from what they sold me, very little effect. and i have a 32" barrel. I was using goex at the time and they said i wouldnt be to far off from their 28" barrel Stats. Im not one who pays much attention to FPS, Ft lbs energy. I leave that for the others who do care.

As long as the load is accurate and the projectile is performing and my shooting ability is good for the range im sighted in for, Its going down.

Yes, I do FG, now that you mention it---but did not think of it right off the top of my head--although I don't forget too many things about PBs . However it would be nice if they told the world that instead of marketing to the fad of speed and long range hunting, which is what they are doing on their web page. Chap

After reading this whole thread, it appears to me that what Frontier Gander is actually describing re: Power Belt bullet performance is that when over-driven by too much powder, they tend to fragment (like Cayugad said), and the fragments do a horrendousjob on the internal organs, butthe exit wound is made by what's left of the base of the bullet. That would explain small entry and exit wounds, but a lot of internal damage. So, IMO, it is NOT a case of faster bullets expanding LESS than slower ones-(that just does not happen to any expanding bullet!)

In the above described action, then, an over-driven Power Belt is performing alot like a Nosler Partition bullet, which also often shows small entrance and exit wounds with great internal damage. I have often heard people complain that the Partition bullet "just pencilled through- it did not expand! But the bullet is gone, so they don't know!! Such actionindeed results in quick kills but often very poor/non-existant blood trails.

In the case with the Power Belts and less powder, slowing them down indeed alters theirperformance, so that the entrance wound is still small, butthe ext wound is much larger, BECAUSE THE BULLET JUST EXPANDS AND DOES NOT FRAGMENT at the slower speeds. The expanded bullet exits, leaving a bigger hole than it would if it had fragmented.

Frontier Gander, you sure have some beautiful places to hunt!! Keep up the good work, and thanks for your research and information!

Frontier

Thanks for the excellent info on power belt bullets. I use them in both of my knight rifles with excellent results. I use 90 grains but plan to try them with 80 grains.

WV Mountaineer

This is an interesting post. I use my ML for hunting only, I shoot it about 5 times a year, 4 to site it in and one at a deer. I keep thinking I want to try these different bullets and maybe even powders, but since one pack of powder lasts me about 5 years, why mess with it....I'm still on my first pack of bulllets and sabots...can't switch until they are gone!!!


I meet a group of guys in SD every year for pheasant camp, we all live in surrounding states.

One guy was new to ML's this year and bought a ThunderHawk because he drew a SD late season tag. He was trying to use 140 grains powder with unknown bullets. The concensus of the whole group was for him to drop his powder to 90 grains, regardless of the brand.

We also all agreed we had the best luck with the Hornady .44's in green sabots. Funny we all ML hunt with different people in different states and we all had the same opinions.

And while we all thought a Encore would be nice, none of us had one.

We can't agree on the best pheasant gun....half shoot Berettas and half benellis.

FG....Good post.

I've been looking for some of those to try. They are darn hard to find. I've shot the 405 gr. hollow point with good results. With 90 gr. of 777, it's quite a thumper. I'm also like the Great plains 410 gr. flat point conical with the same charge.

TTT... ...Deleted by CalHunter...

Put it in your Subscriptions and give them a link to it. Or create a Windows Shortcut and put the URL in a folder called PB. Chap

I guess they still sell a bunch of these bullets each year. There was a HUGE stack of them at wally world on closeout. I don't shoot the things so I didn't even look to see what caliber/weight they were. Hopefully those that know or are willing to learn how to shoot them will pick them up, not someone looking to save money.

Eldequello, if you'll look around the website, there are reports of the bullet blowing up/fragmenting beforeit penetrates the body cavity (or only create an external flesh wound).In these cases, it creates no internal damage.That seems to be the point of the lower powder charge.If they are pushed faster, many times it leads to bad consequences. Maybe they'll change the bullet design, educate usershow to correctly use the bullets, or discontinue making them altogether. Only time will tell.

I've shot powerbelts at the range a bit. They are very accurate in my gun. I like to experiment with different bullets but the powerbelts are about as expensive as they get.

After reading this whole thread I will not spend any more $$$ on powerbelts. It simply doesn't seem prudent when there are so many excellent bullets with no questions about their performance.