driftrider

It's actually not a problem at all so far. I cleaned the bore every 3 shots for the first 20 rounds and every 5 shots after that. I didn't see any appreciable copper buildup. I've shot the TSX bullets when I still had a Tikka T3 300 WSM, and I never had copper fouling with those either. I think that the grooves really help reduce fouling by letting the copper flow to the grooves not wipe off on the barrel. If anything was going to have a problem with copper, I thought that the 257 Wby would be it, but so far I've had no problems. I just wish my chronograph wasn't broken (muzzleloader sabot hit the face breaking the LED display) so I could see the velocity with the 71 grain charge of IMR-7828. Based on the data I've been able to find, I should be able to go to a MAX of 73 grains with this bullet, but with only 20 pcs of brass I just worked up to 71 this time out with no pressure signs. The MV should be in the ballpark of 3400-3500fps.

Next time out I'm going to finish the workup to 73 grains in smaller increments of .3 grains instead of .5 grains to see if I can squeeze a little more accuracy out of it, but the 71gr charge seems very promising.

Mike

Ron Duval

removed by RD

driftrider

The issue with frangibility was what prompted me to go straight to the TSX for the 257 Wby. Bullets like the Nosler BT are, in my experience, extremely accurate, but hearing stories about the relatively delicate construction makes me think that the BT, and other rapid expansion soft lead-core bullets might not be a good choice at 3500fps+. I also wanted to go lead free because of the mess the 150gr Core Lok from my .30-06 made in last seasons deer. The bullet blew apart on impact (from 125 yards), and while the deer dropped DRT (which is good), there were tiny lead fragments everywhere. I tried very hard to trim and flush it all out, but I still found some in the processed venison burger. I don't want my kids eating lead, and I want a bullet that will hold together no matter what, so the Barnes TSX seemed the best choice. I'm just very glad I'm getting the level of accuracy I am with them. If I couldn't get sub-MOA accuracy from either the 100 or 115 grain TSX, my third choice was the 110 grain Accubond. But thankfully I seem to have come across an acceptable combination on the first go around. I can't wait to see what these 100gr TTSX's will do to a deer. The TSX seems to have a great reputation for impressively quick kills, but a somewhat hit-or-miss rep for accuracy (bad pun, sorry).

Mike