Home Forums Reloading Big Game Rifles Speer Grand Slams

A few years back I picked up a little over 1,000 premium bullets at a gun show for $10.00 a box. Most were Nosler Partition and both versions of the Speer GS. Those were in .284" so I tried some of the older two core bullets in my .280 Rem. One of the easiest hunting loads I've ever worked up. I haven't tried the cup and core new version and probably should see what they'll do.

Most of my experience with Speer has been with the 165 gr. HC in the .308 and the 200 gr. HC in the .300 Win. Mag. Both loads are accurate and have worked very nicely on game.

Most of my shooting and hunting over the years has been with bullets from Sierra. They've always worked for, albeit sometimes a bit messy mangling meat. I've probably taken something like 18 or so deer with the 165 gr. Speer HC and never lost an animal. The 250 gr. Speer is accurate in three different .35 Whelen rifles but Lately I've been using the 225 gr. Barnes TSX bullet on my elk hunts.
PJ

I went to the 140 GS back in my pre handloader days after some poor experiences with the 140 CoreLokt factory load in my 260 Remington. The Nitrex 140 Grand Slam load was the only other factory load besides the Remington offerings at that time.

It was a great upgrade. Shot very well in my rifle and never again had issues with shallow penetration and bullets breaking up. The GS would penetrate in a straight line through bone or whatever else and leave a 1” diameter exit wound. I never caught one in a deer from any angle, 90lb whitetail does to a 300lb mulie buck. On the other hand I never had one of the 140 CL exit a deer, even on a neck shot.

My dad used to load the 130GS in his 270 loads and also had great luck with them. He killed a bunch of whitetail and mule deer and at least one elk. The only one he caught was the one he killed the elk with and it looked like an advertisement picture.

I use the 130's in my 270 Win with good accuracy. My 1885 in 7 Mag loves both the 145 grain and 160 grain Grand Slams.

maybe the typical .007 between the lands and grooves aren't enough to stabilize the bullets.

Like many reloaders I am an overthinker and tend to set about fixing what ain't broke then wishing I hadn't. The recent shortages magnified things.
Speer adds fuel to the fire.
105 grain in my 6mm that shot fair and worked okay but so many deemed them too fragile. They weren't Hot Cores or Grand Slams. Hmm.
Decided to try some 95 Hot Cores but could not get my 6mm to group them. Went to Berger Hybrids and loading was a breeze that happily made one hog unhappy so far.
In my 260 Rem those Gold Dots were a bit fragile for those velocities- or so I read- so I gave them to a Grendel shooter.
Wanted to like Hot Cores so I gave the 140's a try in my 260 and they shoot the same load as my Sierra's. Maybe not "quite" as well but well and at least I could find them. And they were cheap.
Still haven't used them on game yet. Expecting to finally like a Speer!

For not having distinguishers like a plastic point you have to know the difference between a Gold Dot, plain Jane boat tail, Hot-Core, and Grand Slam.....or perhaps the moral is it is better to NOT know and just load up and go shoot.

i use cast bullets almost exclusively for my deer hunting, now that's cheap!!!!

i use Nosler BT and Hornady SST's and when that's run out, i'm going to Speer. i handload Remington m14 in 30 Rem with 150gr Speer FN, TC Contender in 30 Herrett with 130gr Speer HP and a '98 Mauser in 8x57 with 170gr Speer semi SP.

Spent many happy decades as a poor boy, loading Speer 150 gr. Hot-Cor's at ~2800 fps (22" Bbl.) for my .270 Winchester, and then switching to the Nosler Partition in the same weight and load for hunting Season, with little or no POI change.

A while back, decided to replace both with the current production Speer Grand Slam, at the same weight and velocity, albeit ahead of H4831sc instead of the ole reliable IMR 4831 load used with the other bullets.

Can not honestly tell the difference.

That they were bought on sale+mother-ship rebate, at ~ 22¢/pop, was just gravy.

