Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters JB: ballistic tip bullets

Some of those early .338 200g BTs were amazingly accurate....but they were unsuitable for anything bigger than deer. I saw them loose their core on onside cow elk ribs a couple times. Ranges were 350-500yds where velocities should have moderate enough for good performance (this was out of a 338win at about 3000fps). I moved to the 210 partitions and never looked back. I am a fan of accubonds and have been able to get them to shoot well enough in most of the rifles I load for.

Hawk Driver,

As far as I can tell, Nosler hasn't changed the construction of the 200 Ballistic Tip/Silvertip since it first appeared. I don't use the .338 as much anymore, but it works great and would be among my top choice. It works great on anything from pronghorn-size to elk-size game.
Have used it both in North America and Africa, and the only one I recovered was from a gemsbok bull taken in 1999 in Namibia. It was quartering toward me at around 150-175 yards, and the bullet broke the near shoulder and spine, and was recovered under the hide of the rump on the opposite side, retaining 60% of its original weight--close to 4 feet of penetration, including substantial bone.

Can't recall whether any of the core remained (still have the bullet in my big tackle box full of recovered bullets, so might check later), but suspect the core was gone. As mentioned earlier, that doesn't matter, as the jacket weighs more than the core in the heavy-jacket Ballistics Tips.

Time frame is correct because my twin boys weren't quite old enough to hunt 14 years old is minimum age here in Saskatchewan. I suspect it was old old production or a bad production run. I tried the ballistic tip because of the good reviews they had and no point deformation. Just my luck lol

I'd been using the Nosler Solid Base bullets (predecessor to the Ballistic Tip) in the 1980's. When the then-new Ballistic Tips appeared, I have to admit to being less than thrilled. Accuracy was excellent, but they were a little "soft" and tended to expand too fast for my liking.

Well... Things changed.

The 95 grain Ballistic Tip from our 6mm Remington has been outstanding! As has the 115 from my 25-06 Remington.

The 165 Ballistic Tip from either 308 or 30-06 (and I lean pretty hard on the 30-06) has been superb! That same great accuracy. And in the field absolutely no problem with whitetail, pronghorn, mule deer, black bear or elk.

I recovered one jacket from the hide of a very dead black bear. The core had separated and exited the bear. The jacket was stuck in the off-side hide, at the exit wound.

Provided 300 Win Mag ammo to a buddy for his plains game hunt in South Africa. Was a bit surprised on his return when he told me that both he and his PH liked the 180 gr Ballistic Tip ammo better than the 180 gr Partitions! He cited the quick kills as the reason.

In general I've seen superb accuracy, excellent expansion, and more than enough penetration. The Nosler Ballistic Tip has become my favorite hunting bullet, for good reason.

Regards, Guy

Thanks JB!

As somebody ( I think JB...) said...if they are now labeled " Hunting" they have been great...Ive had excellent performance and accuracy out of the 95 gr 6mm and the 150 Gr. 7mm

My 6mm loves the 95 NBT. Critters, not so much.

Killed a pile of deer with the 165 NBT from a 30-06.

Also used the 6.5 120(6.5x55), the .284 140(280AI) and the .257 100(25-06)

I once found myself on the north slope of the Brooks range with the wrong box of 257Weatherby ammo. I’d grabbed the 85gr Ballistic tips instead of the 100gr X bullets. With nothing else to do I went ahead and shot two big bulls. Both of them died like they were struck by lightning and the wounds showed no signs of blowup. I did recover the jacket on the second bull, under the offside hide after it had broken a shoulder and some ribs on an angling shot. It wasn’t mangled and was peeled back just like an advertisement picture.

I’ve killed a couple hundred deer with Nosler BTs. Mostly with the 130 gr version in my 270. In recent years I’ve used the 100 and 120 gr BTs in my 260. I have no complaints about the bullet. I started using BTs in my 270 when the old SBBT was discontinued, and many deer fell to the generation 1 version, which was supposedly less tough than the present version. And, with that gen 1 version, I killed a huge boar hog that weighed just shy of 400 pounds. That soft explosive bullet penetrated through to the hide on the off side, so maybe it wasn’t all that explosive.

