Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Why does the 220 grain .30-06 load still exist?

Couple of interesting things regarding 220 gr. 30 caliber bullets.

1. There was an article by the late Finn Aagaard in IIRC either Rifle or Handloader magazine where he was using 220 gr. round nose bullets while culling Whitetail Deer. Results were deer quickly killed and meat damage mostly very minor. Deer were killed at various ranges as I recall but don't remember if any were at any kind of long range. Finn was reputed to be an excellent stalker of game.

2. A few years back I did some experimentation with the Sierra 220 gr. round nose bullet in the .308 Win. using Winchester brass, WLR primer and W760 powder. I got extremely fine accuracy and a velocity of 2310 FPD average with low extreme spread. (9 FPS)

3. At the same time I was running tests of the Winchester 180 gr. Power Points in three barrel lengths. (22", 24" and 26")
The only one that came even close to Winchester's advertised velocity of 2700 FPS was from the 26" barrel of my Ruger #1B. Also interesting was that load did 2600 FPS from a commercial FN Mauser with 22" barrel giving within 15 FPS of the 180 gr. Winchester Power Point load from a 22" barreled .308. I never could find any 30-06 220 gr. ammo here in Tucson at the time of the experiments which could have been interesting as well. Would they have delivered an honest 2400 FPS as advertised or would it been closer to what I got from the .308 handload.

It is also interesting to note the that W.D.M. "Karamojo" Bell once opined that the .308 with a 220 gr. solid at 2200 to 2300 FPS might be the perfect elephant gun. I'd add "for him".
Paul B.