I've gotten several PMs asking me for input on this thread, so I guess I will.
Several years ago, my friend Chub, who worked at Nosler, advised me to try the 7-120 Ballistic. He told me that they'd made the jacket quite heavy for Rifle Silhouette shooting (so it would tip over the 500 meter target) and the resulting bullet was fabulous. Chub tested in on a slew of Northern California wild boars and it punched through both shoulder gristle plates ... something that takes a lot from a bullet.
So, to make a long story mercifully short, I killed a bunch of Montana antelope with the bullet in my .280 Ackley (MV=3,370 fps @10'), experiencing flat trajectory, minimal wind drift, convincing one-shot kills and full penetration, regardless of the angle. As a note, antelope bone is hard stuff, way tougher and harder than deer or elk bone and any time you shoot a goat on a full frontal and punch through the pelvis going out, you've seen a good bullet do its job.
So, I rotated to killing mule deer and Alberta whitetail with the 120. Again, quick kills and full penetration. Frankly, I have never recovered a 120 from a deer or an antelope and I've killed a few pickup loads of those critters with it.
I got caught flatfooted in Alberta once, when I was hunting whitetail with 120s. I had a moose tag in my pocket and a bull ran out into the farm two-track and begged me to whack him. I obliged. He was 91 yards distant and I placed the 120 under his jaw. The shot was kinda angled, so I just did the best I could to drive the life out of the three-year old Bullwinkle.
At the shot, the moose stood there for about three seconds and then fell over like a perfectly balanced sheet of plywood that catches a slight breeze.
The 120 fully-penetrated the neck, taking an entire vertabrae out the back of the neck. Somehow, I clipped a carotic artery because the wound pumped copious quantities of Bullwinkle's lifeblood at each cardiac contraction.
Later, I got caught hunting big mule deer
twice when I had an elk tag in my pocket. In each instance, I whacked a mature 6X6 bull elk with the bullet. I've recounted these kills several times on the Campfire, but I'll give a thumbnail sketch once again. Both bulls died most sincerely dead.
One was shot solidly though both shoulders, with the bull DOA and the bullet rested under the skin on the far shoulder. Range was
+400 yards. Bullet expansion was .75" or so and the expanded bullet weighed slightly less than 100-grains
The second was about 375 yards, below me and looking away. I hald on the back of the head, wanting to hit between the shoulder blades, which I did. The bullet destroyed a vertabrae between the scapulas and penetrated to the chest, where it lodged under the chest hide. The bullet is a clone of the pervious one, expansion to 3/4" and losing perhaps 25% of its weight. The bull bent into an L and rolled down into the snowy canyon. Why the hell do they always roll down into fuggin' canyons?
As a note, the bulls were killed with my little blue 7SGLC that gets a MV of 3,255 fps out of the 120s.
I would not purposly carry 120s for elk or Bullwinkle mooses, but my experience has been that it does the job in a handy fashion. Sometimes I screw up and when I do, the bullet bails me out
One cool mule deer kill that comes to mind was on a convoluted hunt. It was a gumbo year, deep mud and frozen base and we were having troubles getting around. One morning, in the way dark, I found a hell of a mule staring at me through a tree at way close. All I could see was his face and way too good a set of horns to pass up. I placed the Heavy Duplex on his right eye and he went down in a heap.
Actually, I thought the buck was a 150 B&C and he was waaaaay better (sometimes you slip in the gumbo and come out smelling like roses). The bullet entered just below the eyeball, transversed the head and left without breaking the skill (yeaaaa), leaving a one-inch exit.
To those who have had trouble with this bullet, I would suggest that maybe you got really, really old stock. The 120 was originally marketed as a varmint bullet and it originally had a light jacket. Perhaps the rare failures were these original bullets, but those would have to be at least ten years old and in the old boxes.
I have had nothing but wonderful results with the modern version of the Nosler .284" 120-grain Ballistic Tip. Your mileage may vary, but I've killed enough with these bullets to at least have an opion that is based on forty or fifty kills ... I've never counted, but it is a decent sampling.
This is simply my way of trying to help. Hopefully, Campfire members will consider my experiences and make rational decision on bullet choice based on this and other member's experiences in the field. We are all here to help each other and expand our experience base.
In the end, I don't have any monetray investment or gain to be made here. BUT, I do have a moral investment and a great satisfaction when my brothers, other hunters, use a bullet that works. The Nosler 7-120 works!!!
Steve
Here are a few 120-grain victims.