I had never seen a hog that big. He looked like a black VW Beetle with tusks, and that was one time that I wondered if I had enough gun.

I have high hopes for those, and a couple hundred on tap from SPS. If I can get them to shoot, I'll load up.

C

Thanks John, very helpful as always

Some of the original BTs were the same as the old solid base bullets but with a tip added. These had relatively thin jackets with not much taper. They were the big brother to the Zipedo bullet which was a varmint bullet with a solid base to stand up to the likes of the 220 Swift and to improve accuracy. If you remove the tip you have a very large hollow point so not surprising these would practically explode on impact.

Interesting the BT is usually more accurate than the Accubond. I have heard this about bonded bullets in general being less accurate. JB is this because the flux or bonding agent is less uniform or concentric than a bare swagged core?

I like when there is a BT match for the Accubond for load work up and less demanding uses. Also why do the ABLR seem finicky? Is it just the shape or is something getting distorted when they are being seated? This has always been the situation as I have gotten fair accuracy right from the start sometimes with the ABLR.

The 150 and 165/168 out of my 308's have been great on deer/pigs. The 95 has been great out of my shorty 243 too.

I called nosler about this deal a few years back.

The person I talked to denied it ever occurred. The " beefing up the 308 180 deal". So I dropped it.

I do not doubt what you are claiming is true, I just figure I talked to some one a nosler that was not aware.

I have purchased a bunch of old stock BTs and they have different packaging.

Is there anyway to tell what year this beefing up occurred, and how one can distinguish them by the packaging.

We're the CT type bullets affected also? Got a bunch of them also, in different packaging.

Thanks in advance!

John

I've actually sectioned the original green and red box BT's from the late 80's and the new BT's there is a huge differance in jacket thickness. This pertains to the 30 caliber 180. I didnt have any other weight of the old ballistic tips to compare, but would imagine the same holds true.
FWIW the old BT' didnt behave any different than a Sierra Game king IMO. The new ones on the other hand are the toughest non bonded cup and core made.

FWIW I cant say when nosler made the change other than to say I shot a large deer in NE Montana with a 140 BT at 3100fps in the late 90's, 98 IIRC. Impact was at 200 yards with the deer quartering away. The bullet entered in front of the rea leg and was found perfectly mushroomed under between the hide and sternum. The hide actually split, but the bullet was still in place. So clearly they were pretty rough at that point.

BWalker,

The 140 7mm Ballistic Tip was one that was actually never changed, according to an old friend who worked for Nosler at the time.

In the early 1990's I shot a pronghorn with one from a 7x57, which obviously wouldn't stress the bullet much. But the buck was quartering away, and the bullet hit about 2/3 of the way up the chest, going through about six inches of spine and breaking the far shoulder before exiting. Pronghorns have hard bones, harder than cattle, and though the bones aren't thick have seen bone-shot or angling pronghorns stop some pretty stout bullets, including Partitions and TSX's.

Back in 1995 I shot a buck at about 40 years in the shoulder with a 165 gr bt from a 30-06. Bullet blew up but it knocked the deer down..... thinking the deer was dead I lowered the gun and the deer got up and took off for parts unknown. I didnt use ballistic tips for a long time after that but I started again in about 2013 and have killed a pile of deer with them with no issues except driving one a little too fast on a close shot in a 7-08. The 6mm 90 and 95 gr bt's are TOUGH... the 120's in 7mm are decent but not impervious to circumstances.

What is the reccomended way to cut them open to check em out?

Don't know about the "recommended way," but I put them in a good-sized bench vise sideways, then rasp and file them down. However, you have to be sure to "cut" them halfway through. If less, the jacket/core relationship isn't accurate.

A friend and fellow gunwriter also melted a few Ballistic Tips in his lead-casting pot, the fished out the jackets to see how much they weighed.