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Just got around to posting this. Recovered this from a doe I shot about a month ago.

170 yds, head on, entered in her chest, recovered in rear ham. She did the rear leg "push/plow" for about 20 yds.

260 Rem. 3130 MV average on chrono.



Bill

Nice!!!

Did you weight it?

No, I didn't, but will. I'm guessing 99 gr+.

Model Perfecto

Dober

I recovered a 53grn (.223) TSX from a 275 pound boar hog once...barely.

You think so Mark?

Not saying your wrong by any means buddy, just this one and a few other animals taken with said bullet have got me thinking. I'll report my thoughts later.

Bill

deadliest mushroom in the woods.

Did not expand as much as the 6.5mm 120gr TTSX that I have recovered from game, in spite of the 120 grainers beeing launched 200fps slower.

Are they constructed differently to limit expansion?

Looks great!

Nice Bill. I'm planning on converting my 257Bob AI to 100gr TTSX's soon and 140's in my .280.

Bill, I'm with you on this one... at 170 yards launched at 3,100 I'd expect better expansion. At least peeling the petals all the way back to the bottom of the air cavity. What would it look like at 400+ yards?

It's that sort of performance (among other far worse) that puts me off the whole expanding/solid concept as it exists presently...

But congrat's on the kill...

tx270,

You said it was a head on shot. Aside from entering the chest cavity is there any bone that it hit at all? "Guts" are not an expansion limiter, but I doubt they get expansion rolling like bone....

JCMCUBIC,
They expand fairly well when shot into water, or gelatin, without hitting any bone.
BBerg

You read my mind Brad.

When I get a chance, I'll post a pic of that bullet next two an unfired one. I would say expansion went down maybe 1/4 the length of the bullet. ALOT of hollow point was left down in that hole.

Now let me say I'm absolutely not a person to judge a bullet by an example of one. And after having taken over 100 whitetails and mule deer plus other game (including over 150 hogs of various sizes) over the last thirty years I've seen some strange things happen that normally wouldn't.

What bothers me a little is the same week I double shoulder shot a 100 lb or so hog at about 80 yds with same load. The hog stiffened up and ran about 15 yards. Yes, after taking a bullet through both shoulders at only 80 yds it still ran (not nose plowed.....ran!). Damage inside was sufficient, but nothing dramatic, especially not for a close shot with a starting velocity of over 3100 fps. Exit was barely larger than entrance, which I know doesn't mean anything its what happens inside that counts, I'm just saying for reference.

For the heck of it I walked back to where the hog was standing to see what king of blood trail was left. Not a single drop of blood in that fifteen yards, which was no big deal this was a fairly open area, but I think you see my point.

Of the dozens upon dozens upon dozens of hogs I taken over the years with everything from .223 to 45/70 I've never had a double shoulder shot hog go more than 20 ft or so, and that was while plowing dirt with its chin the whole way.

Before the Barnes crowd starts slamming me, let me say I like both TSX's and TTSX's and have used them before. I still prefer cup and cores for most deer size game, but have no problem using a Barnes for them either.

But this particualr bullet worries me a bit. Like Brad said, if it won't expand completely after traveling lengthwise through a deer at fairly close range, what would it do on a broadside shot at 350-400 yds?

Bill

JMC, agreed, but after traveling the full length of a deer at fairly close range, I would at least expect it to expand down to the bottom of the hollow point. The hog incident a couple days later is what really got me to thinking.

Bill

FWIW, I also took another doe and several more hogs with this bullet.

The other doe was a double lung at 100 yds or so, she ran 30 yds or so and fell over, same as if she'd been hit with about any other expanding bullet, so no real conclusion from that one IMO. Didn't check for a blood trail on her as I watched her fall.

The other hogs, minus one, were head or neck shots so again no real conclusion can be drawn from them. The one hog was hit quartering hard away, bullet went in behind the last rib and exited out his jowel. That one melted on the spot.

Bill

You guys are unbelievable.

The petals peeling another 1/8 of an inch would have made absolutely NO difference in the kill or mushroom size. X's of any style like velocity period. That bullet was probably doing 2,500 fps. on impact. I would say that is pretty darn good performance at that velocity. The bullet more than likely didn't hit any bone. Hitting bone definitely changes the game, and that is where the X's shine...crunching bone. I have busted several big critters near and far with the 100 grain XLC's starting out at 3,500 fps. I have recovered two that have the petals blown off completely, but there is still a large mushroom on the front of the bullet. The old XLC's were a LOT softer than the TSX's, hence the blue coating to keep them from smearing copper in the tube. I love them, perfect match of soft material and no copper fouling. It is a fine balance in the bullet manufacturing process when dealing with the X's. Flinch

I'd rather have one like that than a handful little pieces.

And by your own admission you don't take game past a few hundred yards...

Just got around to getting back here.

I understand where Calvin is coming from because my response is usually the same, calling a bullet a "failure" after recovering from a dead animal is silly. Generally I agree.

If everyone had read carefully I said this "particular" bullet not TTSX's or TSX's in general. Like I said this wasn't my first game taken or seen taken with TSX's.

BBERG's comment was really was I was getting at, this was not typical TTSX performance from my experience with them.

Thanks for the lesson Flinch, I know a little about how Barnes bullet act. Sure didn't know the XLC's were "softer"? I found them to expand less than TSX's or TTSX's. The only reason for the coating was to reduce fouling, when they incorporated the rings they did away with the coating because the rings cut down on fouling themselves by reducing bearing surface. At least this is what I thought, but I've been wrong before...

