Hornady Eld-m's...what is the minimum terminal velocity threshold?

[ATL]

yeah I own one of those too, wasn’t this thread about .284 180’s? I’m confused why people keep talking about 6.5 creed and 6.5 PRCs and 147s

The title of the thread:

Hornady Eld-m's...what is the minimum terminal velocity threshold?​

The body of the inquiry specifies .284/180, but based off the title all ELD-M terminal info is fair game, I would think.

My contribution: The farthest I have shot an animal with the .264/147 ELD-M was 460 yards with a 6.5CM. Impact velocity was approximately 2250fps with excellent results - lots of damage internally, bullet exited, animal drt. I would expect good results down to at least 2000-2100fps based off this one example personally.

 

[River Reaper]

I guess I would just point the guy to doing a search for eld-m in the 223 thread, 6mm thread, 6.5 thread, and the magnum thread. The ELD-M is discussed pretty extensively on this site, including a thread specifically for .284 I believe.

 

[River Reaper]

Here is an entrance hole of a .284 180ELD-M at 2400fps, quartered away, right in the crease, the heart completely shredded, fragments found under the hide on the opposite side:

 

[skipper907]

Ryan Avery talked about this on one of the S2H podcast and I believe he was shoot a 7mm one a deer and had eldms not expand
I think he and forum think the minimum is 2k.
This is one downside I see with the eldm they are not test for a minimum expansion velocity like the ELDX is. I understand the eldx minimum is not perfect but they are tested for that minimum velocity

 

[Jordan Smith]

Ryan Avery talked about this on one of the S2H podcast and I believe he was shoot a 7mm one a deer and had eldms not expand
I think he and forum think the minimum is 2k.
This is one downside I see with the eldm they are not test for a minimum expansion velocity like the ELDX is. I understand the eldx minimum is not perfect but they are tested for that minimum velocity

A sample of one or two failures to perform is not alarming. That happens even with the best bullets on rare occasion.

I am speculating here, because I don't have a large sample size at minimum expansion velocity with every model of ELD-M, but I would expect that the minimum impact velocity for reliable expansion likely varies with the specific model.

I have seen good expansion on game from the 147 down below 2000 fps a few times, but it's a small sample size and I haven't tested the bullet much lower.