Doe Dumper

People talk about the 270 not being an elk or moose gun. I cant imagine pushing a 160 np at 2800 fps that it wouldnt just level nearly anything except maybe the largest bears. This velocity looks attainable in most reloading books. Anybody loading this round? Has a sectional density of .298..bc of .434 this looks like a seriously stout big game bullet.

Roskoe

I tried these about 20 years ago. The gave very deep penetration at the expense of a fairly small wound channel. I was hunting in a combined season for deer and elk. Shot a medium sized mule deer buck three times in the chest at about 125 yards. It just stood there -and then just walked away. It walked about 80 yards before another hunter shot it in the neck. Examination of the wound channel of the three bullets through the animal was not very encouraging. Holes looked like .30 caliber FMJ bullet holes.

If I wanted to use a .270 for game so large the various bonded bullets in the 130 to 150 grain weight range weren't sufficient, I would probably load up some Swift A-Frames.

Rebel Hog

DD, I never needed anything else than the 130 and 150 NP for the .270 on deer and Elk. I started using it in 1990 and have used the 6.5mmSwede with 140 and 156gr as well. Over a period of 50yrs Ihave used most calibers, andthese are my two favorites.

eldeguello

You are absolutely correct about the .270 Win.!! I used the 160-grain Noslers for awhile in AK, but ended up using the 150's, and they were adequate for everything I shot up there. I never shot a BIG bear, but the .270 did OK on blackies up to 300 pounds! (My hunting buddies told me "it's DANGEROUS to shoot any kind of bears with that VARMINT rifle! After I'd killed two blackies one afternoon with three 150-grain Noslers from my .270,they said "well, a black bear ain't nuthin' but a VARMINT anyway!!")

When I lived in Fairbanks, there was a local doctor's wife who killed big Polar bears with the .270 using 150-grain Nosler bullets. This was back when the Polar bear was still legal game.

Hosea Sarber, an old-time Alaskan guide, considered the .270 adequate for ALL Alaskan game, provided the right bullets were used-and this was BEFORE John Nosler designed the Partition Jacket bullet, which is head and shoulders above ANY BRANDof bullet that was available in Sarber's day! (He had the same opinion of the .348 Win. - you had to use good bullets in it.)

sabotloader

Doe Dumper

First I have to tell you I am a 270 fan, have been for what seems like several decades now. I hunt in Idaho, have since I was a little kid - my first gun after my Gramps 30-30 was a 270. I have a more than a few elk with a 270 some really big ones and some not so big and the whole gammet of deerfrom Muleies to whitetail. I am not a bear fan so I have only shot one black bear. All the years that I hunted with the 270 I used 130 grain bullets - either 130 grain Sierra Boat tails or Nosler Partition only recently I have switched to the 140 grain bullet to take advantage of better ballistic numbers.

I douse the Nosler for elk and the regular copper clad bullets for deer. I do notthink there is a better bullet than a Nosler Partition for penetration and exspansion. TheNosler will expand at a greater range ofvelocities than any other bullet.

just my 2 bits - Good luck

I have always considered the 270 a poormans magnum because its all around capabilties - flat and power...

Roskoe

I have used the 130 and 150 grain Nosler partitions with pretty good results as well; but there was something about the 160 grain - at least in the one instance described - that left a bad taste in my mouth. Maybe it needs a much larger animal to be fully appreciated . . . .

bronko22000

A long, long time ago, I experimented with 150 gr bullets in my then new Rem 700 in .270 with less than satisfactory results. Just for giggles I wrote a letter to Mr. Jim Carmichael at, I believe was Outdoor Life mag. asking him why I wasn't getting good groups. His answer was - and I don't know the exact wording so I won't quote - The .270 Win cartridge was designed around the 130 gr bullet. This bullet is the ideal weight for the .270.
My suggestion to you is to stick with 130 gr bullets if accuracy is you main goal. I shot many critters (deer and bear) using 130 gr Nosler Ballistic Tips and 55 gr of IMR4350 from ranges point blank to "way out there" and never lost an animal.

eldeguello

It may very well be that the 130-grain bullet is optimal in a .270 with standard 1/10" twist rifling. However, if a .270 caliber rifle does not shoot 150-grain bullets well, it is not due to the design of the cartridge, but to some peculiarity of that particular rifle's bore, probably twist rate!! I happened to have had two .270's in 20" barreled Mannlicher-Schoenauers, and these had 1/9" twists. Bothshot 1.25 MOA groups with Nosler Partition bullets in 130, 150, and 160-grain weights. (I realize that this is not great performance now that everyone has a safe full of 0.5 MOA rifles, but this was in the 1960's, before such things existed!!) They also performed well with the old Speer 170-grain roundnose and the Sierra PSPBT 150 grainer.

I am also one of those nuts who think that the faster a bullet spins, the better it kills. At least, there was SOMETHING about those two short-tubed rifles that made them kill very impressively, and I prefer to think it was something mechanical rather than just plain magic!!

KansasHunter5

If you want to hunt big game with a .270 try reloading a 150gr Speer Grand Slam. I have seen first hand the devastation that the wound channels of these bullets create. A .270 hole in a baseball size hole out and about nothing but mush in the lungs and heart area. This was done on a large whitetail deer, but this bullet can easily take a large elk, muley or moosewith a good shot behind it. Amazing expansion and penetration.

Roskoe

My experience with this bullet has been the same - great combination of good expansion and penetration. Saw a bull elk shot a very close range through both shoulders with this bullet. Didn't some apart.