did exactly what hunters had described.
4) Then they started testing them on animals, first feral pigs that are considered varmints. They worked fine there too.
5) After that they started testing them on other big game animals--and still had not decided whether to sell them as big game bullets, and in fact invited experienced hunters who hadn't used Bergers before to try them out, emphasizing that if the hunters had any objections to the results, they should make them known.

Only after those tests also turned out well did they finally started offering Berger Hunting bullets.

If a hunter understands how they work, they'll ruin less meat than many "purpose designed" hunting bullets, while still killing very well. But obviously you've never shot anything with them, and probably never will, because you believe you know everything about them already.

This was the last critter I shot with an Accubond, large mule deer at 140 yards.

Entrance side:


Didn't even make it to the off shoulder. Not sure what happened but that was pretty much all I needed to see.

Tanner

I shot a mule deer twice last year broadside behind the shoulder, perfect hit, and then a follow-up through the neck as he was still on his feet and all I had to shoot at.

Neither exited at 525 yards from a .280 Ackley....

I gave them two years of shooting stuff, not once did they impress me in any way.

Bullets are funny things, all bullets seem to do wonky stuff at some point but we all have to follow what we've seen and done...

TTSX can make a mess, too. Double hands full of clot and blasted tissue scooped out of this hole. A re-run on this photo, you've seen it before.

WT doe, .240 Wby. 3,600 fps, 80 gr. TTSX at around a hundred yds. or so.

But, it's hard to talk about bullet failure at the skinning shed...

DF

GHC...... friends of mine were slapping bulls and cows absolutely silly with 160 gr Accubonds and 150 gr SS II's this year in Wyoming high country ; the two 6x6 bulls at 385 and 465 yards (not that distance is really all that important but it seems to be the first thing anybody mentions today when they kill something) were both DRT and I mean "right now".

Im sure if you told them how terrible the AB works....or that nothing but a Berger will give you 500 yard DRT's on bull elk, they'd laff in your face.....hell I'd laugh in your face and I used Partitions to do it.


I am no huge AB fan but you have to ask...if they suck so bad how do they do that?


My pals do get outside more than a little,and they do shoot....one is a special forces combat Marine with multiple Afghan tours. My goodness........ how we love to jump to conclusions about people and bullets around here. Like they don't get outside or shoot if they aren't using Bergers.......please. We're smarter than that I thought.

If you think you can draw any "conclusions"about bullets from a handful of animals, you're mistaken......takes a whole bunch more than that.

Greg what AB? 140? What did it do the first shot? If it started out about 3100 fps from a 280 AI it might have just run out of poop for good results at 500 plus yards. (?)


Here's a 140 AB (left) recovered from a mule deer buck that hog dressed #230 pounds,into the the shoulder at 200 yds, The chest was pulped; he went maybe 30 feet. 7 Rem Mag at 3250 fps. Recovered weight is 59 gr.

Jeez... You respond to one guy who's obviously never shot a Berger into a critter and people think you're insulting them, their friend, and the military.

I never got to the "whole bunch of animals" stage with accubonds because the first few I saw/heard of from people I trust sucked so bad. I personally don't know anyone who still uses them.

Pass me the "burgers"....

140, 3150 or so putting impact if I recall correctly above 2100...

First shot my spotter called me rippling him perfect. Buck took it like a man and walked 30 or so yards behind a Palo Verde. Got back on him and sent one through his neck. He death dashed about 30 yards then died...

If that's running out of juice impact speed then they are worse than I thought. Not to mention the wound channel looked like a Barnes (sucked)....

This is not the only occasion I've seen this stuff....

For stuff where I want an exit all day long, pass me an ETIP....

This is so true, and can have you scratching your head. I've killed (along with my hunting buds) big mule deer bucks and aoudad from 30 yds to 458 yds. Dead animals were the result, and bullet performance was excellent on the one's recovered. This from 7mmRemMag, 7mm STW, 7mm08.

Starsky Im just trying to reconcile the disparity in performance. Some love them and some hate them. I'm no huge fan but have to admit that my friends know what they're talking about and seem to like them.

I know you weren't insulting the military.....just making a point about folks getting "outside"

Guys on here have killed hundreds of head of game and some seem very happy with the Accubonds. Even taken them to Africa where they have done well.

