.223 for bear, mountain goat, deer, elk, and moose.

[glock233]

I don't know how one defines a "good controlled expansion bullet" , but there is no question that a 180 grain remington core lokt out of a 30-06 leaves a much larger wound channel and penetrates deeper than a 77 tmk out of a 223.

I have used both. There is no comparison. That said I prefer the 223 and tmk these days.

Disagree on wound channel inside reasonable distances. The 77 TMK is an expanding cone of razor blades.

 

[Formidilosus]

I don't know how one defines a "good controlled expansion bullet" , but there is no question that a 180 grain remington core lokt out of a 30-06 leaves a much larger wound channel and penetrates deeper than a 77 tmk out of a 223.

I have used both. There is no comparison. That said I prefer the 223 and tmk these days.

I have killed a very large quantity of deer with that exact combination of 30/06 and Core Lokt almost never were the wounds remarkable at all.

 

[Pharmseller]

I don't know how one defines a "good controlled expansion bullet" , but there is no question that a 180 grain remington core lokt out of a 30-06 leaves a much larger wound channel and penetrates deeper than a 77 tmk out of a 223.

I have used both. There is no comparison. That said I prefer the 223 and tmk these days.

I have recovered 180 CL bullets from deer. I have yet to recover a 75 ELDM from a deer.

 

[KHntr]

I know without doubt that a 77 grain Tipped Gameking will not give as deep or as wide a wound channel as a 30-06 running a good controlled expanding bullet.

Yeahhhhhhh…. I have killed a pile of elk and moose and deer and bears with 264wm/708/280AI/7wsm/3006/300wm/300RUM/338RUM and “good controlled expanding bullets” that I absolutely couldn’t say that with any credibility. In fact, thats what lead me to the Mouse Rifles in the first place, the wound channels from 75/88 ELD m were bigger than “hunting bullets” from traditional hunting cartridges.

That belief that you have, “that it can’t possibly be as good” is what is holding you back.

I especially know that my 35 Whelen is a far better black timber rifle for Elk in Washington state than a 30-06. Mass makes the difference. There are shots I just won't take with a 223 that I wouldn't hesitate to take with a heavy loaded 30-06 or Whelen. And no I haven't tried it because I am not recoil shy and want more gun when I feel it is warranted.

There are no shots I won’t take with a 223 and a 77TMK/88 ELD m that I would with my 300 RUM. But I know there are shots I can make with that 7lb 223 that I can’t make with an unbraked/unsupressed 8lb RUM.

 

[Kcardwell]

Can someone point me in the direction of what we think about the 77g otms for deer and bear size game? Killed a bear with one this fall and worked great but want to make sure it wasn’t just a fluke

 

[packgoatguy]

Personally I have had terrible results using monos. I swore them off when they first came out. The ole Barnes X bullets were no better than FMJ's. Soured me on Barnes for 20 years. I still have only used the 120 gr. Barnes Matchburners on game. I have some 80 gr. 243 TTSX but still haven't decided if I want to use them.

I've seen it happen with a 200gr ELDX out of a 300wm. My son took a 425 yard shot at a cow elk, and impact was textbook right behind front shoulder. But the bullet split somehow on the rib and half went 90 degrees into the liver/stomach and the rest went straight into the lung. But she stayed on her feet for 5 minutes and covered several hundred yards with the herd (we lost track of her in the maylay and he couldn't get a second shot before she was out of range). Luckily we were in an area where we had a good birds eye view of their escape route... so we were able to re-find her with the spotter. When we later backtracked her trail, there was no blood in the snow. No exit either. I have nothing against the eldx or the 300wm... but sometimes wierd things happen when bullets hit flesh. Just picking a bigger caliber doesn't fix that. On another occasion my niece shot a cow elk at 509 yards with my 300wm, using the Federal Terminal Ascent bullet. It punched through both shoulders, and got lung... and the cow dropped out of sight. But we found her 20 minutes later still alive (but incapacitated). When we processed the front quarters we found neat holes through the scapula about as big as my index finder... very little trauma or bloodshot to the surrounding tissue... On another occasion my son shot a 6 point bull in the Selway from 60 yards with my 300wm... using the Terminal Ascent bullet. It was a high shoulder hit, which dropped the bull to the ground, but it took us more than a few minutes to navigate some crazy nasty deadfall and when we finally got up to it... it was still alive and he had to shoot it in the head with the 9mm. So, at least in my experience... a bigger caliber does not mean a quicker death... and for whatever reason, I've had far fewer rodeos like that since switching to "smaller" calibers like 6.5 creed, 6 creed, 243win, 223rem, etc. and using the 140eld, 109eld, 108eld, and 77tmk.

 

[E.Shell]

Can someone point me in the direction of what we think about the 77g otms for deer and bear size game? Killed a bear with one this fall and worked great but want to make sure it wasn’t just a fluke

Generally speaking, the OTMs are not recommended because they exhibit inconsistent performance (blow up or pencil through) that is much improved with the TMK style bullets.

