frontier gander

225 powerbelt, 80 grains triple 7

sabotloader

FG

Sorry FG, no matter what you post - a PB will never impress me especially one of the light ones. I know you are semi forced to use one cause Colorado is a conical state but there are such better projectiles out there. PB's would be way down the list...

Look at your pic it really is nothing more than a flattened overweight round ball, but I am really glad they work for you.

Which one would you choose... never mind I should not have asked that...

frontier gander

And a roundball is a deadly killer. With 100 grains goex and that 225 powerbelt, im still putting over 900ft lbs energy @ 200 yards with it.

Also have killed with maxi balls and great plains conicals. I didnt like the maxi ball experience but the great plains did a good job. Ive also hunted and killed with roundballs before.

Gotta shoot what shoots best out of your rifle and what has proven to take game down.
Also have to remember that i no longer hunt with my inlines.

Im geared up for 3ed season elk with my .54 flintlock and PRB. But im only buying a tag if its truely cold by november 70* today

frontier gander

Also have to remember that cayugads roundball went through one deer and stopped in the second deer! The question is, what did that roundball look like when it exited the first? More than likey, it mushroomed very very little, If at all. So a roundball that has gone through 2 deer isnt like a powerbelt at all.

The roundball went through the first deer

gt2003

Does anyone have any recovered hornady xtp pictures? I had terrible luck with the 300 grain onesand would like to see some that were recovered from animals to see how well they expand and if they held together.

frontier gander

I havent shot an animal with an XTP but i did recover one out of a telephone pole that i shot at 100 yards. Didnt even expand or anything. I could probably shoot it again but im not that cheap lol.

Bullets perform differently on game.

falcon

i've killed about a dozen deer and big bunches of hogs with my CVA Staghorn and 240 grain XTP bullets. Very few of the animals ever went anywhere when hit. Few of the bullets were recovered. One 240 grain XTP that was recovered went through a deer standing broadside and hit another doe behind her what was quartering toward me.Both deer bang flopped. Distance was about 125 yards. Powder was 130 grains of loose Pyrodex. My wife was cutting up a deer ham for jerky and found that bullet. Would take a photo and post it but my digital camera is on vacation with my wife. Found it!!! Got it mixed up with another photo.

sabotloader

falcon

if truth were to be told there probably has been more deer harvested with a Hornady 240 grain XTP than any other bullet.

It has been used for so many years in all kinds of 44 caliber rifles and 50 cal ML's.

gt2003

I know many people love them. I just couldn't use them in my ML. They shot incredibly accurately when using 90 grains of pyrodex RS. Bullet holes consistently touched at 50 yds. But, when i shot deer, the deer would run forever and i never found them. I could find blood for maybe 15-20 yrds, then nothing. I knew they were good shots and it made me sick. I was at the point of giving up ML hunting until someone suggested the precision rifle all lead bullets. I've shot a few deer with them and 2 fell in their tracks and one went maybe 40 yds or so with a blood trail that was out of this world. The guy I hunt with loves them but I don't get any kind of performance out of them. So, I am just curious to see what they look like once they are recovered. I was shooting the 300 grain xtp's over 90 grains of pyrodex rs at less than 50 yards. Show me some pics. I'd love to see what they look like. Thanks again, Greg.........PS - I'm not putting down these bullets, they just don't seem to work for me.

sabotloader

gt2003

There are actually 3 different 300 grain XTP's, They are built with a really thick copper coat and are really a tough bullet. If you were shooting a XTP-Mag - I really could believe that you might have had some problem with them going all the way through a whitetail without a lot of expansion expecially at close range, actually any of the 3 - 300's will get through in a hurry - but they are decent for tougher skinned animals. The 240 and the 250 on the other hand have a different HP and do expand very easily - one of the reasons that the 240 works so well on deer.

I have used a few Precision lead bullets, and in fact in Washington all lead is required, but i still have some left never really got whati was looking for plus they are expensive and overated by Cecil.

As far as I am concerned the absolute best bullet for deer is the .451/260 grain Nosler Partition also an expensive bullet but totally built for penetration. If you shoot a deer with them and get your bullet in the chest cavity - they will literally turn all the vitals in the cavity to dark red jello as they pass through. The bullet I will use when I run out of Noslers will be the .452/250 grain Speer Gold Dot. They are bonded bullet with controlled expansion to the dot in the middle of the cavity, I call them a poor man's nosler. You can see the Gold Dot that Chap used in the picture above - it was a 300 grain with a BC of .232 from a flint lock - dang it worked good.

Here is a picture of some Gold Dots I shot into saturated clay - then recovered. They really hung together - I shot Hornady into the same medium and stripped the lead right from the copper... Doesn't happen with the Gold Dot or the Nosler.