165 SGK- how fast??

[brmfan]

Last season I took a decent sized buck, but lost my first ever deer (a young doe) using 165 Gamekings (hollow point boat tail) out of a .308 going about 2580 fps. I have been using this load for several years and until now have had nothing but 'bang-flops'. I never had one run let alone have to chase one down.

We'll, I had to hit the buck twice, even though the shot was textbook (60 yards, broad side, just behind the shoulder in the boiler room). He didn't even run... just paced around for a couple of minutes. I could see where I hit him and could not believe he was still standing! He dropped right after shot #2, almost in the same spot.

With the doe, again good shot placement at 110 yards. Unfortunately she ran up and over a ridge into a thick patch of underbrush. It was dark by the time I got over to the spot where I hit her. I tracked her into the brush but lost the blood trail and had to give up the search after about 40 minutes. Went back in the morning but never found her. First deer I have ever lost, and it was upsetting.

So, I would like to keep using the 165 GK, but my question is should I speed it up to over 2600 fps? My best accuracy was in the 2560-2580 range, but I'm willing to give up some MOA if a faster bullet will perform better.

Opinions???

[Panfisher]

Doesn't the Sierra Game King have an exposed lead tip, the HP you are describing sounds more like a matchking, but I haven't loaded Sierras for a long time so it may have changed. The shot at the buck, did he stumble around or simply walk around, not all that unusual, he was dead just didn't know it. The doe, well I am a stickler for this one, if you didn't recover it you have no idea where it was hit. Could be a front leg shot, plenty of blood, peters out in 50 yards or so and then nothing. What did the inside of the buck look like, lots of damage?, complete pass through?, At the distance you are shooting your bullets certainly don't need to be MOA capable. A plain old Rem Cor Lokt, or Hornady, etc. should work just fine. Really curious to know about the bullet damage on the buck though.

[brmfan]

Panfisher: The bullet is a true hollow point (http://www.midwayusa.com/product/326...ail-box-of-100). Where I hunt there are up to 600 yard open fields and thick hardwood stands, so I try to cover all my bases with this bullet since it's match accurate.

The buck literally stood there and then went back to eating some greens. When I finally dropped him with shot #2 he had his mouth full of salad. Internals were shredded, and part of the lung was sticking out of the exit hole. Only found 1 exit wound so I don't know which bullet did the damage. I just field dress then take them to the processor so I don't know more than that.

I did not find much blood on the doe, but saw where she was hit and it looked good. As you said the true bullet effect is anyone's guess. Every deer I've shot with this bullet- about a dozen, from 50 to 220 yards- had massive internal damage.

[dogrunner]

Brimfan, I have used Sierra's #2140 GKHPBT for years as my bullet of choice in both my '06 rifles. Those include an ancient M/70 and a BAR lightweight with a 20" bbl.

My stock load has been 57.5 gr's of IMR 4350 which in the 24" 70 crono's right at 2850...the BAR is nearly 200 fps slower. Still, in both those rifles accuracy superb....that 70 will hold right at half an inch at a hundred...the BAR hovers around an inch....sometimes just a bit less.

Far as stopping/killing power......well, I have had precisely ONE deer move after being hit, and that was a sideways grazing brisket shot that flipped him over. I thought the deer was drt, but he got up staggering and a friend dropped him. Distance: around 250.

I have dropped wild hogs, one weighing nearly 300 pounds, with that load and they just fell down in their tracks.

My bet is that you are not quite pushing that bullet fast enough. What sort of damage did you observe in the deer you mention....every one I've touched with that bullet exhibited massive (explosive is a better term) damage and the singular bullet fragment I ever recovered was a quartering shot that partly exited the front shoulder, leaving a small portion of the jacket and a bit of lead.....every other round was a thru and thru......That big hog I mentioned was shot just a bit shy of a hundred, bullet entered the lower chest quartering toward the right front.....it left nothing but mush...heart/lungs utterly destroyed!

[brmfan]

Dogrunner: You are probably right about needing more speed. I'll probably switch to a new case (been using Federals) with greater internal volume so I can up the charge of Varget and pick up some fps. I have a ton of Black Hills match brass which IIRC weigh about 15-20 grains less so I'll give them a try.

