RE: Darn 243's and Magnums
Crimedog. Excellent points. It suprises me that bullet choice and design is hardly given any consideration by so many hunters. Certainly it seem that whats on sale seems to be the main factor. Its so true that many cartridges Big and Small, get a bad rap because of poor bullet choice by the user. Nothing is more important. Not velocity, not ME but bullet selection, matching the bullet to the game.
KareImp. I had a 308 that was the opposite of your 270. At the range I would pull my hair out trying to get that gun to shoot a group. It never would do it. Groups of 3-4 inches was about normal. However in the field it seemed to always hit right where I aimed or so close it was scarey. It was always and remaims a mystery to me but when it was time to hunt, I knew it would do the jom. Now my new 270 seems to hit exactly where you put the crosshair. One would expect that to be true but as some of us have seen, it ain't always true. I guess it proves a point of mine that some guns are accurate and some guns are just more shootable. Maybe its the trigger, maybe its the scope. I don't know but it keeps things interesting.
I had the same expierence with the 243 while guiding deer hunters. Many deer hit with the 243 would run off over the hill. I got to where I would just follow them for a ways and usually found them dead pretty close by. I wonder how many are lost because people think they missed. I talk to a lot of hunters and did so even more when I had my gun store. I heard this same thing from many gun buyers who wanted to trade their 243 in on something bigger. Many of these same guys would be back to trade their bigger rifles for still bigger rifles. One customer I had stepped up about every year until he ordered a 340 Weatherby mag. He only hunted deer. He must have finally hit one right because he was sold on the big Weatherby In those days I just kept filling my tags with my 6.5x55 Mauser.
Ballistic tips have worked well for me in every caliber that I have tried. I really like them in my 250 Savage rifles. As far as velocities go, Most of my deer have been taken by the 6.5x55 and the 308. These rifles are loaded to about 2600- 2775. With the bullets that I use, they perfom perfectly at those velocities. Deer seldom take more than a couple steps with these rifles and loads. I believe in middle weight bullets at medium velocities. It puts less stress on the bullets and just kills things quick. It could be bullet hang time (the time the bullet spends in the target) Or maybe the bullets that I have settled on just perform best at those speeds.