My suspicion is that we're talking too small a sampling among the critics.


Greg: "Run out of poop" is a poor term for me to use.....what I mean is that at 2100 fps bullets don't expand as fully and violently as they do at closer distances where MV is higher. We've all seen this many times,and it's true of all bullets.

Be interesting to know how long he would have lasted if you'd been unable to shoot a second time....my suspicion is not long.

I can't blame a guy for not wanting to use a bullet that's done wonky stuff only a time or two for him. That's all it takes to sour me on any product, no matter what others have seen.

Mule deer
To reply to you.
You are correct in one thing....I have NOT shot anything with them.

I HAVE been with 21 hunters so far that have shot deer, antelope and elk with them, and I have talked 4 others that have told me there stories, 3 from just this season.
100% failure of the bullets 100% of the time, in real world experience. So there is no need to be insulting.
I am a gunsmith and a hunter and a former guide. I do not "test' bullets anymore in the lab. I only report what I have seen, and I have see this 21 time with my own eyes.

How many more times do you think I should give them?

I am also the former CEO of Cast Performance Bullet Company and when I was at the helm of that company (and also when I was their foreman for years before) I not only tested what we made, but I tested everything I could get from all our competitors too, so I could speak with some authority on the subject. We specialized mostly in high performance handgun bullets, but we tested rifles bullets too, and not just a few. These tests went on for about 7 years.

No one is giving me products to endorse, and no one is paying me for 'testing' so I report what I actually see. No one is going to withhold payment from me if I tell what I have seen either.

Some of this may be a matter of definitions.

Some men may disagree with my definitions. I am OK with that.

I don't have a dog in the fight. I could not care less what you or anyone else uses to kill game. I was amused in fact, when that guy in Canada used a spear. Good for him!

But I define any bullet that sheds its core as a failure if it does so in less then 18" of penetration. I define any bullet that sheds its core that is marketed as a suitable projectile for any game that can be dangerous to be a super failure.

I define any bullet, marketed for game over 50 pounds, that weight less than 30% of it's unfired weight after it stops as a failure.

These are bullet failures, not killing failures. Not even necessarily hunting failures. I am not here to insult anyone.


To say that 16 oz is a pound is a fact.

To say that a cord of wood is a stack 4'X4'X8' is a fact.

If someone comes up with a container of dirt that weight 12 oz and I say it's NOT a pound, or someone tried to sell a firewood stack of 4' X 3" X 7' it's not an insult to say it's fire wood, but it's NOT a cord of fire wood.

If I say that bullets that fragment and weight 30% or less of their unfired weight are not "good" hunting bullets someone may take issue with what I consider "good." I am OK with that.

But when I compare their performance to what I have seen over 52 years of hunting and guiding from good hunting bullets, it's going to be very hard to convince me that they are "good".

If you, and even the majority of the hunters out there think that a bullet fragmenting down to 20% of it's unfired weight is not a failure, it's OK with me. I am not demanding you stop using them.

I just won't use them.

Funny thing though, of all the 21 kills I have seen on REAL animals, none of those shooters will use then again either.

Good, don't use them.

Bob, you should shoot some critters with VLDs impacting at 2100 and below sometime. Wound channels are still suberb...

21 for 21 failures, huh? You're on a roll....

The bullet is doing what is was designed to do as you just described.

Call it what you want and use what you want, but it's not failing...

I figured that was their strong suit.

They've got a few strong points...

All bullets do.

szihn,

Thanks for the clarification. Am not surprised that there are plenty of hunters around that don't define hunting bullets by how well they kill animals, but how they look afterward.

And weaknesses....

Yep. Which is why I try to merely report on what happens with various bullets, not make judgments about which one is "best."

Although I'd love to hear positives from a cor-lok...grin

szihn,

Where did I insult you? Yes, I said you didn't know what you were talking about, but that's because you not only didn't spell Berger correctly, but didn't know how they started selling hunting bullets.

Am certainly impressed with your experience with Cast Performance, but I have also been hunting over 50 years and done considerably guiding, and have seen far more animals taken with Bergers than you have. Like you, at first I thought they "failed," though not because they didn't kill well. It took a while to rearrange my preconceptions, but a lot of quickly dead game animals finally did the trick.

