Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters sst vs standard interlock

Sorry trying to respond to a pm... and got crossed up.

How does the FTX compare to the interlock/SST?

Do you guys realize this thread was started over a decade ago?

Day late and a dollar short.

7MM:

154 sst vs 154 Interlock flat base

154 sst is a great deer bullet out of the 7 Mag that I have found, 63.0g of IM/r4350@ 3100 fps.

Now numerous elk have fallen with the 154g Interlock flat base, 72-73g of R#25 @ 3200+ fps, win mag primer in Rem, Win, and Browning abolts, 7 mags.

The 154g Interlock will shoot hole through both shoulders on a 250 lb boar, broadside shots...nuff said. The 154 SST dumps a lot of energy on the animal and none of them had a surface splash from 50-400 yards.

The 154g Interlock flat base thinks it is a partition.

EastMS explained what happened in his second post. He posted in this thread by accident.

Yes, I know--but apparently most of the responders since then never read (or understood) his post. Instead they kept responding to the OP's question--which he'd already resolved way back when.

My comment was partly due to the SST having evolved somewhat since 2010. Back then it had already changed considerably from the original version, but in recent years my experience is that it's at least as tough as the Interlock.

However, apparently none of that matters much on threads like this, whether started today or whenever, since the responses always include several essentially saying, "I used an SST when they first came out, and never again!"

Both bullets shoot/perform just fine. Like them both but use SST when range or wind might be a factor.

Well, since this general topic pops up fairly often and the revived thread is half off the rails anyway I'll pitch in another $.02 only slightly related. Good of place as any.

I started my son out with a 7mm-08 because the .243 I started out with had a habit of not getting exits with standard 100gr cup and cores. Along the same lines I decided to have him use Hornady's American Whitetail ammo due to many good comments on the toughness of the 139gr Interlock.

His first deer ends up being a spike going 130ish on the hoof, the thing comes around the corner of our pop up blind quartering away at less than 15 yards. When he gets on it it's about 20 yards out, at the shot it mule kicks and takes off towards some thick stuff. The buck only made it about 40 yards where we found it easily despite no blood trail and not seeing it go down. Turns out the bullet hit about 2-3" behind the near left side ribs and angled forward into the offside shoulder, no exit. Lungs were liquified.

Cutting it up in the garage I found the empty jacket in between the ribs and right side scapula, no trace of the core. I realized that the impact velocity would have been pretty high due to the closeness of the shot, but the fact that came apart before striking bone surprised me a little.

I wouldn't go so far to say that it was a bullet failure, just that the same result probably would have occurred if I'd started him with my old .243. Basically it confirms what Mule Deer keeps mentioning, that that similar cartridges are more alike than not. Probably goes for bullets too.

It would seem to me like it would help if when companies adjust the make-up of a bullet they would indicate on the box that a change has been made and offer a siteto visit or a phone# or address to contact that would explain the change.

5sdad,

That's rare. In fact I can only recall as few companies that did something like that, Swift with the Scirocco and Scirocco II--and even then there was some fudging, at least in the gun-writer world.

When Sciroccos were introduced, they were promoted as a higher-BC "deer" bullet, since Swift already made an excellent heavy-game bullet, the A-Frame. When the SIIs appeared a few years later, I was informed personally by a higher-up at Swift that the SIIs were tougher, because so many hunters used them on game larger than deer, due to the BC. But the editor of one of the magazines I write regularly for told me the same guy claimed the SIIs were designed to open up wider, to make a bigger hole in deer, which reduces penetration. (My experience is the first explanation the difference is correct.)

The other company was Barnes, when they introduced the TSX, which solved a couple of problems common with the original X-Bullet, both accuracy and fouling. That said, in my experience they'd pretty much solved the accuracy variations by then--though not the fouling.

Would guess the reasons most bullet companies don't announce changes in hunting bullets is that most hunters would insist on buying the "new and improved" version, even it wouldn't make any difference for their hunting (and might not work as well) as the previous version.

The FTX is an Interlock

John - thanks for the reply. I would be the one hoping that the price on the "old" bullets would drop as I would scoop them up in a heartbeat over the new and improved bullets.

Yes, the FTX bullets have an interlock ring, but so do the SSTs. The FTX is an entirely different bullet than the "standard" IL It has a soft tip so as to function safely in tubular magazine rifles, to wit::

"Hornady® FTX® bullets revolutionized lever gun ballistics, creating a new level of performance for these popular firearms. Lever gun enthusiasts can now harness the accuracy, power and long-range performance of a tipped bullet that's safe to load in tubular magazines.

Hornady® offers the same Flex Tip® technology for handguns that revolutionized lever guns. Typical hollow point pistol bullets deliver good performance at modest velocities, but have a tendency to expand too quickly and sacrifice penetration at the higher velocities achieved with lever action guns".

Great info, thanks John.