I want to reduce my bullet inventory for my 375 Ruger. I am considering sticking with just 300 grain bullets - a solid, the Accubond, and the TSX. I am thinking about loading these to around 2450 - 2550 feet per second muzzle velocity.

There have been several lengthy discussions here about the 260 grain Accubond and the 235 TSX on deer. However, I have not yet found much said about the respective 300 grain bullets on smaller game.

I am interested in hearing about your experiences on deer with either the 300 grain Accubond or TSX.

I have taken some game with my 375 ruger w/300gr Round Nose bullets just to empty some brass for reloading with great success and poor accuracy. Since then, I load almost exclusively the 260gr accubond and it is absolutely devestating on anything I have taken with it. I shot a pig a couple of weeks ago and could have easily put a baseball bat through from entrance to exit. The 300gr will work fine, but for north american game, you wont really gain anthing over the 260 except for more recoil and lower velocity.

The bigger slower bullets should cause a lot less damage to the meat.

I have a Sako 85 kodiak in 375 H&H and have shot various inanimate objects with it testing different bullets. I also had a chat with Barnes about some of their bullets. I have not shot any game with the thing yet, mind you not for a lack of effort. . .
The bullets I have used so far have been the 300 gr sierra SP, 300 Barnes X, and the 260 Accubond. Not that it's a problem, but all three of the bullets were extremely accurate out to 300 yards. The Accubond have consistently produced the tightest groups. At 100 yards the Sierra were the least accurate at almost a two inch group. The other two bullets were less than an inch. There was a slight amount of space between the barnes, which is why I gave the edge to the Accubond. So between the Barnes 300 and the Accubond 260, even on light game I think it's a push. The bullets on say a whitetail deer are going to produce so much energy it shouldn't make a difference either way in the end result and they are probably going to expand to between .400 and .416 so it's going to be like sticking a .416 wooden dowel through whatever your going to be shooting. Sorry about the long drawn out answer, but I think both will be fine go with which ever one your rifle likes, and don't aim for shoulders.

Where legal, the solids with a flat meplat such as the Barnes and Nosler will kill deer. I infer this from using hard-cast bullets in my 375 H&H some years ago. I accidentally added too many wheel weights to a batch and later found out they were too hard. The deer died quickly due to shot placement through the heart. I did not like the wound channel and the exit wound was very small. There was not much of a blood trail. The deer traveled only a few yards and was easy to spot in the short grass. Yet if my shot placement had been different the same deer could easily have been lost in some place like the South Carolina low country.

The concern I have is whether or not the 300 grain Accubonds and TSXs will open up some on deer. Especially from the broadside heart-lung shot that misses the leg and shoulder. I have seen several testimonials that the 260 grain Accubond and the 235 TSX will do this, at least when driven at higher muzzle velocities.

Updating my own post...

Monolithic_Solid describes his use of the 300 Accubond in this thread: https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbth...89/Which_Accubond_in_375_H_H#Post4456989

Quote: "I've shot the 260 grain Accubond in my Ruger Number One Tropical .375 H&H and it shoots very well. It is the most accurate factory load I've shot in this rifle. I've not handloaded the 260, but I have loaded 220s, 270s and 300s. Of these, the 270 is the most accurate in my rifle, but we're talking about small differences here. All loads I've tried in it have been accurate. The 300 is my favorite. Like you, I like the heavier bullets. I also like the 300 loaded down to 1,775 fps. It works well on deer and hogs and is a good round for knocking around in the woods. I accomplish this with IMR SR-4759. This load is accurate too."

I could see an Accubond or 270gr Hornady for deer, but why a 300gr or TSX? Afterall, it's only a deer.

I'd forget about the 300s, save the TSXs for larger stuff and use 270gr Horandys for deer. It's only a deer.

.

I believe Sierra Game Kings come in 250 grains which would likely be good for the game intended. Last year I used a 300 gr Hornady RN Interlock but did not shoot a deer with it. I handloaded to about 2270 fps and was expecting it to work well.

