Home Forums Lever Action Central Big Bore Levers The Mighty Silvertip (348)

Thanks to a couple of members here 348 Bullets from the lower 48 made it safely into my hands donated for testing. I received 6 precious 250 grain Silvertips and 35 Speer 180 grainers. I promised to try and ring out their secrets, so here goes.



Lets start with the 180 grain Speers. These are a flat-nosed design similar to the 35 caliber 180 grain which I always had good luck with. Slammed into wet and dry newsprint at close to 2700 ft/sec these bullets stopped expanding at the cannelure or just past and penetrated very well as well as retaining a lot of weight. They act a lot like a bonded core bullet. If these still were made I'd go buy a lot of 500. Caribou to Elk capable and they seem to be accurate as well.


The 250 Silvertips are an interesting bullet. Expansion is devastating. Penetration? Not so much. In fact the 180 Speers penetrated about as well. Nothing left the kind of holes in the test media like the big Winchester bullet, however. I'd expect fast kills on up to moose sized game but the Woodleigh is more reliable, expands reliably and penetrates much better.



Where does that leave us today? I think the 348 never had it so good. The 200 FlexTip shoots as flat or flatter than the 180 Speer and penetrates in a similar fashion. The 200 FN Hornady is a great all-rounder and for really big stuff the 200 Swift is a super reliable penetrator. I don't think we ever had it so good! They also can be made to shoot to the same point of impact. (Still wish I could go buy some 180 grain Speers though!)




Video of the testing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvhkTOha3W0