RE: 17HMR yote Hunting, What bullet to use?
The polymer tipped bullets are actually more frangible than the hollow points, but they are both pretty explosive and not really designed for penitration. This round was designed for light duty varmint hunting for squirells and rabbits. I have heard reports of them not being very effective on larger woodchucks at longer distances.
I would say go with the 20 grn XTP, it has better penitration and carries a bit more energy. It's sort of inbetween the 17 grn and a .22 mag. That is what they made this round for after we complained we wanted something with a bit more penitration for larger game.
The XTP is a controlled expansion bullet, where the V-max type bullets are very explosive and don't penitrate that well. I think you would have better luck with XTP's on larger animals like dogs providing they shoot well in your rifle. I shot a wild cat a few weeks ago with the hornady 17grns and it ran 50 yards before keeling over. However when I found it it had no internals that were distiguishable. It darn near blew it in half. I shot it at like 30 yards. There was pretty much no exit wound, but lots of damage.
Paul