I have shot a lot of kangaroos in the chest with the 375. Large male Red kangaroo might weigh up to 200 pounds but do not have the muscles in the chest shoulder area like a deer.

300 grain round nose Hornady always worked. Usually drops them straight away ot they take a couple of hops. Exixt range from an inch to very large.

It is years since I used it but the 300 grain Sierra was not much good. Probably a combination of being hard and a spitzer.

I have never used Barnes X but a mate of mine used 350 grain Barnes X (the original ones without the grooves) from 416 Wby and said it really blasted the [bleep] out of roos and pigs.

Quite a few blokes on a Wby forum shoot small stuff with Barnes X in 378, 416 and 460 Wby and all seem to get big quick kills. The Barnes X from 375 up have very big hollow points.

Remember with a big bore on small animals you only need the bullet to expand enough so that it gets a blunt profile on the nose. Its big weight means it travels through the animal at probably more speed than a small bore high velocity calibre.

ShortRifle,

For over a decade through most of the '90s and into this century, I managed kill permits for deer which usually called for at least killing 30 deer over an extended time frame between September and June each year. During that time, I hunted with everything from selfbows thru rifles of many different chamberings.

Of everything I used, one rifle, in particular the cartridge, stood out as the most consistent DRT killer with the least amount of meat damage beyond all others. This being from a rifle that was not intended for deer that I originally took out on a few deer culls just to get trigger time prior to a hunt elsewhere for a big bear. I had built a 375H&H Mauser about as light as I could reasonably afford and it ended up about standard weight for a typical sporting rifle. My only intent was to get this thing out to see if anything broke and to get trigger time before my bear trip. Using full standard loads, this rifle compiled an impressive string of deer kills that spanned many years. I kept a journal with my farthest measured kill being just over 300 yards, my closest being point blank, and with numerous kills between. I've never experienced this level of performance with such minimal meat damage from any other cartridge used. I normally try to shoot through the lungs saving the heart for table fare, and no other cartridge I've used had the same level of DRT power on a thin skin deer while leaving the heart undamaged. Based on this experience, I�d recommend to keep things simple by using the same 260-300 grain bullets used on large game like elk and big bear loaded to standard H&H velocities. When I look at the 375Ruger, I do not think of it as a hyper velocity H&H, I think of it as a standard velocity full length barrel H&H from a short barreled Ruger.

My days of hunting big bears are probably over and the majority of my hunting today involves the long bow with the 30-06 being my go to for a big game rifle, and my 243 being my go to for a vermin rifle. Not sure I�ll ever pull out the lightweight 375 for deer again as it takes a bunch of trigger time for me to handle it as well as the 30-06. But if I did, I�d go back to the same load combinations used before.

As a postscript, If any of my load combinations resulted in a tendency for excessive meat damage and absolute devastation on deer and boar where I could easily put a baseball bat through from entrance to exit, I�d discard that combination. Based on my experience, this level of meat damage is unnecessary with the 375 for clean effective DRT kills. The heart is too large a chunk of good meat to waste with wanton destruction.


Here is a big Russian boar weighing over 300 pounds that I smoked with a 65pound Hill longbow using a single turkey feathered wood arrow with a heavy Grizzly 2-bladed broadhead. It does not take explosive internal meat damage with large amounts of bloodshot meat to kill an animal for the table.

Best:)

I still believe that if you make a good shot, on a whitetail it's not going to matter whether or not the bullet opens up or not. If you shot the deer with a ..243 and the bullet expanded to twice that size it's going to be around .375 or 450 something caliber. So your basically starting with a bullet thats already that size, and both the accubond and the barnes will open up bigger than .375 once it hits flesh.

TheHoundsTooth and GaryVA have expressed points similar to my thinking.