 

[fwafwow]

Can someone point me in the direction of what we think about the 77g otms for deer and bear size game? Killed a bear with one this fall and worked great but want to make sure it wasn’t just a fluke

Not trying to be a d*ck, but give a fish or teach to fish...

The Search feature in the upper right can be used to find any reference to "77 OTM" on the entire site, within a subforum, or even just within this thread (which produced 3 pages worth). As has been pointed out, there is it's easier when you use a desktop browser. I find that, depending on the search topic, it's often better to use the desktop browser and pick the forums you want to search (or, more often, which you want to exclude - especially if you don't want to wade through lots of classified posts on an item).

 

[liv3mind]

Can someone point me in the direction of what we think about the 77g otms for deer and bear size game? Killed a bear with one this fall and worked great but want to make sure it wasn’t just a fluke

Post 12372 is my experience with them.

 

[TradLife406]

Can someone point me in the direction of what we think about the 77g otms for deer and bear size game? Killed a bear with one this fall and worked great but want to make sure it wasn’t just a fluke

The search feature sucks. Just ask Grok to reference Rokslide for what you're looking for. Make sure it's set to "unhinged". Grok is all about this site Chat GPT not so much.

I do this a lot. "Reference Rokslide.com for _____" and it'll speed read all the posts and threads. Or it will even give you a link to the source thread.

 

[FredH]

What shot angles would you take with an 06 that you would pass with a .223? Not trying to be argumentative. From my experience yhe last few years with 77 tmks and 80 eldms, there’s not an angle I would pass on with the 223 that I would take with my 30-06.
* I am not someone that plans on shooting at such an angle that my bullet has to pass thru guts or a rear quarter before making it to the vitals.

Anything that required more than 14" of penetration. I can easily get more bone breaking and deeper penetration with good bullets from a 30-06.

 

[Mikido]

If they can see a tiny piece of blue tape they should be dead.
Like goose hunting. Dudes worry about the smallest dumbest things flaring the birds like empty shotgun shells or other stuff. If they're that close to notice you should be blasting away.

Just paint the tape with some face camo…

 

[Formidilosus]

Anything that required more than 14" of penetration. I can easily get more bone breaking and deeper penetration with good bullets from a 30-06.

Just stop man. You are ignorant on this subject.

 

[Kcardwell]

The search feature sucks. Just ask Grok to reference Rokslide for what you're looking for. Make sure it's set to "unhinged". Grok is all about this site Chat GPT not so much.

I do this a lot. "Reference Rokslide.com for _____" and it'll speed read all the posts and threads. Or it will even give you a link to the source thread.

Thank you!

 

[Big_wals]

Anything that required more than 14" of penetration. I can easily get more bone breaking and deeper penetration with good bullets from a 30-06.

There is zero angles where 14” of penetration won’t reach an elks vitals unless you’re shooting thru guts to get there.

 

[FredH]

One's preference for something doesn't mean another's preference for something (different) won't also work well.

The old "This is what I use and it works. You're dumb for doing something I wouldn't do." is the gist of the invalid argument...and it gets really old hearing it.

I didn't say one persons preference over rules another's. Many people are very happy to use what works, has worked and will work perfectly. Not counting on one specific trait or a few different bullets. I personally have had great results using rifles chambered in cartridges 24 caliber and up using bullets 100 grain and heavier. Next rifle up is my 22 ARC using 80 gr. ELDM's at around 2700 fps. I gain my preferences by using both concepts. So far I have to say no the .224 centerfires are not do all do everything rifles. Meaning if I could have only one deer rifle I would not choose a 223,22-250 or a 22 Creedmoor. Do they have specific uses where they excel yes.

 

[KHntr]

Anything that required more than 14" of penetration. I can easily get more bone breaking and deeper penetration with good bullets from a 30-06.

RickT300, it’s pretty obvious at this point that you simply get bored and come here to post nonsense simply to get some attention.
The only reason that I get involved in anything you post here is so that anyone who is searching for actual information doesn’t see your posts and then think there is any validity to your opinions if there aren’t any replies calling you out on your trolling.

So keep doing you, and I hope you get the attention you need here so you can keep going on with your days.

 

[Thegman]

Anything that required more than 14" of penetration. I can easily get more bone breaking and deeper penetration with good bullets from a 30-06.

Yeah, I didn't pull out the tape measure, but pretty sure it was more than 14" from one side of this moose to the other, where the bullet ended up....

But yeah, I think we all get it, you wouldn't choose a 223 for something like this, and that's okay, no one is trying to tell you to.

 

[Formidilosus]

You gotta watch those big bad elk with only “14 inches of penetration”.


440 yards after traveling through the stomach and completely separating the hip and femur-

 

[FredH]

I rarely see 30-06 wound channels with common bonded/expanding or mono bullets that approximate what these 77gr TMK pics are doing.

And, sorry to say this, but unless you're shooting banded solids out of that 35 Whelen, or buckshot, it's going to be deflected as much as a 77gr .223 bullet by any given branch, practically speaking. It's just what spitzer bullets do.

It has nothing at all to do with deflection, it's all about what the bullet does when it hits the animal. And who says I have to run spitzer bullets?