Bill

Bill, you just need to drink more Koolaid. Mix with vodka, all will be right with the TTSX in the morning...

100g TTSX work great in my Bob and I'm building development loads for my .280 using the 140g TTSX.

Great minds....

354yds is my longest! I might top it next year, I might not.. Who knows.

Thanks for the pictures Bill...

That bullet was traveling approximately 2650+ on impact at that yardage FWIW...

Part of the problem (note to those who may be offended: I did not call this a "failure") is that they've gone with a skinnier ogive on many of the TSX type bullets. People complained that the old XFBs wouldn't shoot, but they sure opened and killed well when they hit fast enough - and they were generally opened to a nice X on the frontal surface when they were recovered. A skinnier ogive means less mass to aid centrifugal forces in the instantaneous moment of expansion (which may be part of the reason why you often see TSX type bullets opened incompletely to a tiny curled bonnet). It also prevents petal loss - the second big complaint that seemed to be popular among non-using nit-pickers of the early designs. But a small frontal area by design seems to make petal loss a very paltry criticism in my view.

I'm sure the challenges of building with "pure" copper are many though. I can't imagine the trouble that must result when the new batch of material comes in and "we're going to have to watch the anneal real close on the .32 wire. It must have traces of zinc, or calcium, or etc in it and it acts brittle." Etc.

Great penetration, dicey expansion considering the circumstances IMHO.

Another dead deer bullet failure. sheesh. You want massive expansion, shoot a cup and core at the higher velocities. You want to eat up to the hole, use a TSX/TTSX.

What I think is "dicey" about this is the length of deer it penetrated for the amount of expansion. We'll never know where it expanded... was it early in the wound path, at the end, progressively the whole time, we can't know.

But I see that bullet after what it did and think, I'd hate to shoot a deer broadside through the lungs and not catch bone! And in fact, the OP mentions seeing some pretty minimal damage on a pig broadside. A dead pig, granted.

Since I've personally shot an Accubond lengthwise through a deer, starting at the (ahem) rear shoulder, I'm not seeing the penetration problem, that would compel me to seek a solution, from a bullet with expansion issues.

Elk? Sure. I've loaded them for elk. Deer? Not seeing it- for me. YMMV and all that jazz.

Classic..

It matters. If it isn't expanding much early, then it isn't expanding much in lungs broadside. Know what I mean, Accubond-user? Thinkin' you do.

I'm thinkin' you have a hard time ordering a cup of coffee, let alone get out of the house in the morning..

You're thinkin' wrongly <g>.

FWIW...

I shot 3 deer this past year with this same bullet and never recovered a single one so do not have pictures to show expansion.

However, I can say without a doubt that the damage done by this bullet to these three deer were MUCH more than with vanilla TSX's and on par with softer C&C offerings....

There was no eating up to the hole with this bullet on these 3 deer, at least if shoulder shot. I salvaged some front shoulder meat but lost a good bit on the offside shoulder.

Sample of three but the damage was consistent.

Is this a make or break for me? Heck no...

If you've not shot anything with the TTSX's, give them a go and report back.

Greg,

The phone conversation you and I had and your experience on your three deer makes me wonder if it's the particular batch of bullets I got.

The internal damage I got was nothing like yours, I think you trust that I know what typical damage from a bullet C&C or all copper looks like. I trust yours too, and thats what has me wondering about this box of bullets.

Bill

cliff,

Read the whole post plus my recent one before commenting next time. I know damn well what a Barnes bullet does, I've killed with them before and witnessed game taken by others with them, and I'll use them again. This was my first time with this bullet as it was brand new when I loaded them. These particular ones didn't follow what I consider typical performance from them.

Its amazing, all some hear is "he said something negative about a Barnes bullet!", all the while stomping their feet red faced, doesn't matter what else was said.

So predictable.....

Bill

You are right, we can never know. From what I�ve seen with TTTSX, however, expansion happens very quickly. One of the antelope I shot was hit high, actually above the spine. TheTTSX made a �U� shaped channel the size of a baseball through the animal�s back above the shoulder. The only bone hit was a process bone on top of the spine and the channel started well before that . The bullet was a 168g .308� running a calculated 2450fps or so at impact. Not good placement, for which I accept blame, but the animal went straight down and never got up. I�ve yet to see antelope or deer hit in the chest with a TTSX where the lungs weren�t a mess.

My guess is the recovered TTSX expanded quickly enough and just slowed to the point where further expansion wasn�t possible unless bone was hit. Further, I don�t know how further expansion would have helped as the diameter would not have changed significantly.

Just my thoughts and I could be completely wrong, but so far the deer and antelope we�ve shot with TTSX and MRX have all gone straight down except for one antelope that made it about 25 yards before collapsing.

Bill,

I know partner. I trust you more than I do myself.

Maybe your blue tip was funky or something or maybe we're just gacking? grin...

I couldn't have "over-analized" this whole thing do you think Greg? A rifle looney would never do that! <laughin>

Never, ever Bill...grin...

I will say that from the damage I've seen and looking at your bullet I am/was surprised...

Maybe shoot some more stuff?

Sourced correctly, copper wire produced by electro-winning is exactly that, 99.99% pure copper. Hardly enough impurity to throw off a heat treat. FWIW.