[Art Eatman]

My '06 handloads with the Sierra 165-grain HPBT had a muzzle velocity somewhere around 2,900 or maybe a bit better.

The only deer I ever shot with one of those was at maybe 35 yards at most. Exit wound you could stick your fist into. (In the top of the near shoulder blade, out through the offside foreleg shoulder joint.) Foot-wide blood trail for fifty feet.

[steveNChunter]

Have you tried any 150 gr bullets in the rifle? You would pick up some speed and the bullet wouldn't be quite as tough to fully expand. My .308 Rem 700 loves 150 gr Sierra Pro-Hunters (flat base version of the Gameking) over a stout load of RL-15. Varget was the 2nd most accurate powder tried.

[jrothWA]

as I use the SPBT for whitetail @ 2600fps.

For upgrading that load for Black Bear @ Elk, they suggested the HPBT,

As those are of STUDIER construction than the SPBT.

[jmr40]

Looking at Sierria's website they advise that the bullet is a "hard" bullet designed for deep penetration and to use 2500 MV minimum. I suspect that it is just too slow to expand at anything but very close range.

I'd speed it up, I'm loading 165's @ 2750 in my 308's, or choose another bullet.

[bamaranger]

I've thought about that slug for many years, but have never bought, loaded, or shot any, at game or target. I've read it is an extremely accurate slug, and held some bench rest or accuracy records of some type in competition for a while.

My take on the OP is that since there has been success with the other deer hit with the slug, that certainly on the lost doe, and possibly with the buck shot twice, that the shooter did not get the hit they thought. The deer appears "broadside" but is not, the hit is not exactly where desired, and the bullet ends up not catching both lungs, or ends up too far back, clipping the liver, that sort of thing.

Honestly, I cannot imagine a deer being hit "broadside in the boiler room" even with an FMJ, and prance around for "several minutes" and go back to feeding, to be shot again. I have seen that behavior, sort of, with arrow shot deer, but at 60 yds, not flee from the blast? I wonder, is this rifle suppressed, maybe short barreled too? And I have never been able to "see" exactly where I hit a deer with a rifle bullet, especially at 110 yds, till I go over and find the dead deer. And more than once, the hit is not where I thought it would be.

Finally, are we in fact sure that this particular load, is in fact running 2580 fps? Is that over a chrono, or from a manual? My chrono makes a liar out of me, routinely! Haggling over 20-30 fps seems pointless. A slug at 2580...2610...etc, what's the difference to a deer? Varget should get that slug to near 2700 fps if not over, safely, if you have any barrel length at all. Accuracy is good, but if you want to "stretch" your shots on game a bit (reasonably), velocity to flatten trajectory is good too, and typically, more destructive.

The comments that the 165 SGKHP is described as a "hard" bullet by the manufacturer is interesting, as I would not have though so...... very interesting. I will try and remember that.

Finally, two bullet entrances, one exit. That means one slug stayed in the deer. I cannot imagine a 165/308, especially one described as "hard" by its maker, arriving at say even 2300 fps, on a perfectly broadside animal, not punching thru both sides of a whitetail.

My take is that in fact, that missing bullet ended up back in the viscera/guts, cause the the deer was not truly "broadside". Consequently, the bullet did not/could not pick up both lungs, maybe the heart, because it started/landed to far rearward initially, and angled back into the guts. So a mildly quartering shot, that ended up too far back. See paragraph two.

Not trying to beat anybody up here, just some of this does not make sense.

[brmfan]

Bama: All valid points, but let me clarify. I did run the bullets over a chrono, and the average was 2580 fps from a 21.75" barrel with a custom muzzle brake (no suppressor). I was also using a Leupold MK 4 set at about 12x, on a Remmy 700 PSS resting on a piece of thick water pipe insulation tube (covering the edge of the shoot house window). Before the doe ran off, I could see what looked like the entrance wound on the upper leg just below the shoulder. Could I have been mistaken? Sure. But my line of sight was pretty clear.
The buck was the strange one. As I said I'd never seen one stand around like nothing happened. I was shooting from an elevated stand in a patch of white and red oaks. He was standing, clearly broadside, along the edge of an open bean field. I agree he should have run off at the blast, but then again it was a strange situation which is why I posted this thread. I don't know if the first shot made the exit or not. Most likely the second hit bone and didn't make it out. Again, I just gutted it and took it to the processor.
Not sure what else to tell you.