Also got a pile of the Grand Slams in .264/140 gr. while the gittin' was good, and they are also outstanding, ahead of H4831sc as well, at ~2700 fps out of the 24" Bbl'ed Ruger African 6.5x55mm Mauser.

Good controlled expansion cup-n-core bullet.




GR

Put lots of grand slams down range. LOTS of 160gr. 7mm from my 280 into elk, deer, coyotes, bears.

Not the most accurate but well past good enough for game. Performance on game was always very good. I only found one grand slam on the opposite side of my first elk... The rest over following years made Two holes, one in one out.

Then Speer changed the construction 'single core not two' and in doing so in my opinion just made a Speer version of the hornady interlock.

Then Speer for a while did not even offer there hot core 145 or 160 gr. Spitzers. After that stunt, I shifted to mostly nosler for the 7mm bullets and never really looked back.

Speer was once labeled worlds finest bullets..... They are still very good, but I feel the last few years and different ownerships, the bullet line does not seem to have much priority.

I still use them, just not as much as I once did. The hot core and grand slam are deadly, reliable bullets that have filled my freezer many times.

I've never used the grand slams but have used the hot cor's quite a bit and their btsp's in a more limited use. Hot cor's have never failed me when I used them, neither have the btsp but that has only been used in .308 165 gr so can't speak to the rest of them.

Just used a hot cor again this evening. 180 FP in a 35 Remington. Deer went 10 ft.

I’ve used .308” old style grand slams in 150 and 200 grain. Absolutely love them, especially the 200 grainers.

2 species of bear, 2 subspecies of elk, 2 subspecies of moose, caribou, mule deer and whitetail. Likely something else I am missing too.

Never an issue.

Well at least they still have a harder base core, since 88 and a cross section shows more of an interlock than Hornady.

I find it interesting that I very rarely see Speer bullets in stores, maybe 4 boxes. Many stores dont have any Speer bullets. When I started reloading back in the 1970s they were the bullet to use and stores had a big selection. I basically got out of reloading while in the Army and after retiring I picked it back up and I was surprised at the lack of Speer support for reloaders, kind of sad.

I remember those days, full shelves, anything and everything. A lot of things were different before the internet. Now you can go to Speer.com and buy whatever you want, and usually cheaper than a store can sell them. And to be honest, I'd rather do that than pick through what a gun shop thinks will sell. Which is also a problem since the internet began. Stores just won't stock anything they can't move fast, and you likely have to wait until hunting season to buy a hunting bullet.

They’re priced well too. I know I’ve been looking at them again.. just cause I’m cheap

Yessir
It's also a double edged sword
All big box stores and most big companies online
have "buyers " that don't always know anything
about what the company they work for does, and
about the customers that made their company
successful. They have that business degree and
probably some kind of economics degree, but
don't know about the customer base.
Most of the mom and pop stores we used to have
( in this area) were run by people who lived their
business, and were likely as not customers or
employees of similar businesses at one time.

Only example that I can think of on one cup of
coffee is the local academy store.
Went in with an acquaintance to the fishing section.
Turns out that they have a few fly rods and fly
reels, but no fly line of either floating or sinking
nor any leader material nor any flies of any
kind nor fly tying paraphernalia
Kinda like if a gun store had guns, but never
sold any ammunition of any kind or optics

I have been shooting 180 gn Grand Slams in my 300 Wby for several years. They group better than the Sierras I tried and are great on deer. They dodn't tear up as much meat as some of the smaller guns the guys I hunt with use. And the.deer rarely take a step. My family has several 30-06s and I load Speer 165 gn SBTs for all of them. Same load works well for all of them. Good results on the deer as well. Always get 2 holes never have caught one yet. The fact that they are less expensive than some of the other brands is nice.

They have free shipping on orders over 99.00. Been that way for a while. I take advantage often.

Have a few boxes of old 375 Grand Slams.Accurate out of my M70 Stainless.Havn't killed anything with 'em,yet.