Well John, my bet is that we'd agree on far more then we'd disagree about. Anyone with 50+ years of hunting, (especially if it's not just their own hunting) is going to come to mostly the same conclusions if the same kind of animals are being killed.

As I said, I don't have a dog in the fight.


If we meet someday I'll buy you lunch and we can solve all the worlds problem over some coffee and elk meat.

Don't forget, that's a valid offer.
Hold me to it.

Yeah, I bet we would agree quite a bit!

Thanks for the lunch offer. The same is extended to you, if you ever make it up Montana way.

Those expanded 140 AB pictures look real good, my only AB experience was with the 160 7mm and it behaved in my case of one, like a bit tougher on deer than I like. Taken into consideration I lunged him broadside without hitting big bones, he went way farther than I'm used too. The exit hole was about the size of a dime, but this was about 10 years ago, and maybe Nosler could have made hardness adjustments since then.

But the expansion pics of the 140's causes me to feel like they would be as good on deer as a Hornady SP, or Speer Hotcor, and probably more accurate on average.

Had my first grizly client with bergers this year. Five rounds into a grizz from a 338 rum. Didn't break a single bone but blew up the insides of that bear. We found flakes of metal all over in that thing! I'd never use those bullets after seeing that.
That being said accubond....not to much better from what I've seen.

A Berger would be about the last thing I'd shoot at a grizzly.

Shot placement? Can you elaborate? I would think blowing up the insides would be a good thing.

You would "think"that,assuming the first shot actually made it to the vitals and did a lot of damage...

Even then one shot kills on grizzly bears are not exactly common.

Since keeping a grizzly firmly in place usually involves busting up some bone, if the first bullet failed to get past the bone to the vitals, what you have is an adrenalin charged, fully pissed off bear that suddenly gets very tough and is bouncing around like a huge,furry ball, making "bullet placement" problematic. It's ALL down hill if the first shot does not do its job.

Shooting a grizzly is distinctly unlike surgically assassinating harmless elk in open meadows and then following up with impunity.

Wow.

powderburner,

Gee, I killed a good-sized grizzly a few years ago with AccuBonds, specifically the 250-grain 9.3mm. Put the first one along the rear crease of the left shoulder so it would exit the right shoulder, which it did. The bear then turned and, after biting at the entrance wound, started running, angling away. A second AccuBond entered the right rear of the ribcage, ending up under the hide of the neck on the opposite side. Maybe 4-5 seconds elapsed between the first shot and the bear dropping dead. The second bullet retained over 80% of its weight.

That's more like it!

I'm going to have a HARD time learning to shoot a 2nd shot when moving to AK I can see it now...

At least I'm going to have to train myself to rack the bolt anyway... Tough to do when you have been shooting suppressed and keep the surroundings as quiet as you can while harvesting/watching deer.

LOL.

Pretty significant difference between hunting in Alaska and harvesting in Texas. No constructed blinds or rests up there.

What % of Texans hunt that way would you guess AlaskaCub?

I rarely go outside but when I do I shoot Accubonds.....


140's out of 270's to be exact. Work great on deer, no experience on elk but imagine they'd be just fine.


And I keep shooting until they go down. Each of the last three bucks I've killed took three direct hits. Think I've recovered 2, maybe 3 bullets.

Um, you are taking a BIG assumption of how I hunt here at times...public lands, no stands at all, last 2 deer I shot have been offhand, no where close to a blind but both shots were only about 80ish yards...

And I've at least one season in AK already... .. LOL. Well actually maybe 2, I think I started hunting there in 2003...

Not quite sure where you are trying to go here?

I won't lie and say I've not shot a few out of a stand here though... but two this year have been off the ground on foot. Another one was around a 40 yard 10mm glock shot from climbing up into a live oak tree on a trail... But there was one shot out of a box blind.

Easy rost...I simply meant that for most deer hunters in Texas the actual hunting is more like harvesting than hunting. Guys "generally" sit in a blind and stare at feeders, food plots, crops, corned roads, etc. They see lots of deer and can pick and choose when they want to take a buck or doe pretty much at will. The marksman part of it is also easily aided by carpeted or padded window sills,etc. providing reliable rests. Seldom is a 2nd shot required when shooting the deer down here unless one simply screws up. Alaska is going to make you work for it, and when the time comes to put an animal down, one wants to make sure the animal is in fact down. Either because it's going to get away or it's going to bite and claw the [bleep] out of you when you go looking for it.