I am curious if the .375 300 Accubond and TSX will expand enough to produce a blunt or a jagged edge in a soft animal like a deer. I think that a blunted or jagged leading edge would be more likely to cut blood vessels as it passes through. My experience with cast bullets showed that the flat-nosed bullets produced bigger blood trails than round-nosed bullets of the same caliber. In the 375 H&H, I cast them very soft and actually loaded the bullets backwards. On broadside heart-lung shots, I could usually put two fingers in the exit wound. Not much spoiled meat. (I eat the heart, too!)

From my screen name, you can infer that I like short barrels. In a 20 inch barrel, the 375 Ruger can reach 2400 feet per second with 300 grain bullets in all of the reloading data that I have. I am hoping for 2450 with the TSX and good accuracy. This speed matches my 375 H&H from a longer barrel so I am familiar with the trajectory.

I think that this level of performance will reliably take game larger than deer. I am hoping to hear from some hunters that have used the 300 Accubond and/or TSX on deer. I doubt anyone will recover one of these bullets from a deer, yet they may be able to tell if it expanded some.

The 260 grain Nosler bullet will do a much better job on thin skinned animal than a 300 grn TSX and it will fly faster also.

Tonk...

I've been using the 260s in my FN/Sako 375 Wby, and they blow big holes in the animals. I may go to bigger-slower again. I love the bullet for its accuracy, but it does cost a lot of meat. Not much ever gets back up though.

Agreed they don't get up or for that matter exist very long! I've shot many deer with the 378 (.375 cal) The only bullet I ever recovered was a 300 grain Hornady boattail, it went the entire length of the mature buck from right shoulder all the way to the hip bone, the bullet followed along the spine in the ribs ripping a path through almost every rib. It was expired by the time I walked the 100 yds to the buck laying in about 3 inches of fresh snow. I was about to roll him over and start skinning and I'll be damn the leg almost fell off. Man what a bummer. I never shoot them length ways anymore- even if I have to pass off on the shot. I'd rather let them walk away rather than do that again. Nowaday I use the 300 grain TSX with 114 grains of 7828 and a Fed 215 light her up and look at that crony spitting out 3000 fp. Merry xmas LUvsafari.

Merry Christmas to you, to my friend.

Shortriflefan,

Great question and one I was pondering this season as I got my first .375 H&H. I like heavier bullets as a rule and was settling on the 300 gr Accubonds in my No.1H which shot them very well (sub-MOA). Of course, to date, it shoots almost any bullet to MOA or better.
Anyway, I posted a question on the 260 vs the 300 for elk/muley hunt but what I really meant to ask was your question. Will the 300 grainers open up decently on a deer sized animal even on the lung shot? I agree that if hunting strictly deer I might go with the 270 or even 230 gr bullets. But elk/deer combo hunts are common here in Idaho and I really wanted to use the big ole 300 gr Accubond. Unfortunately, i got totally skunked this year but, hopefully, next time!
All that to say a big thanks to GaryVA for his perfect answer to my wonderings. That is exactly the hard data from field experience that I was looking for. It looks like we .375 users can load up those 300's and never look back. Now, I just 'need' to sell my 'little' rifles and pick up another .375 H&H in a bolt!



"Learning is not attained by chance. It must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence."--Abigail Adams

+1 to GaryVA's response. I have killed six deer and a hog this season with my 375, two hogs and three deer in previous seasons. I built mine on a standard-length action because that's what I had sitting around. As a result, 260 AccuBonds over RL15 give 0.6" 100-yard accuracy but will not cycle thru the magazine. The 270 TSXs will, and shoot to the same point of aim! So, I thumb a 260 AccuBond in the chamber and have 3-270 TSXs down below, and don't carry that weapon if I might have a shot beyond 200 yards.

The heavier versions of these bullets will not be constructed differently; they'll just be longer. I get expansion every time, even on the 40-lb. doe I shot with the 270 TSX to see what it would do. I have had DRT kills on all the hogs with my shots which are always placed in the lungs (save for the 275-lb. sow I shot thru the shoulders to see what the 260 AccuBond would do), but on average the deer have run about 40 yards, same as they would with most any other caliber with that shot placement. Meat damage is minimal, but not because of velocity or diameter, I believe. It's all in the construction. My 35 Whelen with 250-grain Speer Hot-Cors @ 2200 fps wrecks more than anything I've seen or heard talked about, except a 300WM in the ham with a Ballistic Tip.

