The limitations of a big lead hollow point

[FrontierGander]

From one of my Facebook group users.

It's not just powerbelts over expanding when driven to fast!

 

[Sudsy]

You often get better penetration of a hollow point at a slower speed.
Cranking it up causes too much expansion too quickly, fine on whitetail and yotes, not so much on larger stuff.

 

[flathead#2]

80 grains should have been enough.

 

[FrontierGander]

80 grains should have been enough.

Exactly what I thought. Especially with T7

 

[willfrye027]

Sounds like the elk died? If this was a centerfire bullet you could argue the performance was good but hard to know without seeing the damage

 

[Rich M]

Why not use a solid instead of a HP if wanting penetration?

All you can do is slow it down if stuck with HP.

 

[PathFinder]

There's a lot of information missing here. How far did it penetrate and how far did the elk travel?
Wanting a pretty bullet at the end if penetration is adequate and the animal dies quickly is silly.

Sent from my Pixel 6 using Tapatalk

 

[MThuntr]

Those bullets were designed for much slower impact. They're soft lead (likely pure) so they obturate into the rifling just the same as powerbelts. I'd expect them to act that way going fast at close ranges.

Though I've never encountered it in my limited experience with inlines, I've heard pushing those types of bullets hard in a fast twist rifle can cause some serious lead fouling too.

 

[Dirtyjimmy85]

I've shot several deer using those and always had good expansion with them. I only run 80 gr behind them though. I'm geussing your running that soft lead bullet a little to hot.

 

[5MilesBack]

If that hunk went through the lungs, it had to do some serious damage. That's what I would expect from a hollow point. Tell him to try a 420gr No Excuses if he wants to shoot pure lead with less fragmentation.

My daughter shot a cow moose at close range last year with the 340gr ELD-x over 90gr (volume) of BH. That cow didn't go 10 yards before toppling over dead. Didn't cut her open, but also didn't find any pieces against the hide on the offside. But I'm sure it destroyed her lungs.......in multiple pieces.

 

[Felix40]

I’ve been watching a lot of ML bullet tests lately. The I Love Muzzleloaders guy has a bunch. That’s pretty consistent with what he got too. There’s so many variables with MLs and that’s why nobody can agree on stuff.

Regular power belts have worked great for me on deer and hogs but all the horror stories make me nervous about using them on an elk hunt.

All copper interests me but it seems like a lot of them are designed to open up more than I want. In the meateater sika deer episode they recovered an all copper slug from a 60# deer. 8” of penetration wouldn’t leave a lot of margin for error on a big elk.

The powerbelt elr looks about like what I want. They seem to shed the front half but the back half stays pretty intact. I’ll have to look into no excuses too.