Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Express Rifles and Big Bores Only 348 Winchester HAWK bullets

Does anyone here have any experience with 348 Winchester bullets from Hawk on game (bear and moose size, not deer) I have heard varied opinions from good to very bad.

Howdy. I've asked about these bullets (Hawk, not specifically the 348's), on several diferent forums. I think I want to try some of their .430 dia. in my 444. Generally, there has been no response to my questions... Hopefully someone with expreience, good, bad or indifferent, will respond and give us some advice about these bullets.

I think I will be trying out some 0.416 350 gr round nose Hawks here within the next couple of months. I am planning on using the .035" jacket. If they work well I will most likely also use Hawk's 350gr 0.411" bullets in my 405 Win.

I will advise on what I find out, so stay tuned.

AC

A few of the guys over at "accurate" have used them in 45-70 and the 9.3x74 and seem to like them for pigs and deer, I just recieved some for the 33 winchester but haven't had a chance to shoot them yet

Bullets sure are limited in 348.

I have some 230gr from North Fork, so far very accurate, but I have yet to put fur in front of them. I expect them to work just as good as the 30's and 338's I have used.

I use a 235-grain .400-inch Hawk in my .400 Marlin wildcat. Andy makes these bullets velocity-specific. I have not sectioned one, but they appear to be made from a piece of copper tubing left open at both ends. The base is mostly closed, but (at least on mine) are open about 1/3 of the diameter. I'm not driving these at screamin' velocity (about 2400 fps) so jacket/core separation has not been a problem. Most shots are "bang-flops." You can see the longest bang-flop on Realtree's Monster Bucks XI, Vol.2. Body-wise, that was a big deer. The bullet hit just behind the "knuckle" of the shoulder dead-on from 210 yards breaking it. The bullet took a turn upward and to the left taking out a little of the top left lung and some major blood vessels at the top of the heart, then basically followed the spine about 1/3 of the way up the neck.
The closest deer I've shot was a whitetail doe of about 150-lbs live weight at maybe 7 yards. Tough gal. First shot went in behind the on-side shoulder and out the off-side shattering the shoulder. She wheeled and ran and I shot her again at about 15 yards. That bullet went in (from the other side) a couple of inches from the first bullet's exit hole and came out the other side about 2/3 back in the ribs. She ran roughly 50 yards with no heart or lungs.
As for accuracy, they're grouping 1 1/2 inches at 100 yards, which is what this rifle is capable of doing.
I think in your 348 Win., you'll be satisfied. As for Hawk bullets in cartridges with high velocity, I have no experience and can't comment.

Gentlemen, pardon me for jumping this thread.
---------------------------

Mr Mayer,
Do you have any reloading data for your .400 with 300 - 350 grain bullets?

Expat

I shot my moose witha 350gr/.035 .416 HAWK out of my .416 Taylor at about 2400 fps. Hit him on point of shoulder, shattered the shoulder joint bullet went all the way to diaphragm, my guess 4 feet or a little more total penetration. Even with hitting the shoulder square on the joint bullet held together and continued in straight line, actually only lost 8-10 pounds of meat to "bloodshot" which really ain't much in a moose shoulder.

Have found them very accurate in my Taylor and a couple other cartridges. We also shot one(350 FP out of .50AE Desert Eagle) lengthwise through a SUBURBAN but that is another story.

NEAT!

I did a little development with the 300 grainers while at NRA. According to the pressure equimpent and chronograph available, 48.0 grains of AA2230 produced an average of 1933 fps at 40,000 psi.
49.0 grains of IMR3031 produces an average of 2019 fps at 43,900 psi.
I chose 44K as my max pressure because the gun I'm using comes chambered also in .444 Marlin, and that is its max.
I ran out of 300-grain bullets before getting to where I wanted to be, but believe AA2230 appears to be the road to take for the most velocity at the lowest pressure. Keep in mind, also, that this is with an 18 1/2 inch barrel.
Data that I HAVE NOT TESTED, but is calculated using "Load From A Disk" suggests the following:
Powders:IMR3031, RX15, H335, AA2230, S3032, WW748, N201
Charge wt (grains)/ Velocity (fps)/ Pressure (psi)
39.4/1700/30700
42.0/1800/34900
44.6/1900/39300
47.2/2000/44000
49.9/2100/49200*
52.5/2200/54500*
*WARNING--HIGH PRESSURE--REFERENCE ONLY

Thanks Scott. From a '22 inch barrel this is the practical equivalent of a .405 Win, which is kind of the standard I was looking for. As you referenced using .40 S&W bullets, am I correct in saying the bullets the .400 requires are a bit smaller than that of the .405 Win?

Expat

Yes. This one uses .400 inch bullets, while .405 Win. uses .411 inch bullets. You can also use jacketed .406-inch bullets intended for the .401 Win. or .40-65 Win., but you have to lube them up and push them through a .400-inch Lee sizing die. Trying to size the .405 Win. bullets is too much sizing and the lead extrudes from the nose. Brass is made by annealing the neck area of .450 Marlin brass and running it into the .400 sizing die and then thinning the neck. And yes, it's essentially the same as the .405 Win., but from the Guide Gun platform.
Clymer makes the reamers, Redding makes the dies if you're interested.
I chose .400 because most of the .416 bullets are built w/ the .416 Rem Mag or Rigby in mind and are too tough to perform at this velocity, and I wanted to be able to use it on whitetails. Believe it or not, I've killed two caribou using 180-grain Hornady XTP Mag pistol bullets in this thing. I figured if they were good enough to sabot and shoot caribou with a .45-cal muzzleloader, they should be good enough for the .400 Marlin. If you look at findarticles.com, you'll find one by me called North To Ungava that has this caribou hunt in it. First caribou took it through both shoulder blades at 110 yards. One of the other hunters was watching through binos from a couple of hundred yards away and said that at the shot, a "hose" of blood squirted out of the offside. That animal walked in a couple of circles and layed down dead.
The second one I shot from about 40 yds. the bullet (again a 180-grain Hornady XTP Mag. smashed the heck out of both shoulders and the caribou "bang-flopped." I recovered it under the skin on the offside among the shattered shoulder. It's about the diameter of a quarter and about as thick as one, too.

Scott,
Thanks for the reply. Just out of curiosity, why didn't you neck it to .411 so you could use the bullets from Hornady, Barnes and North Fork etc make for the .405? Seems it operates in the same general velocity range.

Scott,
Thanks for the reply. Just out of curiosity, why didn't you neck it to .411 so you could use the bullets from Hornady, Barnes and North Fork etc make for the .405? Seems it operates in the same general velocity range.

Expat

I was anticipating that the .45-cal muzzleloader market would take off better than it did and that there would be a better selection of .400-inch bullets for use in .45-cal. sabots. I'm NOT a small bullet/high velocity proponent, but wanted to have comparatively light weight, lightly constructed and inexpensive bullets for whitetail and there just aren't any in .411 diameter.