I've been loading for my Whelen for twenty years. Back when I first started hand loading, in the mid-90s, I shot up hundreds of $s worth of bullets and powder having a great time experimenting. After I shot out the second barrel of a rifle, I went to using handholds that gave me the best accuracy, decent velocity, and most importantly, good temperature stability. Most of my rifle hunting takes place in the late seasons and I quickly saw POI changes with my original Whelen favorite powder, Re 15. That was also about the time most loads for Re 15 suddenly decreased in all manuals. Brian Pierce convince me to try H4895 with my 250 grain Partitions and I was very pleased with the result. I haven't had any interest to get any better than my old school load.
My current process when starting handloading for a new to me rifle is to find a couple of top loads between a few manuals, load up a couple, shoot until I'm happy, and go hunting. My load development is now typically less than 20 bullets per rifle. Gives me lots of time to master the rifle from all field positions and to shoot better. Not to mention the time and cost saving! Back in the mid-90s, bullets were cheap, not so much now.
I shot several elk, both bulls and cows, using the Re 15 loads with the 250 grain Hornady SP. The first couple or so went down with no problem. Then the new lots of Hornady bullet in about 2006 were noticeably different in external construction with much less exposed lead at the tip. The next couple of elk shot with the new bullets took several shots to put down for good. Tracing the wound channels clearly indicated that the newer bullets were not expanding to any appreciable degree. I switched to the 250 grain Partition and everything works fine.
Enjoy.
"Whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right." Henry Ford
