.223, 6mm, and 6.5 failures on big game

[teamsprock]

———Update ——-
After some sleep, and some lights in the garage. No more mystery, I made a bad first shot. The first shot was even lower than I thought. The bullet struck the lower leg and blew a hole all the way through it… unfortunately there was no vitals behind that leg to also be destroyed. The bullet and bone fragments caused the flesh wounds I saw last night.

Definitely not a bullet failure, but I will leave the post for the peanut gallery.




——-Original post ——-
Here is an interesting one from tonight. I am new to the 223 game, and so far have been extremely impressed. My gun has killed 3 whitetail bucks and a bull elk. 16” tikka roughtech.

Deer have been with 73gr eldm. Elk was with a 77tmk. First two deer were 150 yards and 300, both died quickly, lungs heart exploded. Elk was 150 yards, heart lungs destroyed.

Tonight I shot a buck at 200 yards (73gr eldm). I could tell his leg was broke, and I watched him hop off, hoping he would die. He finally stopped at 400 yards, hard quartering away shot. I slipped it behind the ribs and he dropped dead.

Upon inspection, the first shot blew up on his lower “elbow” and did not penetrate the rib cage.

Here are some photos, I will try to get more.

Right shoulder, I am holding the leg up, I skinned back the armpit to see if it penetrated. You can see the bullet hole through the leg and then the flesh wound to his chest. Chest photos show no internal damage.

Red area shows approximately where the bullet impacted.

 

[Formidilosus]

Here is an interesting one from tonight. I am new to the 223 game, and so far have been extremely impressed. My gun has killed 3 whitetail bucks and a bull elk. 16” tikka roughtech.

Deer have been with 73gr eldm. Elk was with a 77tmk. First two deer were 150 yards and 300, both died quickly, lungs heart exploded. Elk was 150 yards, heart lungs destroyed.

Tonight I shot a buck at 200 yards (73gr eldm). I could tell his leg was broke, and I watched him hop off, hoping he would die. He finally stopped at 400 yards, hard quartering away shot. I slipped it behind the ribs and he dropped dead.

Upon inspection, the first shot blew up on his lower “elbow” and did not penetrate the rib cage.

Here are some photos, I will try to get more.

Right shoulder, I am holding the leg up, I skinned back the armpit to see if it penetrated. You can see the bullet hole through the leg and then the flesh wound to his chest. Chest photos show no internal damage.

Red area shows approximately where the bullet impacted.

Your red mark and the elbow wouldn’t be “in” the chest cavity, it’s below it. It hard to tell from the photos, however it looks like it skirted the brisket?

 

[The Guide]

Here is an interesting one from tonight. I am new to the 223 game, and so far have been extremely impressed. My gun has killed 3 whitetail bucks and a bull elk. 16” tikka roughtech.

Deer have been with 73gr eldm. Elk was with a 77tmk. First two deer were 150 yards and 300, both died quickly, lungs heart exploded. Elk was 150 yards, heart lungs destroyed.

Tonight I shot a buck at 200 yards (73gr eldm). I could tell his leg was broke, and I watched him hop off, hoping he would die. He finally stopped at 400 yards, hard quartering away shot. I slipped it behind the ribs and he dropped dead.

Upon inspection, the first shot blew up on his lower “elbow” and did not penetrate the rib cage.

Here are some photos, I will try to get more.

Right shoulder, I am holding the leg up, I skinned back the armpit to see if it penetrated. You can see the bullet hole through the leg and then the flesh wound to his chest. Chest photos show no internal damage.

Red area shows approximately where the bullet impacted.

My daughter hit a doe at the other end of the humerus bone where it attaches to the scapula with the same bullet (factory Hornady ELDM ammo) from a 16" Ruger American Ranch 5.56 at 220 yards. Blew up the ball end of the bone and still penetrated the chest (very low) and into heart where it stopped. The area you indicated would suggest to me that even though you hit bone, you were below the chest cavity and possibly below the sternum bone. Tough shot for anything regardless of the caliber.

Jay

 

[teamsprock]

Update posted above…. I made a bad shot, bullet worked as you would have hoped… even on bone.

Back to the gun range for me.

 

[Formidilosus]

Update posted above…. I made a bad shot, bullet worked as you would have hoped… even on bone.

Back to the gun range for me.

Thank you for the update, and the second look.

 

[MrScubaSteve]

Small cal naysayers, this is your chance!

It seems like discussions happen in bits and pieces in lots of threads. The small caliber proponents have this unfairly massive amount of data all compiled in a few great threads.

So I think it would be helpful if the guys that think that is stupid have one consolidated place to share evidence of failures of the .223, 6, or 6.5 calibers using heavy for caliber match ammo.

You got a video of one of those splashy 147 ELDMs “blowing up” on the rib bone of an axis deer? You seen a .223 77 TMK bounce off an Elk?
This is the place to share!

Agreed

 

[Harvey_NW]

Well this one spiraled out of control while I was on vacation, lol! Not out of the ordinary, kind of like how the 143 ELD-X performed on my trip. Shot coyotes at 480, 650, and 690. All obliterated. This was the first one at 650 after death spiral (initially my PB, until the 690 opportunity). With fur prices and populations the way they are we were told just knock down as many as possible, it was awesome.


Getting back on track with this thread though, my hunting partner had what I would consider an interesting result from a 147 ELD-M out of his 6.5 PRC. Cow elk damage tag, 60 yard broadside shot, seemed to have slipped right through. I'm the nerd on this stuff so he didn't take pictures of the lungs, but he said there were no jacket fragments at all, it just left about a quarter sized hole and complete pass through. I'm not calling this a failure, but I would expect that at that velocity it would fragment even if it didn't hit a rib on impact. Or maybe this is the potential negative effect of the thicker/tapered jacket of the 147?

