Exactly what I was thinking when I read this thread.

You should have had pass thru's. I shoot 165gr sierra bthp, they are not super strong bullets but do a very nice job. I cant remember one of them not passing through before, however I always try to shoot for the lungs. I loaded up some 168gr match bullets several years ago and thought I would try them for hunting. Shot 2 bucks with them both exploded inside the animal with no pass thru, both dropped in the tracks, but I want a bullet that will pass thru. Why yours didnt pass through I have no idea.

the problem is that he has two instances of a 180gr bullet from a 30-06 not being able to exit a deer. He is concerned with the poor, and unusual, performance of these bullets. Two dead deer is nice but, with poor performing bullets, his luck might run out the next time.

At what range were these deer when you shot them?

RIGHT ON! The majority of the deer I've killed were with the .30-06 and 165gr. Hornady Interlokts. I've never had a shot that didn't penetrate completely. Even when the shoulders were taken out. If I take my .30-06 elk hunting, I'm going to be using a "premium" 180gr. bullet. Nosler Partition, Swift A-Frame, Barnes TSX, ect. If I use that same load on a whitetail, I would expect a passthrough from almost ANY angle provided shots were under 200 yards or so where velocity has dropped off.

Damn you dont need that kind of ammo on deer, if you want to drop them then you need a 150gr BST, there is no magic bullet though

I shot a small southern whitetail with a 300WSM at 35 yards, quartering shot, deer heading out at 2 oclock, got him slap in the pumphouse.
The load was a Nosler Ballistic Tip 150gr in a Federal factory load.
Yeah, it was WAY overkill, and in theory I should have blown the deer's innards all over the place.
However, what ACTUALLY happened was the deer was dead before it hit the ground, it's innards were turned to goo, and there was no exit wound.

I wanted to figure out why, so I started doing ballistics reaseach, even going so far as to directly ask Nosler to give me their best guess as to what the bullet did.

The information I gathered was pretty interesting.
Nosler figured that, since it was so close, and the bullet was going so fast, the bullet essentially exploded inside the animal.
Which, based on what I saw while gutting it, seemed to be reasonable.

Depending on the load, a 30-06 is zipping along in the 2600-2800 FPS range, based on what I read.
I personally like core-lokts because they're super cheap, the brass is pretty durable, and I can get 10-12 reloads from them.
I won't use them on animals, just because I like other things for that purpose.
My theory on why the jacket stripped off is that you hit something during the bullet's flight that changed it's trajectory as well as it's shape, which would account for both the deer taking off instead of being DRT, and also the jacket being found on the ground.
I'd look along the bullet's flight path, within 20' of where you found the jacket, and see if there's a small twig or something of that nature that's either blown off or nicked.
Again, this is my theory.
Seems plausible, at least based on what you wrote.
Either way, you have a nice pair of dead deer in the freezer.
Dead is dead. Only difference is how far you had to walk to collect your quarry.

I use this round to. I normally get pass throughs. Ive never had a weak blood trail with them. But 1 out of 6 deer shot with this ive only had to track one. And it looked like some one had got a 5 gallon bucket of blood and poured it out all the way to my doe.

I use a 30-06 with 165 gr Federal Premium Nosler Partitions and they almost always drop a deer in their tracks. The few that run don't get out of site. And they always pass through. Not sure what happened in your case though.

My father-in-law put a bad shot on a deer this year with a 150 gr 270. Not sure the brand or bullet, but the bullet is a big, fat bullet that looks like the African big game bullets. It has a very rounded nose instead of being pointy. Anyway, it went through the near side leg, including the bone, up through the hip and out the other hindquarter. He had someone tell him that wasn't a good bullet but it sure did the job.

Probally a federal powershok. They look like some big 670 nitro express bullet. Ass far as the shape of the bullets go.

the 150 grain cor-lokts or however its spelled, and the 150 grain winchesters look identical also, so im betting its one of the 3.