Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Is this bullet a "Failure"?

The photo below shows a 286grn Barnes X from 9.3x62mm which was recovered from the spine of a Warthog after it was headshot from about 70 paces.

I estimate that its muzzle velocity of this load is 2400fps and upon recovery, the bullet had a retained weight of 237grains.

As you can see from the picture, the bullet has lost three of its four petals.

Would you consider this a "failure" ?

Regards,

Pete

I am not an expert on warthogs. but it appears to have done it's job.I would say it did not fail. any other opinions would be appericated..Herb

Pete,

I beleive that all bets are off for that perfect 4 petal mushroom on the Barnes X (any any other bullet for that matter) when you hit bone nearly throughout the path of the bullet. It sounds as if no significant amount of "soft" tissue was hit. The soft tissue is where the expansion would take place. I bet that pig didn't go very far though!

I short, I do not view this as a bullet failure and based upon the amount of bone hit, I am happy to see the level of retained weight.

BigBullet

Gents,

This was the only bullet recovered on a variety of game from warthog to kudu. Most were taken at less than ideal angle's but the bullets still exited. The only other "strange" result I got was another warthog. The shot was a relatively close quartering one which again exited, but the animal went about 250 yards before being found. There was virtually no blood trail just a few specs after 80 yards. On examination the exit wound looked pretty much the same as the entrance wound. It is the small exit would & lack of a blood trail that I really did not like..

One of the complaints I often hear about Barnes X is they "pencil" through game, hence my post..I realise two incidents are not enough to judge a bullet by, but it just leaves some nagging questions. On the other animals, it performed very well leaving a really good blood trail. These bullets also group well in my 9.3x62 hovering just under the 1" if I do my part...

Regards,

Pete

IMO, The bullet did not fail because you were able to recover it from the animal. It sounds like you put the bullet through a lot of bone which makes any bullet's task difficult.
I would think that sheding petals would create secondary projectiles, enhancing the shock and wounding capabilities of the bullet.

I have not used the Barnes bullets because I am a Nosler fan.
Having said that, I feel that the Barnes bullet did a great job for you.
Congratulations on your succesful hunt.

Regards,

JD338

Pete,

If I may add another comment, I believe to truely judge the bullets that passed through the animal, its important to do an autopsy. Look at the path of the bullet, determine the degree of disruption/destruction and then make a judgement weather the bullet passed or failed. Was the path what you expected by looking at the entrance and exit points?

For instance, Nosler Partitions are the bullet we judge the others by, but frequently they leave a very small exit wound. Now if we did an autopsy, we would see the the front 30% of the bullet expanded (creating damage), folded back and then lost the "petals" and just the shank continued leaving only a caliber size hole on the exit.

I have used the 225 grain Barnes X on 2 safaris and plan to use them again this year in my 35 Whelen, I cannot be happier with the results to date on about 10 head of game. I have recovered only one bullet thus far, and it was that perfect 4 petal mushroom shape.

BTW, I hit a rather smallish warthog (about 100 lbs) behind the shoulders, blood everywhere! A blind man could have followed the trail as the width of blood had to be three feet. That little pig ran a good 75-100 yards and it inards were hanging out the last 25 yards, we could see were they were dragging. They are tough little critters.

BigBullet

Is the warthog dead? That's the criteria, for me....

Thats what I was going to say.

I don't think the bullet "failed" because the animal was put down quickly. However, it sure isn't what I want in a bullet. That bullet apparently didn't do a whole lot more than what a solid would have done. That's why I think the X's real forte is in game larger than, say, 800 pounds.

For what the bullet encountered it performed as designed. I've shot everything from 50 pound deer to 800 pound antelope and never had anything but success with the X. Loading them for folks safaris and they have the same results.

The thing that I want is that pencil through if large bone is hit or the angle is tough. You cannot have expansion, destruction and penetration all with one bullet. So I'll take a bit of expansion but for sure penetration.

Trailing an animal is part of the job and I look forward to that also. Part of the hunt to me really.

So if I stick the bullet where it belongs and get a bit of expansion I've got a dead animal.

Blood trails are so iffy anyway. Hit an animal in the same place 10 times (excepting CNS hits) and you may get 10 different results and 10 different blood trails.

Where I continue to be impressed is that where no large bone is hit on large animals like Eland etc.... the few recovered bullets have been 100% retention and 4 petals intact.