Entry


Exit

 

[Jake Larsen]

Well this one spiraled out of control while I was on vacation, lol! Not out of the ordinary, kind of like how the 143 ELD-X performed on my trip. Shot coyotes at 480, 650, and 690. All obliterated. This was the first one at 650 after death spiral (initially my PB, until the 690 opportunity). With fur prices and populations the way they are we were told just knock down as many as possible, it was awesome.
View attachment 800095

Getting back on track with this thread though, my hunting partner had what I would consider an interesting result from a 147 ELD-M out of his 6.5 PRC. Cow elk damage tag, 60 yard broadside shot, seemed to have slipped right through. I'm the nerd on this stuff so he didn't take pictures of the lungs, but he said there were no jacket fragments at all, it just left about a quarter sized hole and complete pass through. I'm not calling this a failure, but I would expect that at that velocity it would fragment even if it didn't hit a rib on impact. Or maybe this is the potential negative effect of the thicker/tapered jacket of the 147?

Entry
View attachment 800097

Exit
View attachment 800099

That’s weird, especially at 60 yards. Interesting to see what others have to say about this. Every ELDM I’ve seen shot goes to pieces on game, especially at high impact velocities.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Formidilosus]

Getting back on track with this thread though, my hunting partner had what I would consider an interesting result from a 147 ELD-M out of his 6.5 PRC. Cow elk damage tag, 60 yard broadside shot, seemed to have slipped right through. I'm the nerd on this stuff so he didn't take pictures of the lungs, but he said there were no jacket fragments at all, it just left about a quarter sized hole and complete pass through. I'm not calling this a failure, but I would expect that at that velocity it would fragment even if it didn't hit a rib on impact. Or maybe this is the potential negative effect of the thicker/tapered jacket of the 147?

It happens every once in a while with the 6.5mm 147gr as well as the .224 88gr.

 

[omicron1792]

How did elk react? I guess it’s possible that the insides were a mess and the chest cavity contained all the carnage. Or it could have really just penciled through.

 

[Harvey_NW]

It happens every once in a while with the 6.5mm 147gr as well as the .224 88gr.

I figured, that rifle is probably approaching 20 big game animals since I set it up for him a couple years ago. All other performance has been flawless and devastating.

How did elk react? I guess it’s possible that the insides were a mess and the chest cavity contained all the carnage. Or it could have really just penciled through.

Elk dropped. He said she laid there with her head bobbing for a short time and then expired. His wife was the shooter so he didn't want her to take another shot unless the cow stood and presented a good one. Initially that's what I thought as well, but being a damage tag they are able to gut and get out whole, so he was able to look at the lungs and didn't find any fragments.

 

[treydfoster]

How will they know the bullet “failed” unless the animal is recovered and photos of the damage (or lack of damage) are recorded? Otherwise the entire thread will be “stories” and “hearsay”.

If someone has a failure post to share, I think it should include photographic evidence of said “splashes” or “blow ups”. The only way anyone would know that either of those things happened is if they recover a dead animal.

Please include photos to backup claims so we can all potentially learn something.

Just because you recover a dead animal doesn't mean a bullet didn't fail. Follow up shots, extensive tracking, finding the animal and shooting it again days later, etc can all recover a dead animal that had a bullet failure. The dead animal argument is poor.

 

[mxgsfmdpx]

Just because you recover a dead animal doesn't mean a bullet didn't fail.

Correct and I agree.

Follow up shots, extensive tracking, finding the animal and shooting it again days later, etc can all recover a dead animal that had a bullet failure.

Correct, we agree.

The dead animal argument is poor.

What?

 

[Jake Larsen]

Elk dropped. He said she laid there with her head bobbing for a short time and then expired. His wife was the shooter so he didn't want her to take another shot unless the cow stood and presented a good one. Initially that's what I thought as well, but being a damage tag they are able to gut and get out whole, so he was able to look at the lungs and didn't find any fragments.

That’s strange. The times I’ve seen penciling the animal reaction was very different…as in, they acted like they weren’t hit at all, and required more shooting.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Formidilosus]

I figured, that rifle is probably approaching 20 big game animals since I set it up for him a couple years ago. All other performance has been flawless and devastating.


Elk dropped.

It almost certainly didn’t fully fail to upset- based on the picture and the elk reaction (though the impact is high). Mostly when it happens it’s just not the dramatic upset/fragmentation that is normal.

 

[Thegman]

It almost certainly didn’t fully fail to upset- based on the picture and the elk reaction (though the impact is high). Mostly when it happens it’s just not the dramatic upset/fragmentation that is normal.

Not that it's worth much, but that would be my guess as well. I've had 30 caliber bullets that expanded fine but retained most of their weight, and made quarter sized holes through lungs, etc. Even less damage than these elk pictures. Probably not ideal in my case, and maybe a little slow killing, but still ended up with a downed moose within 30 seconds or so.

 

[omicron1792]

Not that it's worth much, but that would be my guess as well. I've had 30 caliber bullets that expanded fine but retained most of their weight, and made quarter sized holes through lungs, etc. Even less damage than these elk pictures. Probably not ideal in my case, and maybe a little slow killing, but still ended up with a downed moose within 30 seconds or so.

Why I stopped using the terminal ascent bullet. I’m sure it mushroomed, but man the exit looked like the entrance with minimal damage.