Bullets: The Importance of Construction and Performance on Game

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Whether you’re trying to drop the buck of a lifetime in your back 40 or hoping to anchor a big bull elk on the next ridge, it’s the bullet that does the most important work. Whatever you’re hunting, the bullet must be right for the task. This is not a simple decision. Today we are blessed with an amazing array of projectiles—and accompanying hype that can make decisions difficult. Fortunately, bullet making today is highly advanced, their designs greatly aided by computerized modeling. I doubt there are any “bad” bullets out there today, and I also doubt that any are perfect for all seasons and all reasons. As the ancient knight says in “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade,” “Choose wisely.”

American rifle shooters are traditionally fixated on accuracy and velocity. Both are good, but they’re not necessarily the end-all under all circumstances.

If you’re trying to win a benchrest match or compete in a long-range discipline, then accuracy sort of is everything. In hunting, though, just hitting a target isn’t enough. Sure, you need enough accuracy to get your bullet into the vital zone of your game, but once it gets there, it needs to penetrate deeply and do enough damage to ensure a quick, humane demise.

The size of the vital zone and the amount of penetration required vary widely. A deer’s chest area is not a small target. An elk or a moose offers a huge target.
In other words, it’s okay to sacrifice a bit of accuracy in favor of a bullet that you are certain will penetrate and do its most important job on the animal in question. This can be a hard choice because accuracy builds confidence, and I want more accuracy than I need because confidence is essential when the chips are down.

Right Tool, Right Job

It depends on what I’m hunting. For prairie dogs, there’s no such thing as too much accuracy, and I want frangible bullets so any hit does the job. Deer-size game is different, larger game more different still. You must have enough accuracy for your range envelope, whatever it might be, but bullet performance comes first.

Velocity is good because it increases energy yield, but it can be the archenemy of bullet performance. At the extremes, a bullet that expands well and holds together at, say, 2,500 fps impact velocity may be an unreliable bomb if it’s 1,000 fps faster on impact. The opposite can also be true. An expanding bullet that performs well at high velocity may upset much less—even act like a non-expanding solid—after it has slowed down.

I don’t recommend hunting with any match bullets. They often expand too quickly, especially at high velocity. Worse, since they aren’t designed for hunting, they are inconsistent, and their performance depends on what they encounter. But because their accuracy is seductively tempting, some hunters use them, and a few swear by them.

But the current interest in long-range shooting and the trend toward longer, heavier, low-drag bullets has thrown us a bone. The best way to overcome weakness in bullet construction is to use heavier bullets. Sheer bullet mass matters on game, and heavier bullets cannot be pushed as fast, so some bullet-eating velocity is out of the equation.

Cup and Core

The 168-grain .30 caliber is a classic match bullet. Today we have .30 caliber match bullets of 225 grains and heavier for fast-twist barrels. Like I said, I don’t suggest hunting with any match bullet, but if you must, I submit that heavy-for-caliber bullets have more going for them on impact.

In my experience, the most accurate non-match bullets are good old cup-and-core bullets: copper jackets over a lead core, what I’ve long called “plain old bullets.” They’re simple and easy to make accurate. Good examples include Sierra GameKing and Winchester Power-Point. They aren’t fancy, but they are designed for hunting, usually with thicker jackets than match bullets. Those two have exposed lead at the tip, but many cup-and-core bullets have polymer or metal tips. On impact, the tip is driven down into the bullet, initiating expansion. Aside from looking sexy, tipped bullets have the advantage of not becoming misshapen due to battering in the magazine like exposed-lead tips can.

Some cup-and-core bullets have mechanical features that lock core and jacket together. Remington’s Core-Lokt was introduced clear back in 1939, Hornady’s InterLock in 1977. This locking aids in weight retention. All cup-and-core bullets are relatively quick-expanding. During penetration, a fair amount of lead is likely to be wiped away. If recovered, these bullets often aren’t “pretty.” My old friend, the late Chub Eastman, fielded many customer calls during his years at Nosler. When dealing with a hunter unhappy with the appearance of a recovered bullet, Chub would ask, “Sir, can you please tell me, at what point in the death of the animal did the bullet fail?”

If you like to recover perfectly mushroomed, “pretty” bullets, cup-and-core bullets are likely not your cup of tea. But they work because they provide excellent accuracy and good expansion. Despite the availability of many more modern designs, I still do a lot of hunting with a variety of cup-and-core bullets. I do consider them somewhat velocity-sensitive. However, in fast magnums, this is easily mitigated by stepping up in weight, which is always a good idea with larger game.

