Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Which is tougher 150 SST or BT?

Interesting. I still have some of those old early 90s 7mm 140BT in the same box I loaded the one from that "blew up." and I have a box of new ones I bought as blems off SPS. I could try to section both and see if there is any visible difference in the jackets. I can say the .270 140 BTs I used penetrated well (but those were longer range shots too than my 1992 "blow up", which makes a big difference). Nothing recovered except one full length shot hip to far shoulder on the big Mulie buck.
Obviously the .338 200BTs held up fine, in and out. Both those deer ran a short distance on lung shots and fell dead.

Cheers,
Rex

If Nosler toughened up the Ballistic Tips since the early days' I'd assume the 7mm 140gn would have been toughened up some.

Elvis,

As I mentioned earlier, some got toughened up, others didn't need to be--and one their guys I knew and trusted (the late Chub Eastman) specifically mentioned the 140-grain 7mm. I can even remember when that conversation took place, because we were on a deer hunt together in South Dakota in 2001.

I will also provide more details of my history with the bullet. I started using it in the late 1990s, handloaded in the 7x57 to about 2800 fps, and the first animal taken with it was a pronghorn at around 200 yards. Now pronghorns aren't very big--it takes a large one to field-dress 100 pounds--but they have some of the hardest bones among game animals, mostly to withstand running so fast (up to 60 mph), over over uneven ground. This one stood angling away to the left up a slope from me, and I put the bullet in the middle of the ribs toward the far shoulder.

It landed a little higher than the crosshairs, due to the way the rifle was sighted-in, and the antelope collapsed. Turned out the bullet had not only smashed the far shoulder, but several inches of the lower half of the spine--and exited. I have seen a 130-grain .270 cup-and-core bullet with a good reputation for holding together totally disintegrate on a pronghorn's spine.

Dunno how many animals I've used that bullet on over the years, but they also held up very well in the .280 Ackley Improved when started 300 fps faster. I have never recovered one.

Now, this doesn't mean somewhere, sometime a 140 Ballistic Tip didn't hold together--but I also know the gunsmith Darrel Holland pretty well, and as shown in a photo or two posted by MtnHtr earlier in this thread, he used the 7mm 140 Ballistic Tip considerably in Africa to take much much larger and tougher game that pronghorns and deer, including gemsbok, which not only have very thick hides but heavy shoulder bones.

My experiences with the 7mm 140BTs and others mirrors Mule Deer's. I've killed 2 antelopes with 7mm BTs. The first one was about 450yds in windy conditions and I was using early 150BTs in the 7RM. Held for wind correction but still hit the antelope buck a little far back in the liver, he stood there for maybe 20 seconds and fell over. The 150BT passed thru. Second antelope was at 147yds lazered and quartering towards me while using my 3rd custom Lilja 7-08. The 140BT from my 7-08 broke the off shoulder and passed thru, the lope dropped fairly quick. No second shot needed. Pictured here laying on the broken off shoulder, note the thick leg bones.


I've killed several muley bucks with the 7-08/140BT combo and have never recovered one like Mule Deer. I shot this CA Sierra buck with the same load at about 350yds from the rear as it ran uphill above timberline, the 140BT went thru its hip and exited behind the off shoulder where the blood is seeping.

Another one killed closed to 500yds lasered, both hits exited.


On black bears it's different, I have recovered both 7mm 140BT (7-08) and 165BTs (06) from several bears due to their thick hides. Usually the cup and core is found under the off side hide of the bear.

It’d be interesting to see. The BT has been a wicked good deer killer for my family, friends and I.

I'll bet ya have one explode on the surface of a buck you'd feel different. Lol Had it not i'd prolly feel different. For me? It was to lil time and way to many good bullets out there to dick around...

If the bullet did indeed blow up you wouldnt have found the jacket under the hide.

Well that's a good point. The bullet came completely apart into the shards of the jacket and few pieces of lead remaining. The responses to my post inspired me to stop trusting my memory and go back to my bullet collection and reference the actual notes. I was wrong about no ribs - see the notes in the pic. The frag of the core did make a few pinhole exits through the offside hide. I just weighed all these chunks together and they weighed 56 grains total.

But I was still unhappy with the fragmentation. This was 1992 remember. Most of the good reports I have read here were from the late 90s and beyond. I don't know when or ever the bullet may have been toughened up.
It'll be about 10 days until I get the chance to section the old and new .284 140BTs but I will try to remember to do so when I am able.

Cheers,
Rex

Doesn’t look bad for a 75 yard impact and yeah, the lead did come unglued but as was mentioned that jacket held together about as good as anyone could hope for a 3000+ FPS impact into flesh.

