Barnes TSX performance

[hayseed51]

My nephew drew what he considered to be a once in a lifetime elk tag in eastern MT this year. A unique area in that you'll often see 200 head a day, and some real big bulls. He scouted the area twice and seemed to think it likely that he might have to take a 500+ yard shot. I recently had a rifle made in 325 WSM, and offered to let him use it for the hunt.

I took quite a bit of time this fall and worked up loads for the rifle. Ended up with two loads that I felt pretty happy with for accuracy. 200 gr. Barnes TSX in front of IMR 4350 and 200 gr Accubonds on top of IMR 4007SSC. There was a very slight advantage to the Barnes in group size. Got two 3-shot groups to lay inside of 1 1/4" at 300 yds, in fact.

Rifle is topped with a Leupold VXIII 4.5-14 with the Boone & Crockett reticle. When zeroed at 200, trajectory puts point of impact about 2" above the point of the bottom upright. Real nice. I felt pretty confident in the combo to 500 and beyond.

Like most plans a guy makes for hunting, it didn't play out quite the way we anticipated. I didn't go along on the hunt, but here's what went down. Barnes loaded. The "shot" came at 130 yards. Because of the cover and terrain, it was off-hand, but broadside. Justin made a decent shot, about 3-4" behind the heart. Hit a rib going in and exited. Had to have messed up the lungs. Bull staggers, but takes off. At this point, I think Justin may have got a little excited. Fired a total of 6 more shots, hitting 5 - 2 in the guts, 1 more in the chest, and 2 in the neck (finishers). All bullets exited. The only one that showed heavy expansion was the final kill shot that clipped the spine. When he called me afterwards, he said they just "pinholed".

I got a chance to look at the carcass when he got back. It appeared to me that there was some expansion, maybe in the 50 to 60 cal range, hard to tell.
I've been thinking about it a lot, and I'm thinking that the Barnes probably worked just about the way they had to. Justin is used to 300 Win Mag 180s in non-premium factory loads. Read that a quick opening bullet with a lot of hydrostatic shock, at the probable expense of penetration. In other words, he's used to an animal going down fast. Despite this bull being pretty shot up, it looked like there wasn't going to be very much bloodshot meat.

I've used heavily jacketed bullets as well as Barnes in my old 375 H&H for a long time. I guess I'm sort of used to just boring a hole about the size of a nickle through an elk in almost all conditions. I try to take extra care with shot placement, and not get too concerned if they don't drop in a heap. If I feel good about the shot, I usually have a smoke and let my heart-rate slow back down, then go have a look. I think a lot of the extra shooting could have been avoided, but I guess that may be sort of arm-chair shooting.

It is a real nice big 6x6 bull. It green scores about 360. 18" killers. Probably close to 1000# on the hoof.

I wonder what you guys think about the Barnes performance? I'm sure at 3-500 yds it would have been a different story. I wonder if a person would be better off with the Noslers loaded, and with Barnes in reserve and take the time to swap on long shots?

Thanks, Dick

[Martyn4802]

The TSX's will work as well, or better than Nosler Partitions.

Martyn