Match Bullets to the Game You're After

For deer-size game, I might use 140-grain 7mm bullets and 150-grain .30 caliber bullets. For elk or African plains game, I usually step up to 7mm bullets in the 160s and 180 grains in .30 caliber.

For years, my go-to load in the .30-06 has been the 180-grain Hornady InterLock. There isn’t much one can’t do with a 180-grain .30 caliber, but you can take another step up. I had a .300 H&H that just loved the 200-grain GameKing, a fast-opening bullet that’s usually quite accurate. With that extra weight, it produced awesome performance up to elk and larger African antelopes.

When I was doing a lot of hunting with the 8mm Rem. Mag. I usually used 220-grain GameKings. I pushed them fast, and they often weren’t pretty, but with that much weight, they always worked well.

Today I’m staying on the same page. In both .300 Win. Mag. and .300 Wby. Mag. I’m hunting mostly with Hornady’s 200-grain ELD-X. I haven’t recovered one that’s particularly pretty, but they shoot well and take game effectively, no doubt aided by the extra weight.

Importance of Penetration

Since penetration deeply into, if not completely through, the vitals is mandatory for hunting bullets, let’s talk about that. Penetration with long-proven cup-and-core bullets is generally adequate. Just how deep depends on velocity, weight for caliber, and the size of the animal—plus how much bone and heavy muscle the bullet encounters. Since expansion is large and weight loss is typical, these bullets are likely to remain inside the animal, rather than provide through-and-through penetration and exit wounds.

Some hunters like exit wounds, on the theory that a larger exit wound creates a better blood trail. That’s true, but there’s an opposite theory holding that a bullet that expends all its energy within the animal, rather than wasting what’s left on rocks and trees beyond, is better.

Both have validity. When I was young, I wanted penetration. Today, I lean more toward the second school. Although it’s impossible to orchestrate consistently, I love to find bullets “under the hide on the far side.” Neither is right or wrong; it depends on your preference.

Since upset or mushroom is considerable, and some—often much—bullet weight is lost, the cup-and-core bullets cannot be the deepest-penetrating bullets. Neither can bonded-core bullets, which offer the largest upset of any expanding bullets.

Bonded-Core Bullets

The bonded-core bullet has its lead core chemically bonded to the jacket. This allows greater expansion and better weight retention because bonding prevents the lead from wiping away. Bullet expansion is good, and it creates a large wound channel. However, the more a bullet expands, the more resistance is created, and this reduces penetration. However, the increased resistance is offset by greater retained weight that drives the bullet.

Bill Steigers’s Bitterroot was the first bonded-core bullet, followed by Jack Carter’s Trophy Bonded Bear Claw. Today there are many: Federal Fusion, Trophy Bonded Tipped and Trophy Bonded Bear Claw; Hornady InterBond and DGX Bonded; Nosler AccuBond; Remington Core-Lokt Bonded; and Swift A-Frame and Scirocco.

If you like to recover gorgeous bullets, you’ll love bonded-core bullets. Weight retention does vary. The Swift A-Frame has a dual-core with the front core bonded and the rear core protected by a wall of jacket material. Weight retention into high 90 percent is common, with large upset. The rest vary, but weight retention can range from maybe 75 to above 90 percent, depending largely on what the bullet encounters. Across the board, this is more weight than cup-and-core bullets will usually retain.

If bonded-core bullets are that good, why would anyone hunt with anything else? Now we’re into compromises. Bonded-core bullets are more expensive, often not the most accurate and usually not the most aerodynamic. However, they work so well on game—especially large, tough game—that these may be acceptable trade-offs. On the other hand, if you like through-and-through penetration, you won’t like these, either. The ultimate for penetration is the full metal jacket or “solid.” Since they don’t expand, they leave caliber-size exits. They’re actually illegal for hunting in many U.S. states, and their only hunting purpose is elephants, hippos and rhinos.

Exit Wounds

There are just two expanding bullets that I see as penetrating bullets likely to deliver consistent exit wounds: the Nosler Partition and the homogeneous alloy or “copper” bullet.

Invented in 1948 by John Nosler, the Partition is legendary. It is dual-core, with a rear core protected by a wall or “partition” of jacket material. Partitions are rarely pretty when recovered. The front core expands and some lead wipes away, while the rear core often acts like a mini-solid and continues to drive. Weight retention may not be 60 percent, but the Partition is a sound, deep-penetrating bullet.

