Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Velocity!!! How important is it?

No doubt. Just have to watch out for low flying aircraft that might deflect your bullet.😜

All depends on how far you are shooting.

Bullet design/construction is a significant factor in limiting undesirable meat destruction. The correct soft from
a scorching .240 can result in less meat damage than a .243win pushing a less appropriate soft.



As long as a person uses a bullet than can cope with the higher velocity I dont see the harm in having
more velocity than a person needs. At the other end of the spectrum, with the ranges most people hunt at,
they also dont have to worry about having too little velocity on impact, even if only using moderate loads.

Uhhmmm, the bullet will deflect the low-flying aircraft...

I load all my guns to their potential.

If my guns want to live up to their potential, I'm gonna have to sell 'em to somebody else.

Beat me to it...

Ed

Yes, and why not? !
I really have quit hot rodding but I don't find anything to gain by 'UNDER loading'.

BTW,,,,,,,, + P doesn't mean over potential.


Jerry

This.

I'm in the same camp as you Smokepole! Somehow meat always ends up on the dinner table.

Well like most things alittle velocity is good but you can have too much. I reload fairly conservatively. I use std C&C bullets and several years ago I read an article by some some guy in a gun rag about how velocities of around 2700 fps was the pocket for most bullets performance and providing a flat trajectory over practical hunting ranges. I agree with you MD and my experiences have backed you up. As to accuracy I see on print how the greatest accuracy seems to occur at top velocities but this seems to have changed over the years as in the past it was touted that loads softer than max were often the most accurate. I have also found that milder loads is much more gentle on your brass requiring less trimming and more reloads per case. But what do I know I recently started a thread about how lead round balls at about 1700-1800 fps provided more DRT kills for me % wise than any other bullet for me.

Th general trend of sporting cartridges since the 30-30 has been increased velocity.

Velocity flattens trajectory, reduces wind drift, and with the same twist it imparts more rotational velocity. Flat trajectory is good because I don't have to worry my head about distance until animals are 300-350 yards away.I can mess with turrets and dots after that.


High velocity and rotational velocity helps bullet expansion and makes bullets more effective at distance because it helps them expand after velocity has fallen off at distance.(Assuming the bullet is built for the chore).

I notice that many people automatically equate "velocity" with loading their pet cartridge too hot to get the velocity and therefore consider velocity as somehow "bad". This is backwards thinking. Cartridges do what they do loaded to 60-65,000 psi.If one doesn't give the velocity you want then buy a case with more capacity. Trying to squeeze another 50-75 fps from your pet cartridge is silly.

It's funny watching people tap dancing around and trying to act morally superior somehow as they treat velocity like it's a venereal disease.

I like stuff doing 3000-3200 fps for most BG cartridges and bullets. If velocity is getting much over those numbers I start looking for heavier bullets instead.

I would gladly take as much velocity as I could get if it didn't mean burning too much powder and getting kicked "too hard". Otherwise I've never seen velocity do anything "bad" unless someone mismatched the bullet to the velocity of the cartridge.

Rifles that shoot better at sub par velocities are a rifle problem; not a velocity problem.

If we think velocity is a problem, try shooting a few 500 yard bull elk with a 30-30 instead of a 300 magnum. Tell me which one works better.

I'm primarily an Eastern Whitetail hunter. I have never shot a deer beyond 175 yards. I've shot more deer inside 50 yards than outside 100. I'm also a good Methodist boy with strong Taoist leanings. Somebody says it's velocity that kills, some say mass, some say SD kills, others say BC. There's probably a vote for the color of the tip there somewhere.

I say there is a factor yet unexplored, and it is the same factor that leads so many Western minds to think Taoism is unreachable. Please bear with me for a bit. This gets deep, but I promise to drag y'all back to the shallow end before I'm done.

Taoism is all about getting with the flow. Taoism is not a religion in the sense that it does not conflict with Christianity. It's more of a worldview. You can be a Taoist Christian in the same way as you can drive either a Chevy or Ford truck to church. Okay, I know some of y'all are going to say that's a tremendous difference and the Dodge and Toyota boys are going to Hell, but that's beside the point. Even you get the idea.

To the Taoist, there are a myriad of forces at work in everyday life. The Taoist looks for harmony in those forces and seeks to ride on the balancing point. Here is the story of the Butcher as an example:

The Dexterous Butcher

OK, Shaman, old buddy, you're really off the cliff today. Call the doctor, have him change the dosage.

Look, there's only so much animal there. With a 270 lb live weight buck, there's about 15 inches of deer I need to penetrate on a broadside shot. Maybe 18 inches if the beast is slightly off-broadside. Everything beyond that is extraneous. Furthermore, there is only so much a bullet will take before it fails and only so little before it stops expanding.