I can't begin to guess a % statewide but it's been that way on every deer lease I've hunted on. I've yet to hunt a lease that anyone didn't hunt that way. So in my experience it's been 100%

Raider I know where you hunt it isn't like typical Texas WT hunting, much bigger and open country and different tactics. Not lumping far West Texas into it.

I avoid most outdoorsy stuff too, but found I could shoot deer and elk from the house with Accubonds. Beats the hell outta being outside anyway...

Hard to beat that Lonny. Textbook IMO.

So you catch a high percentage of bullets? What critters are stopping them?

I know that you dont like the performance of Bergers, however VLD's have no problem getting through bone, especially bear. I know a couple of guys who have killed grizzlies/brown bears with Bergers as well as with Partitions, TSX, and Accubonds. They prefer the Bergers....

Catch about 25-30%.

That's from 2 dozen animals using .277 140 AB's. I don't remember exactly, but at least 2 or were found in elk and pretty sure the rest are buck deer and bear.

It was dumb luck a couple times, but I've found every one that stopped in an animal.

Formid: Ive killed two of them using Bitterroots and Partitions. I could find nothing to fault.

I also have a number of friends (one has killed 17) who in the aggregate have killed around 25 or so total.They all used mostly the same bullets I did.

I don't say this as any form of one upmanship....just to illustrate where my comfort level is and why I say what I do.

Guess tat's why i would stick to the traditional stuff I have used before.


But I'll take your word for it.

Bob,


I don't blam someone if they don't like what Bergers do terminally.... or A-MAX's, ELD-M, etc. They create extremely big wounds, sometimes leaving massive exits and in the case of A-MAX/ELD-M if they hit bone can cause a lot of meat loss in what they hit. My point was that Bergers do not have an issue getting through bone especially "shoulders".

We are somewhat screwed to our area on our lease in the hill country. And because I take Carolyn and our cur Tiger with me, we probably hunt out of a blind 50% of the time. Gives me time to put the muffs on the dog if one of us is going to shoot etc..

But the other 50%, we are often just out sitting in our general area, can't even see a feeder or a stand, watching travel lanes, feeding areas and so on. And generally speaking not much cover, IE no brush blinds, and we don't wear camo unless its all we have, IE cold weather stuff all I have thats rain proof and quiet is in camo. The dog has no camo... LOL...

Most folks though, as you note, were born and raised inside boxes... I never cared for the things, found one once, as a young lad, that had a front built onto it, with a few cedar logs and some brush stuffed in it. No rest for the gun, but a crude seat. I spent many hunts in that little nook of brush.

Since then I just gravitate away from blinds mostly, though when its really cold and the dog wants to go, we go to a blind. When its raining same thing.

OTOH for us, it was cool last weekend, wind chill into single digits, I left Tiger home, and was out laying on a tank dam, sitting against a couple of different trees, crawled up in some yaupons all weekend long off and on. We took one deer around 1240 just after noon, no stand, offhand shot. And another sometime close to dark again, offhand and around a tank dam corner.

I actually don't even have a blind at home currently, though I do have a great big one in the build process for friends to use with children or when my 85 year old mother wants to go watch and so on.

I'm good again... I just got a bit riled up.

We have a few things that can get you down here if not careful. But unless its charging at me I"m not shooting again if I'm confident with the first round. Probably comes from the ability to call my shots from who knows how many rounds of rifle competition to silly distances.. if my crosshairs were right when the gun went off, I just relax and give anything I shoot time.

Time is always a plus on my side. Regardless the conditions.

But I've run a bolt gun fast in competition, including reloads... and I can get myself to do it again.

And certainly on dangerous stuff if its coming my way I"ll have to shoot again.

I've only shot 2 times once in AK. First shot was called low by my spotter, it was a fair distance, and called a miss. So I held for the spine on the next, and broke the spine. First shot had hit the lungs. But just over 800 yards away, I doubt the caribou even really knew he had been hit except for feeling weak as his lungs filled...
The rest of all my kills have been well placed one shot at a time. Not what I hear from most though while we are out with the locals... generally it sounds like a small war once the first shot goes off. Dunno really why so much, moose are big, they take a bit of time to bleed out.