I'd say the bullet pictured did just fine.

Jeff

Pete E:

"I realise two incidents are not enough to judge a bullet by, but it just leaves some nagging questions."

Only one way out of this, Pete. You're just going to have to go back there and shoot some more wart hogs. You'll get your answer.

I agree with Arns9. Where and what I hunt expansion is much more important to me than penetration. Unless at wounded game I don't shoot THS or extreme angle shots. There are no dangerous game. The game is smallish deer and pigs to around 250lbs. I prefer most of the energy to be expended inside the animal. that weight, that many are so uptight at loosing, is usually doing what it should do. Helping kill the animal. capt david <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

DEAD IS DEAD. and that warthog wouldnt have known the difference from that bullet or on one that retained all 4 petals

Yep.

BTW - what rifle is the 9.3? Where are the pics of the rifle and critters?

I think the bullet did exactlywhat Barnes brags about, it penetrated heavy bone farther than any pther bullet would have and created a dramatic one shot kill.
Kudos to barnes.( and the shooter)

Been my experience that American hogs don't bleed much anyway so I wouldn't judge the bullet harshly much on the second shot. As to the first, looks like hair or pocket lint on the bullet, your retained weight figure is suspect. You didn't say which part of the spine the bullet was recovered from, neck, thorax, lumbar...how much penetration?

Tongue in cheek BTW, I'd load some more if I were you. Or maybe get a bigger gun for more fun. Bigger bullets are easier to find.

I'm with this dude.

Gents,

Thanks for the comments; i always enjoy listening to other folks opinions on a subject like this...

All in all, I was very happy with the Barnes X . Also, I am very glad I decided to get the 9.3x62mm as many of the shot opportunities just would not have been viable if I had been using my .308win.

The availability of 9.3 bullets is not that good here in the UK and our stupid laws make getting hold of uncommon stuff even more difficult. Still, I would like to try some alternative premiums "just because" but if I was forced to stick with just the Barnes X I could easily live with that!

The rifle used was a CZ550 American. It has a very plain jane stock, but works wonderfully. This is the second however, as the first was returned to CZ due to its bolt binding slightly. They come with a 3 year warrenty in the UK and CZ swapped it without any problems even after I had free floated the barrel.

Anyway, this particular rifle will group the Barnes X just under the 1" and it just seems to fit me pertectly. I will probably re finish the stock, but I don't expect any great improvement in looks as the wood has little pattern to it...

For those interested, I posted some pics of the animals taken over in the African section a little while back:



Thread In African Forum

Regards,

Pete

Out of the numerous Barnes X's (both standard and TS) my wife and I have shot into game, very few have been recovered--and only one looked lihe yours.

This was a 120-grain plain X from a 6.5x55, started at just under 3000, which hit a big axis deer in the shoulder joint as it quartered toward me at about 120 yards. The deer ran 34 steps and keeled over. The bullet was recovered from under the flank skin, retaining 77% of its weight, minus all petals but well-expanded. In fact, it hit the bone so hard the shank even expanded slightly behind the "mushroom."

To me this is wonderful performance.

Have yet to have an X "pencil" through without expanding, but then we tend to match the bullet to the game, which cannot always be done in Africa. We tend to use 100-120 grain X's out of .257's and 6.5x55's on deer, 140-180 grainers on elk-sized game, and 225+ X's on the really big stuff of over 1000 pounds. In every case all has worked perfectly.

I do believe that when deer-hunting with X's (or Fail Safes or Trophy Bondeds) you're better off with around 3000 fps muzzle velocity, because it provides noticeably more damage than lower velocities. Have never had to trail anything more than 40 yards when hit with an X (or Fail Safe) but then again we have somehow always managed to hit them right, something that hasn't always happened with some other bullets.

It is a little odd to me that these days bullet "failure" is often connected to a bullet that killed perfectly, while penetrating all the way through, or ending up on the far side or somewhere deep within the animal. But the poor bullet gets a grade of "F" because it didn't retain 90% of its weight, or lost the front core, or dropped a petal or two.

I may be wrong, but to me bullet failure occurs when the bullet doesn't penetrate to the vitals and fails to kill the animal. Have seen this a few times--occasionally with very expensive bullets--and so have graded those bullets "F" and wil never use them again.

MD

MD,
I'm with you on the performance of this bullet, out of curiosity which bullets have been graded "F" in the past.
Martin