Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Speer Hot Cor Mag Tip

Can anybody tell me about the 30 cal 180gr. Mag Tip bullet made by Speer.I bought this box of bullets by mistake a long time ago.Would they be a suitable bullet for medium sized white tails out my 30/06?

The Mag Tip is a cup and core bullet made by Speer's Hot Cor process. The inside of the jacket is scalloped near the tip so expansion is supposed to be easily initiated even at modest impact velocities. The jacket in the shank of the bullet is supposed to be heavier than that in the regular Speer bullets, the idea being to slow the expansion once the easily started tip has mushroomed.

I have a nice load for my 300 Savage using the 150 grain version, but I haven't killed anything with it yet. It reads like a good deer bullet at sub-magnum speeds though.

mathman

Thanks mathman,that's what I wanted to hear.I really was wondering if it was a bullet for the magnums or for more sedate speeds such as the '06 on down.

I just looked in one of my Speer manuals where they said the shank portion of the jacket was roughly 45% thicker than the same portion of an equivalent Hot Cor spitzer. They also gave specific mention of the fact that the fluted jacket assures expansion even at 300 Savage velocities.

Maybe someone who has used the 180 on deer at your expected velocity will chime in.

mathman

AH...The Speer .308 180 grain Mag-Tip is my current "go to" bullet for my .300 Savage model 99 EG. It is my bullet of choice for Black Bear here in the dense woods of western Washington State where I killed one last fall with a shoulder shot and the the bullet held together while also breaking the spine....the finisher shot in the lungs passed all the way thru but the shoulder shot I recovered and it weighed 143 grains (about 80% retention) and I think it would also be a good bullet for Elk and Deer. I hope to find that out this fall.

I originally chose them as they are a short 180 grain bullet that feeds well in my short magazine rifle and short little .300 Savage case and have since found them to be a great bullet for my purposes!

I have shot a lot of them into test media as follows; A double folded over water soaked fleece jacket, a two inch thick water bottle then a 3" dry phone book backed by 5 water filled gallon milk jugs and they hold together everytime and penetrate about as deep as Nosler Partitions I have tested while retaining more weight and costing half as much!

They are basically a Speer Grand Slam without the heel lock. I have sectioned them and have noticed the cannelure is a mechanical lock like a Remington Core-Lokt and unlike normal Speer Hot-Cor's that dont have cannelures. If you look at one of the 180 grain bullets you will notice a machine cut just above the cannelure, that acts as an expansion stop, as in my testing I noticed that the jacket folds over at that point and slows jacket expansion.... a good idea that seems to work well in my experience!

I only shoot them in a .300 Savage but my brother uses them in his .300 Savage, 7.5x55 Swiss, .308 Win and his 30-06 and likes them also.

The B.C. isn't the greatest at .349 but good enuf for 300 yards without losing too much performance IMO.

I like them so much I just ordered 1000 more of them!...

Using the Hot-Cor process, the cannelure lock, the 45% thicker jacket base and expansion stop ring makes for a tough bullet at a great price!

I also would like to hear what the gunwriters say about them tho as my experience with them on game is limited to one black bear but they shoot accurate in my .300 Savage loaded up to about 2500 fps in my hunting loads and hold together great in my test media.

My long winded 2 cents worth

What's your load for 2500 fps with a 180?

mathman

I once made a perfect back-strap shot on a cow elk about 100yards away. i was trying to hit the base of her tail and got the back-strap. Anyway, the 180gr. Mag Tip penatrated 11ins. of the strap hitting nothing but soft meat. Then the core left the jacket for another 3ins. and stoped. It did put the elk down for a finisher. This was out of an 06 starting at 2600fps. Pedro

I WAS using Varget and using Lymans top load (41 grains) in the 48th edition manual but was getting 2430 average not the 2500 it said in the manual so I asked my brother to load some up with Reloader 15 as he had some and I didn't....

