Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters I'd like to discuss the Barnes TSX.

rost,

I wouldn't use a VLD on a raking shot. They simply don't penetrate far enough. They are good on any shot that enters the rib cage, though.

Whether they exit or not depends a lot on the size of the animal. They'll almost always exit on animals up to about 150 pounds or so,the reason I am pretty particular about bullet placement if I want the meat. On a broadside rib shot they work fine, which is their forte. Size of the bulet has some effect too. I am quite happy with bullets like the 115 .25 and 140 6.5 on deer. They kill well but if they do exit don't make near as much of a mess on the other side.

but as the animals get bigger it's less likely. Of the four 400-pound red stags taken in New Zealand, for instance, two bullets exited and two didn't. (The stags that retained the bullets died quicker, by the way, though they all died pretty darn quickly.) But even if the bullet--or, more likely, bullet parts--does exit on a bigger animal often the meat damage isn't much because it's slowed down so much.

The non-hunting version may not kill as quickly as the hunting version, by the way. Dunno, as i have only used the hunting version.

The VLD's might not fit your shooting. I use them but only for certain types of hunting--just as I also use the TSX (and TTSX) for only for certain types of hunting.

The TSX that failed to expand is very likely to have tumbled upon hitting the bear.

If you look carefully you may notice that one of the bullets is slightly banana shaped.

A bullet is much more difficult to keep travelling head on in animal tissue than in the air, that meaning that a too slow twist may not be detected while shooting on paper.

A bullet with some yaw due to an improper twist that impacts at a less than ideal angle is very likely to tumble.

Ingwe, the bronz-ish look is just because of the light and how the pictures came from the camera.

Rost495, the 6.5s are 120, the 7mms are 150gr, the .308s are 180gr... not really light for caliber, specially in the days of 110gr .277s or 130gr 308s. Not heavy, either. And another thing, if there was no difference between killing an nimal dead where he was standing and killing him anywasy, we would all be shooting solids.

Best regards,

BBerg

Yea, but did it tumble because it didnt expand in the first place? My guess is yes.I dont think twist has anything to do with it.

Methinks twist is the root of many evils.

No, I don't believe incomplete penetration equates with bullet failure. Non-expansion can, as you noted elsewhere, be disasterous.

I really do believe that good old fashion cup and core bullets have their place. It depends upon impact velocity and game. I do some custom loading for bean field deer hunters here in western KY and most have had great success with (gasp!) Nosler ballistic tips. Most of these deer are shot well in excess of 200 yards. And most drop dead immediately regardless of the existence of exit wounds.

I started using X bullets because when I lived in WV because it was not unusual to kill deer off the end of a gun barrel at the end of a deer drive. I learned pretty quickly that your common Core-Lokt would distentegrate on impact.

As you can see, my experience is mostly on the smaller North American stuff (no moose or brown bear yet). Since I am on my way to my first Eland hunt (Namibia in July), I would be interested to what you would think about a 250gr TSX in my Sako Mannlicher (20" barrel) .375. I figure I will get around 2600 fps or so out of it. The only other thing I used this rilfe on was bear where I used a 300 gr Hornady RN at 2400 fps. This worked pretty well too, but I would like to be able to potentially take a 300 yard shot without the attendant holdover required by a 300 gr bullet. Anyway, the comments and suggestions of the Campfire crowd would be most welcome.

Thank you for your description of the Berger. That does answer some of my questions. For some reason or another, I was under the impression that the Berger held together. As long as the vitals are destroyed, that's all that matters.

BWalker,

All expanding bullets tumble much more than most hunters realize. It may have something to do with twist, especially with a solid, but not much with an expanding bullet.

OK...we need to petition the guys at "Time Warp" on the discovery channel to slo mo some TSXs at different speeds and twist rates....cause I can sure see how they wouldnt open if they hit at an oblique...

Interesting theory guys....made me think too...

Ingwe

Does a 10 twist per foot twist faster when it enters the animal. I don't understand the statement. The rate of turn should never change right? If a bullet leaves a barrel turning at 10 turns per foot it will do this until it strikes something or hits dirt. I've been loading some of these TSX bullets and I do see increased speeds coming out my 378 ==300 TSX. ONly problem is that I have a band exactly at COAL and it gets the odd grimp which pisses me off.

Expanding bullets tend to tumble because the "mushroom" makes them less stable. The front end becomes bigger than the rear end, so they act more less like an open umbrella pointed into the wind. This can stay mushroom forward, but if anything tilts them somewhat sideways they can flip around and tumble.