One of the first I shot, I went back to camp and had breakfast... there is no rush. In fact that was even shot with a single shot. LOL.

Like I said it just rubbed me wrong, my apologies for blowing steam.

Jeff

Nice, I've recovered just a few barnes. Never had one though that wasn't peeled back perfect and weighed 100% of the weight yet. Obviously after a handful if you could catch them, you might find some weight loss here and there. I have had a few lehigh shed a petal though, basically the same bullet type.

But all in all, thats not nearly as bad as I expected for the accubonds.

I think we ought to ask this question to Phil Shoemaker, the badass. No offense whatsoever to you formid, but I'd bet significant $$$ he doesn't have Berger in his Top 5.

It is what it is man, and when in Rome.....I've obviously hunted out of the boxes many times too (though I hate it). This year I hunted military land and took a buck while leaning against the base of an oak tree overlooking a pasture with mixed cedars while rattling , worked pretty well. I've actually hunted leases where you HAD to be in a blind , lease rules. I'm working pretty hard right now to get back to alaska permanently and man it can't come soon enough.

I've recently worked up some great loads with both 165 and 180 Accubonds for my new Montucky and I was hoping for a little better reviews on their performance, thought the whole Accubomb stigma was gone!

Damage from a 180 Accubond out of a 30-06 on a grizzly. That's a lot of damage!

The mangled shoulder is the exit side, you can see the Bullet laying in the meat

Don't you expect lots of damage when you crash through bone/shoulders?

Of course, but I'm impressed with how well the Accubond held up. That's not exactly Accubomb results, looks a lot more like a Partition or an AFrame

I hope the "Accubomb" effect is over. I'm really hoping to use the .308 200gr variety in my 300 Win for elk?

That has been my results with the 260 gr in 375 Ruger on black and grizzly bears, the 200 gr on black bears and 225 gr on moose and other game in 35 Whelen, 180 gr on goat and deer in 30-06 and 130 gr in 260 Rem on deer. One of the 180 gr 30-06 opened up a bigger hole on a deer than I liked but I chalked that up to one of those things that just happens sometimes. All others put decent holes through with a lot of bloodshot meat. The 358 and 375's have been very good in that regard in particular and are my favourites in those cartridges.

I'm not the least bit surprised. As I mentioned before I've crashed them through zebra, kudu, wildebeest, aoudad, etc and it's pretty typical from my experience.

Should have also mentioned I want to try the 170 gr Berger from my 270 Win on a black bear this spring just to get some first hand experience with the Berger bullets finally. It is good to try all sorts of bullets instead of just trying a few favourites and being close minded after good experiences.

That said the Accubond is my go too bullet but experimenting is fun......

Formid: I understand . Thanks.

That'll be cool Gerry. I'll be looking forward to seeing what it does.

Take a look over on Nosler. We've posted up quite a few Accubonds from animals and some water jug tests. I've got no issue using an Accubond anywhere I'd use a Partition. Especially the 7mm 160 and 200 308.. both have a great track record.

I hate discussions like this that turn otherwise friends into enemies. What you all should be bitching about - to the manufacturers is the lack of terminal ballistic details available to the consumer. I have a 30-year old Sierra manual that lists the best velocity range for every bullet they produced. With the velocities produced today there is no bullet that will be ideal at all ranges. If it is a long range bullet then is should be designed to open up well at lower end velocities; however, shoot it at a live target at 100 yards and that same bullet can open up like a grenade. Likewise hitting meat or bone - at higher or lower velocities - can give totally differening results.

I'm sure both bullets discussed will work for the gentleman but in differing scenarios - and only he can best predict which will fit his most likely hunting situation. I have not shot Bergers although I've read all that I can on them. Being in SC the opportunities for long range shots are very limited - if I lived out west, I would definitely give them a try at long range. However inspite of my less than lofty opinions of Nosler as a responsible ammunition manufacturer, I have used Nosler BT's and AB's and have had great if not totally predictable results. My qualifier is that I doubt that few if any shots (across all the different calibers I shoot) have ever impacted an animal over 3000fps. Bottomline, it is so easy to generalize negatives and positives from an isolated incident, especially when it is human nature to 'want' a desired outcome. As far as I'm concerned most of this is comparing apples and oranges.