Thank you for posting that. Pretty neat stuff.

At which point in the "bang-flop" did you determine that the bullet failed?

Quite a bit more steam than a 270 will put on a 150.

A bud had same issues w 140s in a 7 Mag in the last 10 years. That is a lot of velocity under 100 yards.

I'd like to see a better closeup of the jacket. From the photo you've posted it certainly doesn't look "blown up" to me. The jacket looks like it held together well enough, and the bullet did its job as designed, being retrieved from a dead animal.

If a guy wants picture perfect retrieved bullets from dead animals 100% of the time, a bonded or Partition bullet is the answer.

Yep, that's a good one that has been well and accurately used over the years.
I had shot partitions exclusively up until this try with the BT, so I was spoiled on broken bones and nice exits. Even though I had previously caught a .257 115 Partition that went stern to stem on a bedded pronghorn. But I had only shot the 175 Partition previously in my 7RM, and those don't get caught too much! I figured that Nevada doe tag was a good one to try out the BT on. It was for sure the most dramatic kill I ever made. The doe literally did a back flip and landed dead, and that with no CNS impact. But again, the bullet ended up like that having hit nothing but a rib on entry, and in my other notes from that hunt, I just saw the words "thank goodness I didn't hit the shoulder."
I'm no hater on the BT - I have at least 2000 of them in my stocks right now in .243, .264, .284, .308, and .338.
I just had that early one come apart. I fully believe the newer ones are much stronger, as so many folks have had great results with them.

Perhaps if any others who respond here could try to "date-stamp" their experiences and lets see if break-ups seem more prevalent prior to 1995 or so?

Cheers,
Rex

Yes, the jacket held together and you can feel the weight of the base of it when holding it in your hand.

EDIT to add...But I don't want picture perfect retrieved bullets. I want exit holes, with carnage in their wake.

Cheers,
Rex

Then a Partition or Accubond is your huckleberry. It's that simple.

And even then there's no guarantee, as my little anecdote at the top of this thread illustrated! With essentially identical hits on similar sized cow elk, the 150 NBT from my 270 exited, and the 180 NAB from my friends 300 WM did not.

If a guy insists on using a 7mm RM, I'd certainly step up to at least the 150 NBT, and better yet, a 160 of stout construction. Seems to me it's asking a lot of a 140 NBT at 7mm RM speeds.

Indeed. Six of my ten ten kills in 2018-2020 were with ABs, Partitions, or Barnes TSX (2 elk, 2 pronghorn, 2 deer) but the other 4 were with BTs (3 deer, one pronghorn) and those BTs worked fine and penetrated fully, which was what I was trying to add to the OPs question and thread content. But it's only fair to also share the one that came apart on me back in 92, especially since it supports the idea that the BTs have been toughened up over the years.


Regards,
Rex

"But it's only fair to also share the one that came apart on me back in 92, especially since it supports the idea that the BTs have been toughened up over the years."

No, it doesn't support that "idea."

For one thing, it didn't blow up, as you claimed in your first post here. The jacket held together and penetrated sufficiently, and the deer died instantly.

From a 7mm RM at close range that's very consistent to the way 140 Ballistic Tips have worked since they appeared. They're cup-and-cores, so expansion will vary with impact velocity.

Thanks John. I must have misinterpreted your mention of the .284 140BT earlier in this thread. If I understand right, you’re saying that particular bullet is largely unchanged since its intro, is that right? I interpreted it the opposite when I first read your words. I’ll still try to section and old one and a new one week after next when I’m back in my shop, since s couple respondents were interested in that.
And sorry for the choice of words earlier. I reckon “blow up” should be reserved for situations where there is little or no penetration and pretty much bullet disintegration. That one instance was just the only time I had a bullet “come apart and the core break up into probably about a dozen pieces” and it made an impression on me. But as you said it did the job. This is largely due to bullet choice over the years, as I’d never used anything but but partitions and “X” prior to 2018. Well, one exception was one 225 SGK on a pronghorn with the 35 Whelen in 1994, but that of course worked perfectly.

Cheers,
Rex

I think it would be important for you to come to some rational conclusions as to exactly what your hunting bullets are for. That way you can develop some realistic expectations.

You are disappointed in an instant incapacitation because either the bullet didn't exit or it had shed too much weight in the process. You thanked your lucky stars that you didn't hit a shoulder, but since you didn't, you have no idea what the outcome would have been. If the goal isn't instant incapacitation leading to a quick death, what exactly is the goal?

You claim you want exits. You can get them nearly every time with non-expanding flat nose bullets. You will give up instant incapacitation, unless you hit the CNS, but your shots will most effectively break bones, and you will get more exits than using an expanding bullet.