Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Africa Recommend an "All Around .375 Softpoint"

300 woodleigh, north fork and a frame in that order.

Funny how the Woodleigh is now the old dugga boy in the herd. Fame is earned, good or otherwise.

Switching between TSX and any other bullets is inviting trouble with excessive fouling. I have found that mixing the TSX with other bullets creates copper fouling in some barrels, which includes all of mine except the 30/06 with the PacNor barrel.

As far as opening and the 150lb animal a leopard, it's no problem with the 270 at 2800. It's so cleanly crumpled and created massive internal damage to animals like impala, blesbok, and lions, that they will have no problem doing the job your asking of it.

Softs like the Aframe are probably the perfect bullet in the 250-270 weight. The key for an animal that is this size is speed. High velocity will create the best result on an animal like a leopard. This is not the animal that you want to shoot with a solid that offers up minimal impact and lets an agile and fast animal like a cat to vanish and give you a ton of heartburn in your search.

Maximum "shock and impact" is the best choice here. The 270 TSX provides this with maximum velocity. 2800fps should be easy to get, even Hornady Factory ammo shoots the 270's at well over 2800fps in a 28" barrel. The beauty of the 270grain is that it's as good on the really big stuff too

I have heard this complaint on excessive fouling on switching between pure copper and gilding metal. I'm sure its been a problem for some folks, but I have never experienced this--not even on switching between 200 gr Hornady FP at 2550 fps and Barnes Originals 250 gr at 2200 fps in a Model 71. The only excessive fouling problems I've ever had were with the early X bullets (I've used them since 1990). Otherwise, I've not had this problem on switching with literally dozens of rifles. YMMV

HSetters

My story parrallels yours. 175 gr 338 in late 80's at 3150 ft/sec were good for only 10 rounds before cleaning. I had brushes for fouling the barrel of my target rifles, and after using them on the 338 I could go 20 rounds before cleaning.

My Tikka has shot over 200 rounds since last cleanning and there has been no loss of accuracy and no visible fowling. I use hornady 165 and barnes 168 on about an equal ratio so far.

Randy

Same experience here Randy...and like you guys and JJ,I had a bad time with fouling in original X bullets...the TSXs...not at all, and Ive a number of rifles I switch back and forth between the TSXs and "practice" bullets

Ingwe

I have had rifle barels that liked fouling. Had a .416 Weatherby that fouled badly when using the 1st generation X bullets. I cleaned it back to bare metal and it thought it was a shotgun.

After letting it foul to the point of seeing the copper "very" clearly with the naked eye, it shot its tightest groups.

Never took cleaning too seriously after that. If the gun shoots, it shoots.

JW

Monolithics are Obama bullets (no lead) it's just the principle of the thing! Shades of California!

I would pick the 300 grain Trophy Bonded Bear Claw or Swift A-Frame. I've used both on everything from duikers to buffalo with excellent success.