Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Anybody use 165 HPBT Gameking on Deer?

We call the 165 gr HPBT the " Flying meat grinder".. cause once they start flying, your gonna need to get out your meat grinder...

It constantly amazes me that people will use cup and core bullets at magnum speeds when Partitions are so cheap.

I love Sierra bullets for whitetails. Not much trackin' necessary most of the time. DRT. I also love Partitions but anyone that says they don't make a mess hasn't been paying attention. I've shot many critters with NP's including a dandy 6x7 Bull here in Arkansas that Partitions handled with aplomb. 100% reliable BUT they make BIG holes be it through a ham, both hams or wherever. If shot's are inside 50 yards most of the time, I would use something besides a Sierra, but anywhere past that out to as far as you can handle your business they are death on a stick. Cheaper than NBT's and shoot at least as well. Pass-thru's are common out past 150 yards. Speakin' for .270/130's and 7mm/150's.

I just don't see a need for partitions where I hunt. I have killed a lot of deer with cup and core bullets, in our club no one uses them that I know of and only one shot that was made in the last 9 years where the deer was hit reasonably well and was not recovered, we did think we found it latter (8 point) but it was too decomposed for an autopsy. The rifle in question was a 7mm rem mag, now I can also tell you a sad story about a guy shooting a small deer to pieces with a 300WSM and premium ammo, ran out of cartridges (5) and had to walk back to the car to get a pistol....no reflection on the ammunition of course. Fast forward to today and that episode convinced him that he needed to learn how to shoot.

I must add however that I am considering using a .243 some this year for late season does and may use partitions for this gun...I hear pros and cons regards this caliber.

jimmy-load that lil 243 with a 85 TSX and all you'll see if the "pros"...grins

Dober

I have to agree with Dobrenski with regards to the .243 win. I've had quite a bit of mixed success with that little cartridge. The fault of the bullet in use more than the caliber I'm pretty sure. 95 NBT's don't exit, sometimes fly apart. Sierra 100's too soft up close. I'm currently working on 85 TSX loads for several in my group. (Hopefully one common load will work well for all). EX. nice 9 point shot at 70 yards by mother in law, almost lost it in the thickets, but luckily after 2 hours of searching found it. Little entry hole, no blood. Perfect broadside shot, just not enough damage and no blood trail. Not a problem where you can see forever but on gaslines,etc you have longggg shots in 2 directions and terrible thickets and swamp on either side. Either DRT or good blood trails are essential.

7mmmaniac, I have just got to get off of this forum it costs me too much money! I could have just been dumb and happy with 100 grain Hornady's but now I have to buy Barnes 85 grain TSX bullets!!! The sad truth is that somewhere in the back of my mind I keep playing with a concern that the .243 could be marginal in some cases. I have another aquaintance that swears by it and says he does not want the bullet to exit but blow up in the deer. He uses 85 grain bullets of some type but not a barnes of course.

Here is what I think a partial list looks like In order of apparent penetration ability from least to most penetration:
95grain ballistic tip
100 grain sierra BTSP
85 grain Sierra HPBT
95 grain partition
85 grain TSX.

Does the 85 grain Sierra HPBT sit there? Where do the 100 grain Hornady interloc belong, the Swift Scirocco II?

jimmyp,

for your .243, you ought to try either, or both of the sierra 85bthp or the speer 90 spitzer... the best pair of all around bullets that i have personally tried...

the problem with me giving this type of advice???
i stop looking for answers when i find one or two that work... i do not feel compelled to explore every load combination available if the load that i've got works out...

fwiw, the sierra 85 bthp and a max load of imr4895 are a well known accuracy load... i know of several guys who use this load to test rifles for accuracy... haven't heard of many that failed to shoot this load well.....

This bullet always performed excellent for me in the past (when I reloaded)...........................547.

Many in my group either use or have used .243's quite a bit. Most kills are quick and humane. But I have experienced several shot by myself that just seemed to 'wander around' or just walk off, requiring second shots. My experiences were with 95 NBT's for the most part and Sierra SPT 100's. Just didn't seem like it did much sometimes and other times thes bang/flop. I've heard the same stories from many people. I just don't want to risk losing a game animal like that. There's enough to worry about as it is. I am trying the 85 TSX's this year. For what it is worth, most of the 'problem' shots were b/w 200 and 300 yards.

I load a 243 for my nephew and he hunts GA. 95gr Nosler Partitions have worked great for him.

I loaded up 100 of them for a friend's 30-06 and he was quite happy with them. He shot three coyotes and two whitetails with all one shot kills. They didn't seem to blow the fur of the yotes either. It's a pretty tough buller for being a hollow point. I don't used them because I just can't get beyond the performance of the Game King and Pro Hunter.

I had read somewhere that the .243 just runs out of steam past 200 yards. This seems reasonable to me, I think I am going to try both the Sierra 85 grain HPBT and the 85 grain TSX, hopefully they might shoot somewhere near the same point of impact and I can zero for both loads.

I've always 'read' that the .243 win is good for deer out to about 300 yards. I can concur. I know there's thousands of people that have a success story at that range or further but it really shook my confidence in the round after seeing it happen more than once. I guess like anything else, you must understand the limitations of the tool at hand. All else being equal, I've never experienced the same reactions with a .270 or larger.(refering to bullet diameter) But to be fair, I've never hunted with a 6.5mm, just loaded 'em for a buddy.