Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Why no love for Speer bullets

Because when you compare them to everything else, they suck.



Dave

I shoot Speers in two of my rifles, a Savage 99 in 300 Savage because the load I got from Gunner shoots lights out AND he gave me about 800 bullets, the other is a Marlin Carbine 336RC in 32 Special for the same reason. These two rifles will only be used to shoot deer and hogs and so far no issues. Other than that, they do suck.

I used the 200 grain .30 caliber Speer spitzer loaded to around 2950 in a .300 Win Mag on several elk. They worked just fine. But there are certainly better bullets out there (I've since gone to the NP).

Been shooting 87 gr hot cores in 250 savage for a long time. I bought a bunch in case they stop making them

Of the speer line the only bullets I have used have been the hotcor in 25cal 120 gr 270 130 gr and in 30 the 150 and 165 gr. I have only recovered one a 150 gr hotcore from my 3006. It weighed 75 gr or 50%, whitetail buck at 125 yards. The rest have. gone clear thru and I found them to be one inch or less at 100 yards..I like them and think they are a very good bullet, but their marketing does suck. They are extremely difficult to find in Canada, and if Speer are trying to kill their handloading supply business they are doing a good job.

Speer Hot Core 160 gr is the only bullet i use in my 280 Ack and i just loaded 50 rounds yesterday for my 6mm Rem with the Speer 90 gr Deep Shock for this coming deer season.

Master Mule Deer summed it up...ditto from me.

Also, I have a harder time finding the ones that shot well for me. They're just not on the shelf consistently around here. My favorite Hornadys are always easier to find.

John,

Bravo!!!!

Your post is the sort of unequivocal analysis that one would expect from a well informed professional.

There are only 4 Speer bullets that I keep on-hand, the 87 grain .257" HotCore and TNT to shoot in 1-14" ROT 250-3000s and the 180 and 220 grain .358" FPs that I use in the 356. Those are, for me, the best available bullets for those specific applications that I found.

Which company are you going to eviscerate next?

I'm betting Remington...

I'm glad y'all never go swimmin' in the ocean. A shark could come up and not only pull your leg, but bite it clean off, and y'all would bleed out before you knew.

I say that, but at the same time there is probably some truth to it-- not at our level of course (the shaman smirks). However, if you have a beginner going to his LGS, his eyes are going to catch the red box first. That is a huge advantage. Those relationships between customer and brand form early and they can persist for generations. Take that from a guy who has been partying with Proctor & Gamble folks his whole life.

By the way, if you think red boxes are a stretch, look at P&G. They revolutionized the laundry detergent world by putting blue speckles in their Oxydal about 50 years ago. It was just food coloring, but the housewives went nuts over "Power Crystals." You and I can think that's absurd, but then you start looking at our own brand loyalties, and you see the same dynamics.

Even more to the point as to why there is less love for Speer, is the distribution aspect. Those red Hornady boxes generally dominate the shelves. There is a bigger selection, and ( I think most importantly) a stable selection of Hornady offerings than any other. At least that is how I've seen it here in Cincinnati over the past (takes off his socks) thirty-some years. If I go to the store and look for a new bullet for a new load, I usually can find something in a red box. There is usually more than one box too. When I go back in a few months to replenish, those same bullets are there.

I'll pull your leg once more and then get on with my afternoon. I had been loading using my buddy's press here and there, but did not load on my own until 2000. At that time I got a RCBS kit, as recommended by some of y'all over at shooters.com. It came with a Speer manual. I went to my LGS with my manual, with Post-its marking the loads I wanted to try. The old guy behind the reloading counter saw what I was doing and asked if he could help. There I was, all ready to buy Speer so it would match the loads in the manual, and 3 for 3 they were out and I ended up walking out with red boxes. To this day, I've never tried to buy Speer equivalents for those loads.

Hornady's "Zombie" bullets in the bright green boxes are really eye-catching.

260RemGuy,

I also have some Speer bullets around for specific purposes, including the ones you mentioned. I like the way the flat-nose .35's work on game in moderate-velocity cartridges, and in fact the 180 is what my wife uses in her older German combination gun, which supposedly has a 9.3x72R rifle barrel, but is really a .35.

I also like the 200 Speer Hot-Core .338 spitzer at around 2650 fps. Have used it both in the .338 Federal and with reduced loads in the .338 Winchester Magnum. It's a little soft at full-house .338 Magnum velocities, but works great when slowed down a little.

The 30-grain Speer "Green" TNT's also work very well in the .22 Hornet where a non-toxic bullet's required.

Exactly, they need to get their $hit together.

I know the problem with the DeepShock was they'd hoped for a lower-cost bullet that worked like a premium. But then it turned out to be more expensive to produce than they anticipated.

I also noticed that by the time DeepCurls appeared on store shelves they were also considerably more expensive than the Hot-Cores they were supposed to replace.

I don`t know if they make Gold Dot Pistol and Revolver bullets anymore,but I have a good supply and next to a WFN hard cast in Revolvers is the next best thing.

Used them for years as they were carried by the LGS and were a bit cheaper than everything else. Seems they are not as well priced and frankly there are more Hornady,s around. The speer where always fine for me.

Good bullets....clueless management.

I could never get Speers to shoot as well as Hornady's or Sierra's, so I quit buying their rifle bullets, and while I got some superb accuracy out of their old half-jacket pistol bullets, the knuckleheads quit making those (specifically, the .357 146HP and the 200 and 220 gr. .41 Magnum bullets).

I gave up on them when they gave up on those bullets. I killed my first deer with a 105spitzer out of a .243, but that was a long time ago, and I gotta go with what works, and more importantly, what I can FIND. If I can't find them, I surely can't buy them.

How does a plastic tip change bullet performance?

I had started to post a reply earlier, but figured every point I had planned to make someone else could probably do a better job at it. Mule Deer stepped up to the plate and made most of them in a more clear and concise manner than I could have done.

But there was still something that I believe is true that I'd like to state. While they have had some definite missteps over the years I think a lot of it boils down to one thing: They do not find the handloading market a priority for their business. And I think the attitude has become mutual. Handloaders don't find supporting their handloading business a priority.

Many posts here and at others sites claim that after speaking with a Speer/ATK rep. they have been told that they are focusing their resources on loaded ammunition. This shows in their distribution channels. Speer bullets get noticeably smaller amounts of shelf space around here, and the space they do have rarely gets restocked. You can't support a company with your business if they don't supply the product. You find substitutes and move on...

I'm sure they make more money in loaded ammunition than in selling components. So it is at least making them more money in the short term. Is it an attitude that could come back to bite them in the longer term? Who knows?