[bamaranger]

Sounds like you've got a grip on your ammo, rifle and gear. I dunno either.
Hunt/shoot long enough and once in a while you'll loose one. All we can do is learn from it. You are trying to do just that, so good for you.

I'd not give up on the slug or the .308. But I would crank the velocity up a bit (safely), and gladly give up a bit of MOA for 150 fps. Varget BTW is one of my favorite accuracy powders, especially for .308.

Better luck and good shooting to you.

[Art Eatman]

I've been using the Sierra 30-cal hunting bullets some forty years, now. Mostly, the 150-grain bullets. The SP flat-base, per the Sierra folks in a thread here, back a long time ago, is a bit tougher than the SPBT. I had "over-driven" a boat-tail into a buck's neck at about 25 yards and the bullet blew up without exiting. MV of around 3,100 was too fast. That bullet works well for an MV of around 2,800 or so. Flat base? No problem.

All I know is, if you put the bullet in the right place, Bambi doesn't go anywhere.

[Brian Pfleuger]

Originally Posted by bamaranger

Honestly, I cannot imagine a deer being hit "broadside in the boiler room" even with an FMJ, and prance around for "several minutes" and go back to feeding, to be shot again. I have seen that behavior, sort of, with arrow shot deer, but at 60 yds, not flee from the blast? I wonder, is this rifle suppressed, maybe short barreled too? And I have never been able to "see" exactly where I hit a deer with a rifle bullet, especially at 110 yds, till I go over and find the dead deer. And more than once, the hit is not where I thought it would be.

I concur. No deer (or animal of any kind) can be hit in the lungs and stand there like nothing happened. I've seen them not react to a gunshot from VERY close range and I've seen them stand there like nothing happened when they got shot too but no way does one stand there "for a couple of minutes" when it can't breathe. It might have SEEMED like a couple of minutes, it was probably 10 seconds or less.

Personally, I've never had or seen a "bullet failure". I've only had and seen shot placement failure.

There's a few guys on the forum that track deer with dogs, maybe one of them will chime in. All the guys I've talked to who do that have NEVER found a deer that was hit "in the boiler room" even though virtually every hunter insists that it's where they shot the animal.

The doe was never recovered, therefore you have no idea where that bullet hit. Under the circumstances, "could see what looked like" is "didn't see a thing." No recovered animal, no idea on shot placement.

[Panfisher]

I agree, I would also think that the bullet you are talking bout as being tougher than average and maybe needing more velocity to expand almost certainly didn't hit a bone and disintegrate or stop. The first shot at the buck was almost certainly a miss. As others have mentioned I would happily trade some accuracy for bullet performance, especially at those ranges.

[Unlicensed Dremel]

Since there's so much just dumb luck involved with whether it's a DRT or not, I seriously doubt that adding 50 or 100 fps will make any difference with the same bullet.

However - and this is not scientific, but purely anecdotal - a *lot* of people seem to report a high degree of bang-flops using Barnes monolithic bullets (Triple-Shock, aka TSX or TTSX). Since they expand so uniformly and consistently, and since they give great penetration (due to staying together), they evidently kill a bit out of proportion to other bullets of the same size at the same speed.

However, if you do decide to "speed it up" with same bullet, I'd speed it up via a different rifle chambered in .30-'06 or bigger - no need to push the envelope - espec since 2500-2600 at muzzle means impact velocities significantly lower than that at known needed ranges (110+ in your case).

[jmr40]

He doesn't need to shoot it from a 30-06 to speed it up safely. He is almost 200 fps slower than what would be considered "standard speed" for a 308/168. 2900 fps is doable with that bullet in a 308.