High velocity plays as much part in meat loss as bullet construction. No doubt.

.

I think you missed the point. My Whelen has left holes I could stick my fist in. The 375 is a larger, heavier bullet at a faster speed. Why does it damage less? Bullet construction...

+1

I've used my .375 Ultra mag on two trips to Africa. The first trip I shot 300 gr TSX bullets, and the second trip I used 270 gr TSX bullets. I shot a variety of game with these bullets varying from Steenbok to Buffalo. Although the Ultra mag velocities are quite a bit faster than the velocities that ShortRifleFan was asking about, the TSX bullets opened beautifully in all animals and at all ranges from 30 to 348 yds.

I think just about any .375" cup and core bullet would easily kill a deer. Why waste a 300 gr TSX on small animals at reduced velocities.

300 gr TSX bullets are a great bullet for large dangerous game. For anything else, a Hornady or Speer bullet at half the cost of a TSX will work just fine. Most of us will probably shoot way more bullets at deer than we will at dangerous game. So unless you have a supply of 300 gr TSX bullets that you just want to use up, go buy some 225 or 230 gr Hornady or Speer cup and core bullets and whack some deer.

buffybr - "I think just about any .375" cup and core bullet would easily kill a deer. Why waste a 300 gr TSX on small animals at reduced velocities."

I agree with your statement about killing deer. I also agree with the other helpful posters who pointed out that lighter bullets will work just fine on deer.

My 'armchair African and Alaskan hunter' mind was thinking that 300 grain bullets at 2450 to 2550 feet per second was fast enough for about anything. Also, I model a jacketed bullet trajectory in my head of +1" at 50, +2.5" at 100, +2" at 150, zero at 200, -6" at 250, -12" at 300, -24" at 350, -36" at 400, and -48" at 450 yards. This is my game rifle reference trajectory. No rifle I own actually shoots this exact trajectory, but all come close (with the bullet and velocity combination that I reload).

Thinking this way has helped my game shooting over the years.

The 375s that I own were bought with the thought of using heavier bullets for Africa or Alaska, yet lighter ones for the lower 48 in the US. Sadly, I no longer get to the range often enough to keep my shooting skills as sharp as I would like. Nor do I have enough time to stay on top of a bunch of reloading. So, I decided to reduce my 375 loads to just three bullets - potentially a Barnes solid, the 300 Accubond, and the 300 TSX. These bullets all group close together in my 375 Rugers.

With these thoughts in mind, I started this thread to see if anyone had experience with the 300 Accubond or 300 TSX on light animals such as deer. I wanted to find out if hunters were getting at least some minimal expansion on deer. If so, I planned to settle on the Accubond and TSX. Then anytime I was able to get to the range, I would be practicing with actual loads and my rifles would be sighted in.

You answered your own question Watson. The older type H type and lead core design were destined for the slower moving winchester type rifles. But then came along rifles that could push the .375 slug types to ultra speeds- then you got the results you speak of. The .375 crowd with Weatherby, Ruger,Remy were limited by what they could get at the local grocery store. But in the last 25 years we see more fellas hunting Africa due partly to the economic boom we've enjoyed for so many years. The demand was there because of the poor bullet designs and thanks to Barnes, and many others they stepped up to the task and have designed bullets that really hold together well and open in a regulated way- not scrapnel format. Anyway I was a reluctant Barnes fan also but from the animals I've knocked down, many I credit for the bullet design- not only marksmanship. I'm sold on Barnes and I stick with the same bullet because I don't want to keep shooting all the time to set my scope. I set the bastard and it stays there ready for all game and at many ranges. I don't have to guess, I know that 300 grain will drop 32 inches at 500 yds and beware critter if you get in that range. LOL Merry Xmas.