Never mind that the sierra data is off by a bit needless to say....

Sierra makes good match bullets. The rest is just about junk.

That's a cool bunch of recovered Accubonds. They look just about like any of the others I've been able to catch.

killed a lot of critters with Sierra hpbt game kings over the years. Accurate and dependable. Coyotes to elk.

Here are the only two I have recovered, I know you have seen them but many others have not. No bullet failures here........

35 Whelen 200 gr Accubond from black bear, it is .660" across and retained 69% on it's weight, 2840 fps shot at around 50 yards





35 Whelen 225 gr Accubond from moose, it is .710" across and retained 84.9% on it's weight, 2760 fps shot at under 50 yards.

Awesome pictures Gerry. Both of those look perfect.

I will do that. Thanks for the suggestion. I'm looking forward to shooting that 200gr Accubond. I've always had good accuracy and velocity(with the 200gr AB) out of various 30 cal magnums, just never killed anything with them, for whatever reason? Looking forward to changing that.

Very impressive!

That's a great choice in any 30 caliber Magnum. They're rough on elk and deer.

Respectfully Rost495, there has been more game taken with Sierra, Speer, and Hornady "old-school" bullets than all others combined. Remember that they did not have the technologies available today. The point I was making though, was that they gave the handloader the appropriate velocities to get the best terminal performance from their bullets and they posted plenty of feedback via customer reviews and photos as to the effectiveness on a specific species of game. Pretty damn thoughtful compared to today's corporate gimmickry marketing.

I agree on the info part. Of course if you knew Barnes you'd know they give the same info, impact above X fps suggested. AND they work way better than sierra.

I've killed, well lets just say a couple of deer before barnes ever came along...

And I still knew as a kid in grade school, that bullets should really perform more consisttently, then you'd know what to expect.

Of course it doesn't take much to kill a deer. Good old 22lr, and according to my mentor his father used 22 shorts for a lot of deer. Not in the head either.

Just cause a boat load of deer were killed with the 30-30 doesn't mean it didn't have flaws...

Having shot and seen deer shot from up close to far out, and with just about anything you can think of, except a spear, I've come to appreciate consistency. I've found that in Lehigh and Barnes. And berger isn't to far behind, they are much more consistent that Sierra... I should have been done with green, when I had one of their pistol bullets not open at all on a deer for my wife. Luckily she shot him in the heart, like she generally did with her archery kills. They told me not enough speed for their pistol bullet to open... and I said, really? Out of a 30-30 16 inch contender round?

I probably made a mistake years ago when starting out loading with a lee loader in grade school, and Speer bullets, should have never bought big green... speer did a lot more consistent for me.

But I digress... I don't know about gimmickry marketing, but I can do wihtout hunting shows, gadgets, high fives, and having to have everything on a show listed down to what real tree AP toilet paper helped with the kill...

this

A friend of mine had the same thing happen with a 168 TTSX out of a 24" .308 barrel at 60 yards on an elk. Bullet looked new, minus the tip. Lucky for him he hit it in the heart.

Rost, I could finish off my career using nothing but game kings and be fine with it.

I haven't used these in the field yet, but my Weatherby Vanguard Back Country sure likes them.





It likes the 180 Partition just as much, though, and I have a great deal of positive experience with Partitions. If you go Berger on elk, I think JB would advise you to stay away from shoulder shots. From what I've read broadside through the ribs is the shot you want with Bergers.





P

Its funny how they guys that hit the animal bone/shoulder are complaining about the meat damage and blaming the bullet. (regardless of brand)

This guy I took out in October with 160gr AccuBond out of 7mm RM and there was no meat damage. And he was standing less than 50 yards from me so pretty much 3000fps.

just saying ...

[img]http://scontent-sea1-1.xx.fbcdn.net...32c2a50ed3aa6e057a416d7a&oe=5906BEC5[/img]

I have shot just about everything that I have killed with AccuBonds ever since they became available--both here and in Namibia. I have never had a "failure", regardless of how anyone would define it, nor have I recovered very many of them.

