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Has anyone used 160 gr Nosler Accubonds out of a 7 mag on elk? If so how did they perform?

Thanks Tom

Once
elk died

Quickly?......no strangling involved? 😁

One of my elk hunting pards uses them exclusively in his 7mag. He loves them, the elk hate em. They work very well. I used them on elk in a 300 RUM @ 200 grains with very good results. Just a hair less weight retention than a partition, but similar performance in my statistically small observation.

I'll be following this thread, same bullet I shoot in my 7mm Mashburn, have thought about it for elk too.

Not elk exactly, but elk sized animals anyway. These animals were shot at a max distance of 125 yards, and I had these 160's running 3150 fps at muzzle (Retumbo). IMO this is why retention wasn't quite as high as some would anticipate. I intentionally shot through low shoulders trying for heart shots, and they worked like a champ. Farthest one ran was one wildebeest which made it about 40 yards. I was impressed.

Boring. Just my style.

Damn good stuff JG, thanks for posting those results, zebra and wildebeest are especially tough hardy animals.

160 Accubond out of a 7 Mashburn. I think 415 yards. Dropped at the shot; Scotty put another in him because he was still breathing when we got to him but he wasn't going anywhere.

Not a 7mm, but I've shot a number of elk with them in 165 and 180 gr from a 300WSM and a 30-06. They're very accurate and they do kill quickly but I think the meat waste is excessive. They tend to blow up on impact.

If you call shedding 40% of their weight "blowing up", you're right. I don't, not even close.

Not a 7mm, but I have shot elk with several wts. mostly .30 cal.. 150, 165 & 200,.. Also a couple in .338 cal.. 200 & 225.. Those were out of a .340 and the others out various .300 mags..
Good performance all...

Like Ulvejaeger, I've only used a 160 Accubond from my 7 RM once on an elk, and it was a bang-flop kill.

I've also used them on a half dozen South African plains game animals, three Canadian caribou, and a musk ox. The 160 grain Accubonds worked fine on all of them.

Shoulder shots or heart/lung shots?

Son in law used that one about 10 years ago on a good sized raghorn. Broadside, the bull made it about 50 yards and piled up in a blowdown, of course. Don’t remember if there was an exit or not.
The next year he used the same combo on a nice antelope at about 200 yards. That one exited, but no excessive damage

Both. The bullet almost explodes on impact leaving a 12" wide area of bloodshot mush. It still penetrates for the kill but you leave a lot of meat on the hill. If it's the ribs there isn't a lot of meat there to lose but if you hit the shoulder, you can mess up quite a few steaks.

I have found the meat damage about like Partitions of the same diameter and velocity. Have used, and been standing next to other hunters who used, various AccuBonds from 6.5mm up to .375, and in general they have performed exactly how Nosler designed them to work from the beginning: retaining about as much weight as Partitions of the same caliber/weight. In general, this means around 60-70% in calibers from .30 down, and 80%+ in larger, heavier bullets.

That said, there is apparently still some residual tribal memory of a FEW AccuBonds that weren't properly bonded. This happened a couple years after they were introduced, when they'd become so popular one of the Nosler workers decided to "help" by speeding up his particular job. This results in soft, unbonded bullets that came apart very easily. Since they frequently test bullets for both accuracy and expansion, this was discovered quickly, but some bullets had been shipped. They recalled as many as possible, but some did end up being used on game.

There weren't all that many, and in fact I've been using AccuBonds since they were introduced (in fact, probably a little earlier) and never encountered any of those. But like other bullets that didn't work exactly as intended, some hunters tend to remember the failures more--especially if they happened to them. Which is understandable.

Since have shot a pile of big game with AB's since 2003, about the time they were introduced, including North American and Africa animals from 100 to 750 pounds. The vast majority have exited, but have recovered a few. The retained weight varied from about 60-80%. They do expand a little wider than Partitions, as do most bonded bullets, but haven't seen a vast difference in penetration depth. The last one I recovered was a 150 from a .308, which went into the left shoulder of a whitetail doe at about 75 yards, as she stood facing me almost directly. It did do some meat damage to the shoulder, but have seen plenty of bullets (including several monolithics) damage considerable meat when they hit a shoulder. Found it under the hide of the right ham.

I have shot quite a bit of game with various Accubonds, ranging from pronghorns and Coues whitetails up to and including large bull elk, kudu, oryx, waterbuck and eland (as well as a few of the smaller African antelopes). I have used a variety of rifles ranging from a .257 AI up to and including a .375 H&H. I don't remember any excessive meat damage, and the capes that I have had mounted are all intact without much in the way of entrance and exit holes. I have a shoulder mount of my best impala on my wall that was taken with the .375 H&H and a 260-grain AB--a one-shot kill at an estimated 300 meters--looks like he must have died of natural causes.

Yep, they work!

That said, there is apparently still some residual tribal memory of a FEW AccuBonds that weren't properly bonded. This happened a couple years after they were introduced, when they'd become so popular one of the Nosler workers decided to "help" by speeding up his particular job. This results in soft, unbonded bullets that came apart very easily. Since they frequently test bullets for both accuracy and expansion, this was discovered quickly, but some bullets had been shipped. They recalled as many as possible, but some did end up being used on game.

That's interesting.

I worked up a 140gr AB load in my 7x57 with great accuracy at 2,800fps. In 2007/08 I shot a roe deer - about 50lbs - and the damage was truly incredible. The exit basically removed all ribs and flesh between the sternum and spine. Previously those bullets had caused very little damage. I put it down to one of those things.