Back in the late 80's I read about a shooting trip to Australia Ross Seyfried took and another article by an Aussie guide and outfitter that was part of a culling operation that shot the heck out of over 20,000 critters. Water buffalo, feral donkeys that were big and other big critters were shot. One thing stood out in my opinion, their praise of the performance of Barnes X bullets. They drew conclusions from a bunch of gut piles, more then any other source I am aware of. Very few places left on earth have the "opportunity" or need to harvest that many critters. When you shoot so many critters you are replacing barrel's on a .308 you are getting after it!
I think some of the calibers were .308 WIn, .338 Win., 340 Weatherby and 375 H&H, maybe more. The 225 X bullet out of a .340 Weatherby gave stellar performance, better then the Woodleigh in the opinion of the Aussie author. This was a killing report, not a accuracy or barrel cleaning report. Any way, I tried them in our .338's and 30-06 rifles and eventually left the Nosler Partition. But, I could easily go back to that bullet if I was shooting deer and antelope, but the X bullet is a great bullet for Alaska's big game. Eventually I went from 250 to 225 grain TTSX in my custom .338 Winny and 180's in our 30-06 rifles. But, the 200 grain Nosler Partition was a great performer in our 30-06 rifles. I now load 175 grain LRX and 168 grain TTSX bullets in my two 30-06 rifles.
I had one Pre-64 .338 that was a copper fouler and my old Pre-64 30-06 takes longer to clean then my other barrels. Lapping and Dyna Bore Coating has helped the 30-06 and the old .338 was traded off. Other then that our barrels clean up with out to much effort. My custom Mod. 70 has a stock barrel and it loves every X bullet I stick in it, from the original 250 grain version to the blue coated 225 grain version to the current 225 grain TTSX. In fact the rifle has only shot some flavor of X bullets since I put it together. Our 30-06's also shoot the X bullets well, as did the .243 and my 6.5 Creedmoor.
Most of my hunting friends shoot X bullets and I don't see them switching. Some experimenting with seating depth often helps to shrink groups. They are not the only good killing bullet, but they are a great killer of big game. Bullets and their performance on paper and on critters has always been the subject of many a conversation and I doubt that will ever change. One thing is for sure, just as smokeless powder forever changed our thoughts on cartridges, so has the Nosler Partition and Barnes X bullets.