I will probably try a 185 TTSX on elk in my .330-06 Improved this year, just because it shoots very tiny groups with them. The '06 will be loaded with 168 Hunting VLDs because I want to see how they perform on game for me. Don't know if I will hunt deer this year, but if I do, I will be trying 115 Ballistic Tips in the .257 AI.

Why the changes? I am old and bored and have a lot of time to spend in the reloading room and on the range.

I have been impressed with the 130gr VLD out of both my 6.5 Creeds. Love the accuracy and everything shot has went less than 30-40yds.

I guess we all view the world through our own filter.

In my view game bullets need to produce repeatable wound channels in game. Wound channels kill not retained bullet weights.

If a bullet reliably produces a wound channel of sufficient depth and volume to quickly kill the animal then it is not a failure no matter what the finale condition of the bullet.

I promise that the 140 AB on the left killed very quickly if not instantly. It weighed 59 gr afterward and the chest was a train wreck.

The two 140 gr BBC's on the right killed so fast I lost them in recoil.The damage was impressive. Retained weight was 98% plus.

People miss the point entirely with retained weight.....the retained weight is part of the design of the bullet and what makes it work,the same way a Berger or other work by blowing themselves to pieces.

Agreed.



This I disagree with and contend that bullets can - and often do - fail to perform as desired yet still result with a kill.

What we disagree with is the definition of 'fail'. Yours appears to be based entirely on whether an animal dies. Mine is based on overall performance, of which reliably producing a dead animal is the most important but not the only criteria.

In particular, I'm not interested in bullets that essentially go 'poof' after contact. What I want s a bullet that reliably destroys vital function and can do so from any angle I'm willing to take - or need to take to stop a wounded or potentially wounded animal including a THS if that is all that is presented. For me that means bullets that provide reliable but controlled and limited expansion with high weight retention and deep penetration. Speer Grand Slam, North Fork SS, Swift A-Frame and Barnes TTSX have never failed me or those I hunt with, from antelope to elk. (Which is very different from saying I have never failed in placement.) Bullets that go 'poof' by design need not apply.

Agreed with John on this one. For us the heavy for caliber Bergers have always delivered. If I hunted heavy cover and had shots less than 150 yards typically, I might use a woodleigh or something like that I guess. But I don't and will keep using Bergers, Scenars and experimenting with the new Hornady ELD line for something do in the spring/summer.

I loaded Berger for a 264 Win mag. I shot quite a few pigs, bullets went off like grenades inside. I hit one 200 lb sow I had trapped, shot her in the shoulder at 60 yds. She went down, but was back up eating corn in a few minutes. It left a big flesh wound in that shoulder. I Don't have a dog in this fight either. I think the bigger the Berger the better, this was a 140. They are accurate, for damn sure. Maybe that was a bad bullet. That was the only one I shoulder shot. I gave the rest away.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNlcGpUD5zw

It was merely a flesh wound? Tough pig for sure.

Excellent information, John.

So far I've killed three black bears using my 9.3 x 62. The first was one wounded by a young, inexperienced hunter. I finished it using a 286 Hornady at an MV of 2400 fps. It was a hard angling-away shot that entered just behind the rib cage on the right side and made exit at the back of the neck. Bullet or fragments were never found. The thick fold of hide and fur hid the damage at the exit until it was pulled off in skinning. Several vertebrae were taken out before exit.

The second bear was taken with a 286 Nosler Partition at an MV of 2600+ fps as it was facing me from 68 yards in tall grass. Bullet entered center chest. Bear went 20 yards, fell or rolled down an escarpment, was dead at the bottom. Bullet remains fell out from the right flank on skinning, retaining 211 grains. A six-foot bear.

Third bear was shot at 85 yards on Oct. 1st, 2015. This time I used the 250 AccuBond leaving the muzzle at 2700 +. Bear went 20 yards leaving a massive blood trail that the proverbial blind man could follow. Shooting from a tree stand, impact was high in rib cage, took out one rib, pulverized the heart and two more ribs on exit. Bear was below me and quartering away. Bullet never retrieved, nor any fragments thereof. Another healthy 6-foot bear.

Thought someone might be interested.

Bob

www.bigbores.ca

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