He tested them and was using data from Speer's #13 manual which gave 43 grains RL15 as the top load. He used 42.5 and a 180 grain Sierra RN and got an average 2481 fps with 10 shots from a 1953 model 99R .300 Savage. I asked him to send me 10 of those loads to shoot in my 1950 99EG.

They both have 24" barrels. I shot them and got an average of 2542 fps with the same 42.5 grain load! The fastest was 2560fps!!! I said HOLY $HIT and went and bought some Reloader 15 that day....BUT!!!!

I did notice a tiny bit of resistance ejecting those rounds tho and decided to work up from 40 grains in .5 grain increments till I got the first signs of excessive pressure...

I got to 42 grains and started to feel the smallest bit of resistance on ejection so I dropped to 41.5 grains and all is well but that is MAX in my gun...your mileage may vary.

The difference in velocity must just be the barrels of our respective rifles I guess?

I also noticed a speed increase of about 20 fps when I used the 180 Speer Mag-Tips compared to the Sierra 180 Rn he sent me to test. The Mag-Tip has a longer bearing surface and in measureing that I found the cannelure ever so slightly exceeded .308....Gas Check?.....

So MY hunting load is a Speer 180 Grain Mag-tip, 41.5 grains of Reloader 15, WW cases, CCI 200 primers and a light crimp in the cannelure to even out the start pressure curve and I weigh each charge to get exact 41.5 grain weight. This is a slightly compressed load with the 180 grain bullet seated to Speer's recomended 2.535" OAL.

I get 2510-2515 fps average from 10 shots conistently with a standard deviation of about 17-22 fps with NO signs of excessive pressue in MY gun...again....your mileage may vary! It is a pretty warm load.

as an aside; the Speer manual says THEY used 43 grains of RL15 in a 20" barrel 99E....I WOULDN'T TRY THAT IN MY RIFLE!!! Hell I'd probably get close to 2600 FPS but its not worth the risk!

99Lover,

Thanks for the data. I'm running a Remmy 700 Classic and it really likes 40 grains of IMR-4895 under 180 Speer BTs in R-P cases. I get 2400 fps and great accuracy just like my older Lyman (46th) manual suggests. Using Hornady's data for Re-15 I get about 2600 with a 165. I just might see if I can creep up on 2500 with the 180s. I can typically run a 2.7" overall length.

mathman

It ought to be easy in a newer bolt action to get 2500....Hell, my old Lever rifles older than ME...(just barely tho :))

I doubled checked my Lyman 48th edition manual which says 41.5 grains of RL-15 is max when I was working this up and it gave 2498 fps with the 41.5 grain load in their test rifle...About exactly what I get...

I average 2490 without the light crimp and 2510-2515 fps with the crimp....I use the crimp as it lowers my SD... as does the hand weighing of the powder....Good luck and safe shooting!

Still would like to hear from some gunwriters on THEIR experience with Speer Mag-Tips!!!

I've been loading the 180's in my Cousin's '06 for a few years now. Lots of deer have hit the freezer because of them! I'd not want to use them in a higher velocity cartridge, but they do a fine job on Wisconsin Whitetails when fired from the '06, for sure.

I had an internet friend on a now defunct website that was determined to kill a moose in his home state of Vermont with his Ruger 7x57 and was testing out several different bullets. I had bought a box of 175 gr. Mag-Tips in 7mm for $10.00 from a guy who was more or less selling out his reloading supplies.

So I sent Vermoose 20 to try out since I had never loaded or shot a one. My rifle was just a few serial numbers away from his so we had similar rifles. All I asked for were his results and opinions about the bullet. He shot them into wet phone books and stuff and claimed them to be about the toughest bullet he had ever seen as they would not expand well until he loaded them up to higher velosities in his 7 Mag. He came to the conclusion that they were designed for the 7 Mag. speed range so I have never loaded a one as I have only a 7x57 and a .280.

