Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Anybody have experience with the 115 Ballistic Tip/257 Weatherby?

Just curious if this bullet holds up ok at ranges under 150 yards on thinner skinned game? Noslers site advertises 3100 fps as the max optimum speed.

My Vanguard loves this bullet, but at 3400 fps I'm curious if it may be a little fragile at Weatherby speeds under 150 yards. I will primarily be shooting Texas Whitetails and hogs(not exactly thin skinned, I know).

Anyone, have input on this.

Thanks all.

just my 2cents but i think if you would drop down to the 110gr accubond or step up to the 115gr partition you should be good to go. i havent got to shoot any deer or game with the 110 gr accubond out of my .257wby but i did some expansion tests at 75 yds. test media was wet newspaper stacked inside a cardboard box. and the accubond beat all the bullets that i tested. when i say beat i mean the accubond had nicer mushrooms and retained more weight. the other bullets i tested it with where the ballistic tip, the hornady sst, the hornady btsp,and the sierra gameking boattail. i would gladly post all the results and exact numbers as far as weight retension and mushroom size, but alas the notebook i had them written in ended up in the garbage on cleanup day.

I've not used the 115 NBT @ 3400 but my guess would be it'd be just fine.

Or put another way, if I was running a 257 Wby I'd not worry one bit about elk with the 115 NBT if that helps any.

3400 is running awfully warm though, especially if your rifle has a 24" barrel. What are your burning for a load?

Gracias

Dober

Thanks for the replys guy's.

Mark...Just using the Weatherby factory load. It's advertised at 3400fps. I haven't chrono'd my gun yet with this load, but I've seen where a few folks tested the 115 BST out of a Vanguard and it actually averaged a skosh over 3400. With that in mind, I figured I was probably getting somewhere close to that.

I shot 1 deer with that bullet in 2002 out of a .257 Roberts at about 2820 fps. Hit a doe in the throat patch below the chin at about 80 yards, and she ran off. I tracked her for 1/2 mile until she got on adjoining property. The landowner killed her 3 days later. Not sure if the bullet hit a branch and opened/slowed prior to hitting her, or if it just fragmented on impact but the result was a very shallow wound. I don't know if the bullets are made the same today or if I got a bad bullet, but I stopped using it then and there, and went to a 120 gr. solid base, which did not to open on the next deer I shot and recovered. Your mileage may vary.

That is a rockin, if Wby lists it as such I'd guess they're probably getting it. If you get around to clocking it let us know what it runs.

Dober

My wife shot an average-body-size whitetail buck in West Virginia a couple of years ago with a .257 Roberts handload using the 115 BT, started at just about 3000 fps. The range was about 20 FEET, not yards. The bullet hit in the crease at the rear of the shoulder and exited, leaving a 3/4" hole, making a mess of the insides.

It is is pretty tough bullet these days, which is my experience with big game Ballistic Tips in general.

If your rifle does get the advertised 3400 (and generally found Weatherby ammo is close to what's claimed), then velocity would be around 3150 at 100 yards. I wouldn't worry too much about that velocity level, but at 20 feet it might be a bit much.

Not the 257 weatherby, but my roberts loves them and my son took a whitetail doe at about 250 yards with a straight in the shoulder shot which was a complete pass through and a bang flop. This was in 2009.

I took a 10 point this year with it a about 75 yards. A true to life texas heart shot that resulted in a bang flop. Bullet did not exit and I didnt find it. Suprisingly there was very litte meat damage. I dont know what this load chronys. I feel like they are a pretty touph bullet.

Will do.

Thanks John. Good info.

Haven't used them on game yet, but my .257 Wby sure does like them accuracy wise. With any luck, I'll be able to report back on how they perform on both pigs and Whitetail after this weekend.

John

I've shot a lot of them into whitetails from a 25saum. 61 or 62 grains of H1000 and 27 inches of barrel. I also gave the 110 accubond a try. I can't see any difference and have never had either one stay in a deer. Also never had to shoot one twice or track any. Most recent was a doe killed Jan 7 across a wheat field. The bullet went in the right side just under the spine and thu the top part of the shoulder blade and out the left side about the last rib. NO big gapping holes on either side.

Thsnks headspace. What kind of velocity are you getting with that combo?

a .25saum sounds real interesting i would like to hear a bit more about it myself

H1000 and 115 BT and standard primers goes 3385 average.
110 accubonds do a little better but they really like R25 in this rifle. 3400 or a little more with either is all it wants and still shoot, and not enlarge primer pockets. That's more than enough tho for what I do with it.

lmartin, unless you are determined to spend a lot of money and need a project, just buy a weatherby. I began this rifle in '03 and made a lot of dumb mistakes, but managed to come out all right and kept busy anyway.
140s in an STW, and 95s in a 6x284, and 115s in this 25saum all have trajectories about the same. My vote for the best of all goes to the 6x284 because it costs less to burn up a Lilja barrel with it than with the bigger boys.
If you need more info I'll go into details of all the things I did wrong with the saum.

well i would like to hear more about it if you dont mind sharing.
i already have a .257wby in a vanguard but i have been enamored by the thought of building a short action 257 magnum for a while already , been thinking heavily on a .25-300wsm but i am kinda a remington guy and always have liked the rsaums. the biggest thing holding me back is lack of info from people who have actually done one or currently have one.if i were to do one i would like to get with someone who has done one so i can avoid the pitfalls and also i would like to use a smith who has experiance doing this very thing. i know a lot of people will say just keep the weatherby and run with it but i like the short mags

I'll start a thread in custom rifles so as not to sidetrack this one.

Well, I ended up using 115gr VLDs instead of Bal Tips this weekend. FWIW, shot three pigs with the VLDs. 1st was 160 yard broadside. Left a half dollar sized exit wound and the most pronounced blood trail I have ever seen... All 20 yards of it. I mean it was as if someone had taken a paint gun and sprayed the grass in a two foot wide swath for the entire 20 yard death run. The next was running dead away as fast as she could go and I made about as perfect a butt shot as you could ask for at a lasered 283 yards. She dropped right there, squealed to high heaven for a few seconds and then was done. No exit wound but I had a pretty good ideal of what it looked like inside her and wasn't curious enough to deal with the messy autopsy. Victim # 3 was a pretty darned big sow, about 200 pounds. She was the biggest wild sow I have ever seen. It was getting pretty darn dark, and I hit her just a little far back at about 200 yards. She ran maybe a little less than 100 yards. No exit wound. I have seen pigs so hit make it much farther, so I was reasonably impressed.

Still plan on testing the Ballistic Tips. They shoot a little more accurately than the VLDs out of my .257 Wby, but that report will have to wait for another time.

John

I like the 115’s also, hell on deer and pigs.

3000 FPS with a Bob? That's cooking with grease. I shoot a 115 BT from my 22 in Ruger at @ 2800 FPS with 44 gr of imr4350.