338g Boolitz
 

What i think is Screwbolts felt sorry for me as i struggled with the 45 acp bullet in my rifle. He sent me a couple versions of his boolitz to try. This morning, the 338g LBT-LFN water dropped W. W. was tried.










The load was 90g Blackhorn, black crush rib sabot, CCI 250 primer, and the boolit. Kinda planned to shoot close range first to see how they worked in my rifle, but mud was bad bad bad, so i took the easy out, and shot from 200 yard. It was wonderful to see the very first shot hit paper. It was great when the second shot also hit in the red.











Traveling further through a muddy mess, the truck took us to a nice level spot to set up the bullet trap.











One shot was taken at paper to see that the boolit hit about 2" high. The range was 45 yard. Then the camera was started, and aiming 2" low on the trap, a boolit was sent on the way.












The boolit went through all milk jugs, the first phone book, and halfway through the second phone book.

The Capture video.





Then i spent some time shooting my 45 acp at paper, and water filled jugs. Then a move was made back to where a 200 yard shot could be made. The breeze was plenty strong, and swirly. The following target shows 6 shots at the top target from 200 yard, made by the boolitz, and 5 shots at the bottom target made from 39' with the 45 pistol.

those things look like a good bullet. What mold are they out of?

Ken would know better than me. However, it is my understanding that these were cast using an LBT mold. Also, it is my understanding the Harvester hard cast bullets, are made using the same mold.

The Boolitz that Ron shot were indeed cast from a LBT double cavity mold. They are cast of straight wheel weight alloy that was water dropped from the mold. My current WW alloy appears to have a higher percentage of Pb, in the past they cast at 333 gr.

Verel Smith of LBT also cut the molds for Harvester. These are a catalog item at LBT, I should have had him cut me a 4 cavity.

I cast these as Verel recommended, WWs, water dropped. They are not supposed to expand, just button slightly.

I cast these the day before I sent them to Ron. They will reach their max hardness in another week. As Ron's test shows they will shot great and drive deep in a straight line.

My family, friends and I have shot thousands of these in Harvester "smooth" sabots over the past 6 years. The vast majority are shot from smokeless guns. The rest are from guns charged with BH209, @ 80 gr. I have harvested many deer with these. Piles of these have gone to friends in Alaska, Colorado and Montana, were they have Harvested game there.

This is one of the samples of Boolitz I sent to Ron. :-)

Good shooting Ron!

Those bullets appear to have a lot of potential. My only concern is the lack of expansion from the WW alloy. (I know a .50 cal hole through the lungs will work but....) The alloy used would be sufficient for cape buffalo or even elephant with the penetration you get with them!
But we don't have many of those running around these parts..lol.
I bet casting them with pure lead would allow them to be just as accurate with more expansion and less penetration but enough to give you complete pass thrus on any whitetail or elk.
Good report Ron and nice bullet Screw.

Ron, I'm always impressed with your long range accuracy.

200 yards, with wind is a good poke in any book. I guess you need the range out on the prairie.

P.S. The walleyes are hot at Chaimberlain if you have the time and inclination.

150 yard shots have been the norm out on the prairie, so being able to shoot 200 yard is necessary of course. Hopefully one day not too far off, we will be able to hunt the hills again. It kinda sorta seems the lion population has been reduced a bit by hunters; hopefully more deer will be available for our freezers.

When i walked off the ice 3 days ago, my socks got wet; seems it indeed is time to get the boat ready. Yes, the fishing report say most teams last week-end limited with average 2 1/2 lb fish; with largest being 11 lb. Am hoping Oahe will come up enough we will be able to launch at Foster Bay, but if not, i guess we will have to travel to Minneconjou. Last year wife, and i did good. Always fun to catch a limit of 2 lb fish, with an occasional hog to get the heart running. The trip to the river is necessary; fishing close has kinda gotten tough.

We all walk different roads threw life, and that is OK. On some roads in life they feel that bullet expansion is absolutely necessary. And that is OK. These trekkers can never, and will never understand how a Hard Boolit with a good meplat can possibly create a predictable wound channel, that is effective at letting blood out and air in. And this is OK. We walk different roads. I know, it is OK.

Others walk a different road with hard boolitz and properly sized Meplats. They know that it doesn't have to be driven very fast or much above the speed of sound to be very effective, not overly destructive but capable of producing a good wound channel with out destroying the entire area. And that is OK. These trekkers understand that to much speed is actual detrimental to results. ( to much tissue damage and slowed flow of blood, because of the great clotting ability of the cells nucleus, if it is membrane is broken in the destruction) They realize that there is a formula for accurately predicting the wound channel size, based on Meplat size an Speed of projectile. It can be referred to as tissue spray area, DV. And that is OK. We simply travel different roads. And that is OK.

I copied and Pasted this short old Test from another forum to share what a slow boolit can and does do.

" Impact test photo

You'll get no argument from me about a non-expanding bullet (esp a .50 cal) leaving a devastating wound channel and getting the job done.
But in the experiment given by Ron at the start of this thread - the amount of penetration this bullet exhibited was superb. Far more than what is necessary for whitetail or elk.
I am of the opinion that the bullet that provides the greatest wound channel, expending almost all of its energy inside the animal and then exiting is the best bullet for that situation. But you know what they say about opinions!

My opinion is based on somewhat limited experience.

I tried hard cast 250 grain Lead Bullet Technology (LBT) WFN (Wide Flat Nose) bullets in my .41 Mag Ruger Bisley, shooting them at 1250 fps. (Picture Below) The gun wears a 2X Leupold pistol scope and would keep that load into 5-shot groups of less than 5" at 100 yards from a rest, and under 2" at 50 yards.

The perfect deer load, right? Well yes - but.

if I shot to break the shoulders the deer was down and kicking, usually dieing fairly quickly. But on heart/lung shots it punched through with modest (but deadly) internal damage. The deer usually traveled quite a ways after a heart/lung shot with small entry/exit holes.

I don't care for those bone breaking shoulder shots. Switched to Speer 210 grain Deep Curls and results with heart/lung shots were much more to my liking, with a good size exit hole and lots of bleeding. Sometimes they would drop at the shot. But more often they would run. But they don't go far and leave a good blood trail.