Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Any testing with the Hornady ELDX's?

Or real life on game experiences? Especially at magnum speeds?

200 gr ELD-X from 300 WIn Mag. 100ish yard impact, rear quartering shot, bullet exploded in lungs, found in off shoulder. Impact velocity around 2800 fps. Elk ran into an aspen tree and fell over dead spewing blood from nose and mouth! Only 73.3 gr remaining.

Not too shabby for a CnC I guess!

The 162's certainly shoot well in my 7 WSM! Solidly 1/2 MOA.

I've not shot any game with them yet but the 200 gr ELDX shoots incredibly well in my 300 Win Mag!

I would have been more happy with a little more weight retention but dead is dead.

True!

That performance looks much like the old SST did which many derided as being way too fragile.

For mine it looks like it did pretty well.

I would not want light for caliber bullet in the magnums based on this experience of one and it pretty much describes Hornady's description to a T:

At conventional range (0-400 yards), the ELD-X bullet is designed to continually expand throughout its penetration path. Upon impact the thin nose section of the bullet peels back and sheds material until it reaches the thick shank of the bullet jacket where the InterLock ring works to keep the core and jacket together. The remaining heavy shank of the bullet continues to drive forward and expand for extremely lethal results.

I haven't shot anything but paper yet, but the 143 gr ELDXs shoot very well out of my LAW in 6.5 Creedmoor.

donsm70

I agree, but they don't make any "light for caliber" ELD-X's. In 30 caliber the lightest bullet is 178 gr up to 220 gr. I haven't shot any game with them yet, but based on what I'm reading and seeing from others I think it is going to be a good bullet. A little on the soft side, but with the heavier bullet weights I'm thinking it should be fine. The results in the Field & Stream test are impressive.

I've gotten excellent accuracy with 200's in my 300 WSM and 178's in my 308. For whatever reason I haven't found the right combo with either weight in my 30-06, at least not yet. At 300 yards the 178's fired from my 308 only have 2" more bullet drop than 150 gr SST's. And even though they start 200 fps slower are virtually the same speed at 300 yards, faster beyond 350 yards.

That's what I meant, the lighter weights like the 178. That bullet would be great out of a 308 or 3006 at reduced speeds. They also make a 150 gr 7mm I would not want to use out of a 7 mag too.