I have shot deer with everything from a 25-06 to a 12 GA slug. The thing that seems to kill deer the best is not velocity. In fact gunwriters do not even have a word to describe it. "Balance" does not cover it. "Flowiness" is not even a word. However, it is a mastery and harmonization of the forces in play that brings a nice fat buck into a toes-up configuration.

Think about it. We all talk about maximizing this or that, but what does excess buy us? More dirt flying up on the far side of the animal. A flinch that won't go away? We as Westerners can grasp accuracy, speed, and trajectory, but we stop abruptly before going any further. Part of the reason we have these threads is that we all glimpse what's on the other side of the intellectual chasm, but we just cannot describe it.

I've been sitting in the same luxury shooting box called Midway for 7 seasons-- good name for a Taoist deer blind. I go there for a few reasons. Midway is out of the rain and wind. It affords me a good view of a 1/4 acre spot in the middle of a pasture I call "The Garden of Stone." When I started hunting there about a decade ago, I'd put a small stone under each carcass before picking it up. Pretty soon, I had a whole mess of stones in that patch. I usually go there to fill my last tag for the freezer. This is well after I've done all the Man-vs-Elements thing I can handle for the year, and just want it to be over.

I've shot deer from Midway with a good part of my whole deer arsenal. This is about as controlled a situation as you'll find. I can usually wait for a broadside shot, and I like to aim such that I take out both lungs and the top of the heart. The goal here is to drop the deer as close as possible to the center of the Garden of Stone, so I can get the truck in for a quick and easy extraction. If it goes right, I can be to the processor and back and sipping scotch in the moonlight in 2 hours. The processor is a half-hour away. I give myself extra points if the deer drops touching a stone placed from a previous season. This is how a Taoist goes deer hunting.

On the small end, the 25-06 with a 117 grain bullet hits the deer at 150 yards at 2500 fps, give or take. The deer runs a bit, and piles up. .25 cal onside hole. Thumb-sized far-side hole. The last doe made it to the fence and got over before succumbing. That added about 20 minutes to the total process.

On the far end, my Remington 7600 Whelenizer spits out a 200 Grain Rem SPCL that hits the deer at 1700-1800 fps at 150 yards. The deer runs a bit, and goes down. There's a .35 cal hole going in and a 2-inch hole going out. The last doe I Whelenized made it to the fence and got downhill about 20 yards. It added about 30 minutes to getting her out and I had to follow a weak blood trail in drizzle, so that was another 10 minutes of tracking. No Taoist bonus points there, but plenty of nice venison in the end.

Now, let us turn to the Voice of the Tao, the .30 Briar, the 7.62X63 Light Magnum, my Ruger Hawkeye in 30-06. It runs a 165 grain Hornady SPBT. At 150 yards, it hits the deer at 2400 fps, give or take. In the last minute of legal hunting last year, I took a shot at a nice fat doe. The shot blinded me for a bit. When I looked back, it was too dark to see. I did not even bother to confirm the kill before getting on the walkie-talkie and calling for the deer wagon. She was toes-up in her tracks at 155 yards with a bloody rock already under the carcass. The holes going in and out were optimal. That palpable feeling of whatever-it-is was there. Balance? Harmony? I could feel it before I pulled the trigger.

Speed kills, baby...

Velocity is accuracy.

I have found, for the most part, that my most accurate loads are usually the loads that are close to, or at max. At any rate, since I am never going to shoot a rifle enough to burn the barrel out, I usually choose to reload cartridges that will go as fast as they can without being on the hot side. I won't give up accuracy for speed, but if I can have both, why not. I figure that's a no brainer.

Bob, somehow it seems that ^^this^^ has been forgotten.
Why doesn't everybody just use a 44/40 ?



Bob, I think people are not listening or they just hear what they WANT to hear.



You know, it seems that I read/learned that @ 40 yrs. ago. I guess some just aren't old enuff.



Yes, I read/hear that condescending attitude. I guess it makes some feel better.

(per VD)



Agreed, I find that envelope a very good compromise with trajectory and recoil.



OR when people put the bullet in the WRONG place. If you hunt long enuff it will happen.



!!!!!!!!!! I've seldom read that !!!!!!!! I agree....

OR the handloader hasn't used the right components.



To which the response cliche' is....

"learn how to hunt" meaning get closer.

I know from yrs. of WT hunting that there are occasions when you don't have time to get closer OR it is impossible.

If you haven't figured it out..... Great post Bob.


Jerry

Rarely have I found 'better' accuracy slower than near max.

That's with cartridges from 243/6mm->->->338WM.

Jerry

In that thread you said that was a sample of 7-8 deer.

Many of us responded that we did NOT share that experience. I've trailed many (more than 7-8) WT shot w/mzldr for myself and friends. IMO, you've been very lucky.

Jerry

I quit handloading so I take what they give me. And I'm able to get to bed before 1:00AM....