Also, the Barnes bullets only work well when impact speeds are 2200 fps or greater. From what I can tell the bullet in question is going to need very similar speeds to expand. If you research copper bullets you'll see that they give very similar results when shot too slow. Starting a 165 so slow is going to have you under acceptable speeds for expansion at around 200 yards. I'm not at all surprised that this happened.

Sometimes bullets still kill quickly with little or no expansion. But it is more likely to put one down fast with rapid, explosive expansion. The bullet in this case likely did not fail, but performed just as designed. It was the wrong bullet for the task. Shooting it faster would help, but it is still too tough for whitetails.

[Unlicensed Dremel]

Yeah, but 2200 is a lot less than 2500, so there's a lot more room for error with the Barnes bullets if sticking with .308.

[green_MTman]

You know you can use the classic game kings(im sorry it actually was a pro hunter) ,there beyond accurate and yes the deer I took with the 120gr game king dropped instantaniously,did not walk or run even and foot.
I have never shot the game king HPBT although I have a box of the 130gr's laying around

I don't believe sierra advertises them as a slow expander with elk moose potential.I believe there website said "mid size game" black bear,goat/sheep or caribou.

With deer there is never a need for anything but a lead tip exposes game king or pro hunter

[eastbank]

i have shot a pile of deer with the 165gr nosler BT at 2600fps out of a .308 and at 2700fps out of a 3006, but do wait for a broadside shot and double lung them with no walk aways. eastbank.

[Art Eatman]

A 165-grain any-bullet at 2,580 is more Oomph than a thutty-thutty. I see no reason for more velocity.

[cornbush]

As far as an animal just standing there after being hit I have seen it first hand. It was a cow elk, hit twice through the lungs, no shoulder hit, between ribs on both sides. She just stood there, no flinch, no stagger, finally my buddy hit her again high in the shoulder and she dropped. All the shots were right at 200 yards with a 7mm mag and I believe a 160 grain nosler partition. The chest cavity was jello, and there was pieces of lung on the sage brush behind her, all three bullets were pass thru. The whole thing took place over maybe 45 seconds to a minute.

[riverratt]

According to several sierra techs the 308 dia 165gr HPBT is considered a magnum bullet. It is made for longer range shots from a 300 win or better.

I always try to do my research before selecting a bullet to hunt with. This includes shooting wetpack at various ranges that i intend to take game at and shooting through cow bones into wetpack to simulate a worst case senario heavy bone strike. And what i found is that there are only 2 bullets that i will use in my 06. #1 is the sierra 180gr rn #2 is the 165gr HPBT. Why? They almost always hold up, and always expand. The 180gr does not reliably expand over 150yrds, but is devistating inside of 100 with deep penatration. The 165gr expands reliably out to 350yrds (havnt tested past that). Even after direct hits on the bone at 30yrds the 165gr held together long enough to make it through the vitals. The only time i ever had a 165gr test bullet fail it was a glancing hit on bone. The bullet passed through the wetpack without expanding (or so it looked). I assume the bullets hollowpoint closed up and didnt expand. I never had an issue with a deer though

All of my test with the 165gr were done at a MV around 2800fps. I cant say for sure what happened with your deer but the 165gr is one heck of a deer bullet but sometimes the deer just dont want to die and stuff happens. Ive even almost lost a deer that i shot through the sholder with the 180gr bullet, shattered the shoulder through the heart exit behind the off shoulder, the deer ran about 200yrds without much blood. if the bullet shoots good and has a provin track record id keep useing it.

[zatoan]

as I use the SPBT for whitetail @ 2600fps.

For upgrading that load for Black Bear @ Elk, they suggested the HPBT,

As those are of STUDIER construction than the SPBT.

[hooligan1]

My rifle is a Rem,700 adl with a 24",1-10" barrel. It has been pleasingly accurate with those bullets, I have confidence in any shot that this bullet will hit poa, having more than a few called bullseye shots at 100.
Im only telling you this because yesterday I purchased another 200 of them,BNIB for 40.00.....
I definitely want to try them this season because of the confidence level I have in them.