Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska 300 Win Mag Big Bear Bullet

Jeff, why no 180 NPs?

Better bullets out there today...Never know for sure how much is left of a partition to carry through.

300 mag speeds they come apart to quickly. They won't even make it stem to stern on our TX whitetail deer. John told me that was designed for the 06 type speeds, if you wanted to use partitions on a bigger animal go to the 200 partitions. I was amazed at that poor performance. Even a Lehigh 194 started at 1000 fps will exit a stem to stern shot on most deer at a similar distance as my experiments, around 75-125 steps or so. So I was amazed the 300 with 180 partitions would not. Plus it blood shot a LOT of meat.

Really is no reason not too use mono these days when it counts and even not. But even us still hang on and push berger bullets in some guns.

I'm totally confident in Sierra bullets though. They will go through a paper target and make a hole every time. Anything beyond that... well lets just say I would use the SMKs still but nothing else

But you know core lokt in an 06 pump is the best bear medicine anywhere....

I've only shot 2 bull elk and 1/2 doz deer with 180 NPT's in handloads for 2 different 300 Win Mags mv of 3000+ fps never had a problem with them "coming apart". Having said that I now also have 250 200 gr NPT's from SPS to use and work up a load for my 300 Wins and 30-06's can't imagine for Alaskan hunting that there could be a 1 load does all, that would be better than the 200 NPT in a 300 Mag. just my 2 cts worth . MB

Interesting. Coming apart may have been bad wording, but full front end totally gone. No close shots, generally 75 to 125 on the distances I played with it. The main point is if a small whitetail can stop that bullet then I dont' want to use it on bigger game.

Heck I've driven 950 fps or so 194 lehighs lengthwise through deer for tests at same distances. goes either all the way through or caught by hide...

I think it was smart to move to 200s for you.

Smarter is mono by far in my opinion, but you know what you paid for that. LOL

a question. why no 200 gr monos being advised for the big ones? velocity? for my moose hunts and bou hunts i carried 5 extra 200 barns x for piece of mind just in case rounds. i figured if they were used it would be very close and a head on shot.

as a side note, i shoot a 180 grand slam [30-06] and it has been very good on elk, moose and deer and bou. stem to stern exit on deer and nearly full length on 3 elk. most shots were pass throughs but some [5] were recovered with high wt retention.
i still dont think i would trust it on big ones however. and this fall i used a 300 win with a 180ttsx on a blackie.

I'm no expert and only have limited experience but I have shot both interior grizzly and brown bears with both the 30 cal 200 Nosler Partitions and .375 cal 270 TSX. Either will do exactly what they were designed to do IF properly placed. If I had to decide today i would go with the Barnes TSX in 180- 200 grain in 30 cal or 270-300 grains out of a 375. YMMV

rost, now that you have defined (coming apart) I understand your view point better. Yes the frt end comes off to the partition. The first bull elk I ever shot was down hill at about 130 yds quartering on at slight angle. I placed the 180NPT in frt of the near side shoulder to spine him and I did .He went over backwards and never regained his feet. I figured I'd also get his plumbing as well as the far shoulder on the way out. The angle was less than I estimated. Never found the bullet while gutting him. When we ate the last roast from the frt of the right hindquarter, I found my bullet. weighed 116 grs. Yup I like NPT's and I'll be totally honest I think the Barnes people can take a free flying f*** at a rolling donut hole. MB

A 200gr. Swift A-Frame or a 200 or 220 grain Nosler Partition.

agreed x2

Well lets talk about barnes performance then. 210 TTSX. Yeah, just an old barnes. 126 steps. Bull was angling to me a bit. I had no choice. Put the bullet just on the point of the onside shoulder. Bullet broke that shoulder, the spine at the neck, the other shoulder, wrecked some other vitals in between, and came to rest as a lump just under the skin, and the skin was cut by the petals about half the thickness of the skin.

Weight after retrieval and cleaning. 210.4 grains so I'm sure there was still some tissue there.

Dumped the bull on the spot. Bull was not an elk but a mature Alaskan moose. Cartridge no magnum either. Just a measly 338-06 and not even a really hot load, warm, but not hot.

Gonna say I couldn't be any happier with results like that. 100% retention. 100% expansion. And going through what that did on a moose ain't shabby from a 338-06.

So I'll pass on the free flying etc and use the bullet that works better LOL. Again, no flies on partitions, but I've found something that works better for what I desire.

I like to use the best controlled expansion bullet that works the best in that particular rifle.(accurate, functions in the mag)
I have used coreloks for years on moose and caribou not one has bounced off their hide. I'm not in brown bear country so I don't worry about it much. Grizzlies in the interior aren't more than 5-6 hundred pounds. Not many bigger than that (in the interior). If I did I would use one of the great new CE bullets that are available today. Accubonds, interbonds, TSX, TTSX weldcore, Kodiak bonded bullets ect. Many more.

Rost,
no need for you to reply to my post I don't consider your input useful!!!!

I daught I will be that lucky.

You pretty well hit it on the head but thats evidently not a useful comment. So I went against your own personal wishes. Sorry. I think.

I suspect I have put more NPTs and Barnes X bullets through meat than you have. And I have looked at them and their result carefully after the fact. It has been years since I used a NPT.

Killed my grizz with a 200gr accubond.

Penetration was stellar

Did you catch one?

Wow bragging about putting bullets “ through meat”? So you’re a [bleep] shot? You like bragging about wasting meat? What a piece of chit. Trying aiming for the vitals. And then you’re realize it doesn’t matter which bullet...