Its reputation is that it’s not especially accurate, but you never know. I hunted with 180-grain .30 caliber Partitions for years, and they were accurate in the .30-06 I was shooting back then. Partitions also shot well in both a .338 Win. Mag. and .340 Wby. Mag. I used in the 1980s and ’90s.

I’m headed to Alaska soon for brown bear, and I’m taking a .338 barrel on my Blaser R8. I had several lighter bullets in my stash, but the only 250-grain loads on hand were Nosler Custom with Partitions that had been loaded for Diana Rupp and acquired from her husband (our editor) in an ammo swap.

Back in ’92 I shot a big bear in Kamchatka with a 250-grain Partition from my .340 Wby. The bear was quartering to, and I recovered the bullet against the hide on the far hip—just the way I like it. I decided to see how this custom load would shoot in my Blaser. I fired five three-shot groups, the largest just over one inch, the rest under. The last group was one not-so-ragged hole. I’d found my bear load—and made a lie of all the stories about Partition accuracy.

All-Copper Monolithics

The all-copper or copper-alloy expanding bullet is relatively new. The Barnes X was the first, introduced in 1989. There are many today. Some are tipped, some are not, but all work essentially the same way. A skived or serrated nose surrounds a nose cavity. Upon impact, material is driven into the cavity, and the nose peels back in petals. Expansion is limited by depth of cavity, and upset is generally smaller in diameter than with cup-and-core or bonded-core bullets, which is partly why the copper bullet is such a penetrator. This penetration is aided by nearly full weight retention. Unless petals break off, which does happen, the all-copper bullet retains almost all original weight. Initially, copper fouling was an issue, but that’s long since been rectified by grooves and driving bands in the bullet’s base.

Accuracy is spectacular in some rifles but not in others. As always, you never know until you try. Since copper is lighter than lead, copper bullets are long. Today’s copper bullet is highly advanced from the 1990s, but because of length and cartridge overall length restrictions, there are limits on weight and how high the ballistic coefficients can be. At longer ranges, as velocity drops, expansion is reduced.

Many hunters love them, others not so much. For sure, they penetrate. You won’t recover many copper bullets. When you do, most of them are pretty. For me, the bigger the animal, the better they work.

In California, we must use unleaded projectiles for all hunting. The all-copper bullets are almost too tough for our small-bodied blacktail deer. On deer-size game, instead of the behind-the-shoulder lung shot American hunters love, go for the center of the shoulder in order to offer that bullet as much resistance as possible. Most of the time it’s still going to exit, so if you want through-and-through penetration, you’ll like the copper bullets.

Bullet Selection

The important thing about bullet selection is to ignore the hype and understand how a given bullet is designed to perform. Match that against the game you’re hunting, the cartridge you’re shooting, and your most likely ranges.

In open country on deer-size game, where close shots are unlikely, perhaps you can use fast-opening bullets like Ballistic Tips and SSTs. In thicker cover, where shots may be close, maybe you want tougher bullets, especially in fast cartridges. It’s almost impossible to make a bonded-core or copper bullet come unglued. On larger game, for sure you want tougher bullets of at least medium weight for caliber.

Today, there are lots of good bullets for any application. Try to make a sound, educated choice—without getting wrapped up in accuracy and velocity. When in doubt, add some bullet weight.

Bears and Big Bovines

The biggest Alaska brown and polar bears can weigh about the same as a Cape buffalo—1,500 pounds—and bullet selection must be dealt with carefully. Thankfully there are no compromises to deal with. Ranges are short and the target is large, so you don’t need extreme accuracy. Bullet performance is everything, and penetration must be deep. Cartridges and calibers both must be adequate for large, tough game. Use at least medium-to-heavy for caliber bullets and choose a tough bullet that will hold together and penetrate deeply.

Both Alaskan guides and African professional hunters typically recommend either bonded-core or copper-alloy bullets, and the good old Nosler Partition retains a following. I have no qualms about taking it for brown bear in 9.3mm or larger, and I wouldn’t hesitate to use Partitions for buffalo—and I have, many times.

In recent years, I’ve done most of my buffalo hunting with Swift A-Frame, Hornady DGX (now Bonded) and Federal Trophy Bonded Bear Claw. I also love the Barnes X in appropriate calibers, but where I hunt buffaloes in Mozambique, we’re often into big herds and have to worry about overpenetration. Therefore I like big bonded-core bullets, which provide lots of expansion and deep penetration but are unlikely to exit on broadside shots.

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