I don't need them in Arkansas, just bought 'em cause they were cheap and thought I might want to elk hunt sometime. One of my friends calls them the "poor man's A-Frame".

Maybe I should try them out at moderate velosity just to see what they will do to a 10 year old pine tree! Don't know what else to shoot 'em at around here. Oh I forgot.....Hogs! Brimfish

My old Speer Number Nine manual shows that very bullet nicely expanded after being fired into "wet-lap" paper pulp from a 7x57 at 300 yards. There's a photo on page 203 of the manual.

mathman

I don't know about the "Poor man's A-Frame" but at lower velocities they seem like a pretty tough bullet.

When I shoot the 180's out of my .300 Savage into my test media (which I outlined in my 1st post in this thread) they hit at about 2450 fps which you should be able to get out of both your 7x57 or .280....they expand well for me and penetrate to the 5th water filled milk jug after goin thru the 2" jug, 3" dry phone book, and soaked fleece jacket....about 30" total... My guess is those 175grain 7mm Mag-tips will kill Hogs dead!...Sectional density is .310 on that bullet...should penetrate well!

Would like to here from the gunwriters that have used them on game...

Sorry, I'm not a writer (yet?) but I have used the Speer Mag Tip bullets on deer. I've used the 180 grain from a 30-06 and the 160 grain from a couple different 7x57s. They are indeed excellent deer hunting bullets. The exit holes tend to be just a bit smaller than those left by the standard Speer Hot-Cor spitzer bullets of the same weight. Every deer shot with them died. I will say that in my Ruger #1A 7x57, the Mag Tip does not shoot quite as consistently as the pointed spitzer, and to a slightly different point of impact on target, so I must adjust the scope just a bit when going from one bullet to the other. This year I plan to try the 30 cal 180 grain Mag Tip in my 308 Kimber. We tried the 165 grain spitzer last year and of two deer shot with that bullet, neither exited. I will admit to you, however, that the shoulders of both deer were absolutely smashed by the 165 grain bullets. On my wife's deer, both shoulders were literally smashed to bits. I've never seen worse damage. My deer was shot in the ribcage and the far shoulder was smashed. I'm hoping the Mag Tip will be a little gentler on the hamburger and exit. Yeah, yeah, I know we don't have to hit them in the shoulders. But try as I may, I remain imperfect. Sometimes the bullet doesn't land just so. That is why I like to hunt with tough bullets that penetrate deeply if the shot strays a bit. Does that make me a bad man? Wait, don't answer that.
_

I loaded them for a few fellows that used them in their 300 Win Mags, and one that liked using them in his 7MM Mag.
They work well and the recovered ones always showed a nice mushroom.

Resurrecting a cool old thread for the 300 Savage.

Glad this reappeared as I have 4 boxes of 175 grain 7mm Mag-Tips and was kind of apprehensive on using them for southern W/Ts out of my 7x57. I had reserved them for my 7x64 thinking that may be the best option but, if 180s work in .300S then 175s should work in my 7x57.

Interesting thread.

As was mentioned above, I also got the impression that the Mag-tip was similar to the Speer Grand Slam(which is/was considered by many to be a great elk Bullet).
I used to shoot 160gr Mag-tips in my 7mm Rem Mag because they were so darn accurate in that particular rifle. Shot several whitetail with that bullet at 2,950 fps muzzle velocity(w/impacts on deer inside 150 yds). Never had a problem. They seemed to behave much like a Nosler Partition from what I could tell(Bang/flop). Good bullet that I found was easy to get to shoot well when other more promising bullets wouldn't group well. Never recovered one as they always left an exit hole.

They'll perform just fine in the 30.06 as fast as you can push them.

Leftybolt

They were one of my favourites, the 180 gr Mag Tip held up fine on moose at impact velocities of over 3100 fps. If I found some locally I would surely buy them. They were a tough bullet at prices just above the typical cup and core bullet.