Home Forums Reloading Big Game Rifles ABLRs

Does anyone have anything good to say about them? I seem to hear nothing but negative stuff, and the 190's sure didn't perform in the 300 Win Mag I loaded them for.

When's Nosler giving up on them--or do they simply have to have a LR offering?

6,5s have worked quite well in my two tighlyt twisted 6,5x57R's. They have performed quite well on game.

I would not get the 150gr .270`s in any of my two 1:10" rifles chambered for that cartridge.

168gr did quite wel in my 7x65R, again with a tight twist wuth quite good performance on game.

150g did not group at all in one 7x57 and two 7x57Rs. All long htroated European guns with a tight twist.

Jyst my .02

I worked with the 168 ABLR in two new Remington 5R rifles, a .308 and a .300 Winchester. No decent accuracy with the bullet in the .308, but did find one good load using H4350 in the .300.

I've tried the 129 and 142 6.5 mm offerings in a .264 Win Mag (1:9") and .260 (1:8"). The Tikka 260 will do sub-MOA, but . . .

the ELD-X is a better mousetrap in both rifles.

Only have shot four deer with the 129 ABLR out of a 6.5x55 and I like them so far. They are no different than any longer or VLD secant type bullet they can take more experimenting with seating depth than a more hybrid ogive type.I suspect many people gave up too soon on these. I am sure there are many twist and throat combinations that won't shoot them but mine worked out fine.

The ELD-x is shooting fine in my 6mm AI. I will see if they work as well on game soon I hope. But there is no question on the ABLR holding half or more of its weight, not so sure about the ELD-X But that is based off the A-Max and the X has a beefier jacket.

I tried them in a 26 Nosler, swapped to a Ballistic tip.

I've only killed one moose with the 190 ABLR out of my 300 win mag, and I don't have any reason to believe that they won't kill an elk for me come this fall.
Accurate enough for me and penetrated into the off shoulder of the moose I shot, after hitting a rib going in on the 1/4 away shot. The recovered bullet weighed in at 168 gr.

One hole accuracy with 6.5's. You need to play with the seating depth....they like a jump.

The ABLRs work great when used as intended - i.e. at lower velocity impacts. Most of the negative reports on game seem to be from people using them in situations with relatively high velocity impacts. If that's your intended use, then pick the regular AB instead. The hint is in the name....

And yeah, the ELD-x is easier to get to print small groups on paper, but it's not a better bullet on game if we're talking about the ABLR's intended use. Those two bullets are designed for two different roles; there is a reason the ABLR designs expand down to ~1300 fps, and the ELDx don't. Tiny groups are not as important as using the right bullet for the application, IMO.

I shot a big mule deer and a few antelope this past fall with the 190 grain NABLR loaded over 84.5 grains of Ramshot Magnum in my Cooper Open Country LR LW in .300 Win Mag. Shots were a hundred yards away on the mulie and 300-400 yards on the antelope. All bang-flop and complete pass-throughs as one would imagine. This load shoots about .5 MOA in my rifle.

They just need to stop claiming that they are "bonded." They shouldn't be associated with typical accubonds in any way.

I loaded the 150gr to a modest 2515 fps in my daughter's 7mm08 last season. The load was crazy accurate, but the bullet doesn't hold together worth a damn. We took two coues deer, a mule deer, and a desert bighorn with them from150 to 350 yards. Not one bullet exited and I found slivers of lead for more than 18 inches in every direction of the main wound channel. Yes, they did the trick and the animals died quickly, but the meat loss was ridiculous. I hate to think what it wouls have looked like at 7mm mag speeds.

Interesting. I had good results with the 6.5mm 129gr version at 2,900fps MV and would use it again in a heartbeat. It often penetrated fully and my only recovered bullet was picture-perfect. Only tried it in two rifles though. One loved it, the other hated it.

JackAZ:

The ABLR is bonded only on the bottom half to two thirds the nose is intended to fragment. MD has posted several times about an employee at Nosler who decided to skip the bonding process to speed production. No idea how many of these went out the door but it is possible that you got hold of some of these.

The ABLR is softer than the Accubond but it is still close to the Partition in performance with a little less weight retention. It is a good mix between the BT and Partition in performance IMO..

I've been trying to get them to shoot in three different 7x57 rifles and a .280 Rem. So far the 150 gr. ABLR has been a total dud unless you like 4and 5 inch groups. FWIW the three 7x57s and .280 are all MOA or better grouping rifles with the 150 gr Nosler Partition.
Paul B.

Tejano,

That incident occurred the standard Accubonds, NOT the ABLRs, a year two after the ABs appeared.

In my experience the ABLRs shoot very well if you're willing to experiment. with seating depth. A good example is my lightweight 6.5 PRC puts 5 (not 3) into less than half an inch at 100 yards--but the bullets are seated just about .1 inch from the lands. (This is common with many high-BC bullets.)

Because the ABLRs were designed to expand down to 1300 fps, they tend to lose about half their weight at shorter ranges, give or take 10%--similar to Ballistic Tips and Hornady Interlocks. Thus hunters who use them for "standard" range hunting may be disappointed in weight retention and penetration, but ABLRs were not designed for standard ranges, as their name plainly states.

In fact, at standard ranges (say out to 400 yards) there is no advantages in using ABLRs over regular AccuBonds. But plenty of hunters apparently do--and then bitch about the results in varying degrees.

I’ve got a Remington 40-XB and a Remington APR in 7 mag that do really well with the 7mm, 168 gr ABLR and Retumbo. The 27” barrel of the 40-XB gets just over 3000 fps and the 26” APR just over 2900+. The 40-XB is usually good for 0.4 - 0.6” for five shots and the APR rarely goes over 0.75 for five shots with its first three usually around 0.5”. I just had to play around with seating depth a bit.

I've only used the 129 ABLR but I've had excellent results with it regarding both accuracy and on game performance (deer and coyotes). Most shots have been shorter range, a couple longer, but I'm also not pushing it with a magnum.

I tried a few in .270, 7mm mag, .308, and .300 win mag over the years with no success.

More recently I've been shooting them in a 6.5 PRC. I wish I could say the results were better but I can't. I shot both the 129s and the 142s with H4831, IMR 7828, RL 25 and 26, and Retumbo. Also varied OAL from .02 short of contact to .15 short of contact. There was simply no consistency. Shoot one group with a load that would get my hopes up and the next would look like a buckshot pattern. It's a fail.

Tom

Not anything too good to say about 190's in my 300 wm. Trying to make them work and tried IMR 7828 ssc in two differnt loads, RL 17 and RL 25 in two differnt loads. 1.5-4" groups. Not what I was hoping for. Did just find some H1000 so will try that next.

Little better results with 7 mag. 7828ssc and RL25 . 1.5-2" groups. Again not what I'm looking for but will keep trying. I'm limited on both guns with the magazine length.
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I didn't have any problems but maybe a faster powder will bump them up more, not open based like the Partitions where this doe's work, but might be worth a try. Also first I would see if there is a sweet spot for seating depth before testing a bunch of different powders. Sometimes there won't be one. Many times the sweet spot, if found, will work for multiple powders. If it pans out then you will know it is the bullet powder combination and not seating depth.