This isn't often seen when testing in media because most test media is homogeneous, so there's nothing to upset the equilibrium of the bullet. But it happens quite a bit inside animals. In fact, it's quite possible for a bullet to tumble completely and end up mushroom-forward under the hide on the far side, like a car that flips and ends up on its tires again.

A bullet is less likely to tumble if a long shank remains behind the mushroom, but it still happens now and then. Bullets that mushroom widely and end up looking like an irregular ball or a really short mushroom, are of course more likely to tumble.

A lot of this doesn't really matter because a tumbling bullet still tears hell out of an animal's insides. In fact it might very well do more damage.

I have seen some threads on the Campfire where somebody found a bullet that was rear-end front when recovered on the far side of an animal, and the poster then went into a rant about how they would never use that bullet again because it tumbles. Trouble is, I have heard that about almost every bullet on the market.

Just today I was talking to Charlie Sisk, who had recommended TSX's to a guy for a pig hunt in Texas. The first pig shot was a big boar and the bullet stopped under the hide on the far side, shank end out. The guy was realy upset and swore he would never use that dang bullet again, even though the pig died very quickly.

Or the lack thereof

John......Thanks for the input..Ive seen some of that phenomena myself...

But what I was thinkin is that the bullet may be yawing before impact,setting off a tumble instead of a 'shroom on impact...


Does that sound plausible??


Ingwe

I'm convinced of it.

If a bullet is yawing severely before impact it usually doesn't open. I have seen this with more than one brand of bullet too. Generally it has to hit something else before it hits the animal for this to happen, though.

Ok John....even if the twist/speed isnt right to stabilize, and our intrepid hunter is awash in ignorant bliss???


( its been known to happen....)


Ingwe

Not what I'd assumed, you are right, decent weights for caliber. Squashes one theory that way anyway.
Of course I'll agree to disagree on the DRT thing. I'm much more complete penetration since you never know what a bullet does upon impact, etc.... I'm a boy scout -- prepare for the worst, accept the best. I am tied up in good bullets that will penetrate stem to stern, more so than how they open up. IE I'd rather work a hole through the complete animal, than risk a big hole in only one lung type of deal. As JB states some of the bullets are not good for raking shots and since I can't control what I might get or not....

Anyway IMHO too many folks are also to tied to having DRT. Kinda pizzes me off since it appears they are too lazy to track, don't know how to track etc... Tracking after the shot is part of the hunt to me. And even if the animal falls right there its rarely instantly dead anyway so bleed out and thrash in place or run a short ways and keel over, its all the same to me.
Now if its a nice deer to clean that I'm worried about I'll head shoot em every time and that is a DRT. But I do it since its so much nicer to clean on than having the gore blown all through the cavity.

Just my different take on life.

BTW I agree on slow twists, I err on the fast side if I have a choice and have rarely seen anything negative from that.

Jeff,

If you like to track 'em, then you've chosen the perfect bullet for your style of hunting!

Sorry. Couldn't resist. Carry on gents.

Jeff, both,

One of the virtues, perhaps the major one, of the X type bullet is that they don't generally do a lot of generalized damage but push it out over a longer narrow path. (I have long likened bullet damage to balloons; most cored bullets make a somewhat round balloon shape area of trauma while the monoliths make the skinny, shape-tying type balloon path.) And, as has been pointed out a number of times, they don't as often bloody up a whole bunch of meat. This means that a person can drive them through parts of an animal that one might prefer to avoid with a cored bullet: bones, in other words. Used this way, I always thought, based on experience soley with the earlier X versions, that they had a high rate of quicker drops and very rapid, humane kills. (Barnes was never much impressed by anything I shared in regard to such experience, or perhaps they were too busy to respond to silly snail mail.)

One thing you can't count on when hunting the bigger animals is that impact energy will impress a creature. Often, especially if a first bullet is absorbed without severe reaction, a large animal can take a tremendous amount of bullet energy. The one thing that will certainly affect them, however, is to break major bones. A number of bullets are capable of that, but the Barnes and similar designs, I'm sure, must be at the top of the heap in doing such deeds with aplomb.

I had this very problem with 22-250 with 55 gr. bulllets;
they would hit a blade of grass, and actually go unstable, and 'detonate'; (the bullet actually explodes) (it cant keep it's self together)