Bullet Interchangeability

T

TreeDog

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Jan 3, 2017
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Location
Marion, MT
Been working up loads for my Colorado elk and mule deer hunt next month. Rifle is a Tikka in .308. I've messed with Accubonds, Partitions, Sierra Game Kings all 165's. Problem is Partitions and Accubonds aren't cheap. I've always heard that ballistic tips and Accubonds can be interchanged i.e. load ballistic tips to practice with and Accubonds to hunt with. What's everyone's experience with this? Are there any bullets that would work in place of partitions to practice? Also what are the thoughts on using SGK's for elk at .308 velocities? Thanks in advance.
 
Nosler lists Accubonds and Ballistic Tips as having the same BC, which indicates they are the same shape. Would I stick an AB in a maximum load I worked up with a BT and pull the trigger? Probably not. You only get two eyes and bullets are much cheaper, even when they are expensive.

My advice: Ditch the idea of using SMKs for elk. Just forget about it and use a real elk bullet. Buy your Noslers from shooters pro shop when they have them in stock. In the mean time, price out what your trip from WV to Colorado costs, including food, lodging, fuel, and non res tag fees, and then decide if paying $15 more a box for bullets is really "expensive."
 
I had heard that partitions and Nosler ballistic tips were interchangeable but they do not seem to work like that for me. I am looking into hornady eld-x as they are about the same price as partitions but for 100 instead of 50.
 
TreeDog said:
Been working up loads for my Colorado elk and mule deer hunt next month. Rifle is a Tikka in .308. I've messed with Accubonds, Partitions, Sierra Game Kings all 165's. Problem is Partitions and Accubonds aren't cheap. I've always heard that ballistic tips and Accubonds can be interchanged i.e. load ballistic tips to practice with and Accubonds to hunt with. What's everyone's experience with this? Are there any bullets that would work in place of partitions to practice? Also what are the thoughts on using SGK's for elk at .308 velocities? Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

If you are focused at all on accuracy I doubt you will find an acceptable "match". If you just want to run through box or two to shake the rust off, the $20 savings doesn't seem worth the effort and would just shoot your chosen bullet for practice and the field. If you want to put hundreds of bullets down range for practice and are concerned about budget, I would pick an inexpensive load/bullet with the same weight and muzzle velocity and zero it. Then practice to your heart's content. Then right before you go hunting go out and tweak your zero with your field bullets at a couple of different distances and you are good to go.
 
VikingsGuy said:
If you want to put hundreds of bullets down range for practice and are concerned about budget, I would pick an inexpensive load/bullet with the same weight and muzzle velocity and zero it. Then practice to your heart's content. Then right before you go hunting go out and tweak your zero with your field bullets at a couple of different distances and you are good to go.
Click to expand...

This is what I did with my Tikka T3 .308 Win. I worked up a load using Hornady 150 gr. SPBT Interlocks to break in the barrel and for practice. I then worked up the same load but with a Barnes 150 gr. TSX bullet as my deer and elk round. Both shoot inside .75 moa and don't require a change of zero in my particular rifle. Your results may vary.
 
I had a great load worked up with ballistic tips--consistent .7 inch groups at 100 yards. I used the exact same cases, primers, powder charge, seating depth, etc. with accubonds of the same grain weight, and groups opened up to about an inch and a quarter. Not interchangeable in my experience.
 
I use 2 bullets in the same rifle for different purposes, one is my elk load with Accubonds while the other is my deer load with SSTs. My suggestion would be if you plan on shooting fairly often is keep VERY good notes for your respective loads and load up about 40 of each. After you shoot up the cheap bullets, throw a few of the good ones downrange (once your gun has cooled off) and see if there's an effect on your groups, write everything down. It's important to know how shooting cheaper bullets will effect the condition of your bore vs the expensive ones. Always get some practice in with you hunting ammo because it may behave differently at longer range (bullet drop, wind drift, etc.) If your groups with you good ammo deteriorate after the cheap ammo try cleaning the rifle. Before you go hunting, ALWAYS clean your rifle and foul it with a few rounds of GOOD ammo. Different bullets foul the bore differently and will alter your POI, especially when the bore reaches a copper fouling equilibrium.
 
My experience...
Even though the BT and AB bullets have same BC, they prefer different seating depths.
AB like to be close to the lands in my rifles.

Gamekings have killed plenty of elk. Just no by me.. No luck drawing a tag.

Pick the bullet you want to use and do your work up.
Simple as that.
 
A 165gr bullet in a 308 is not going at speeds that overly stress the bullet. At 308 speeds a "tougher" non premium like the Hornady Interlock may be just the ticket and cheaper than a premium. A poster on another site yearly turfs a bull in MT with a 308 and the Hornady and Speer Hot-Core have been his bullets of choice the past few years. The Sierra would probably work just fine at those speeds as well. Interestingly enough, Sierra reports that the HPBT Gameking is tougher than the spire point version...
 
I've never hunted with Partitions but did start out with that in mind when I got my 6.5x06. For break in, only rifle I ever did that with, I used Hornady 140gr Inter loc's. Then switched to 140gr partitions. They both shot to the same point of aim. Came hunting seson and all I had ready was the Hornady load so took it. Two one shot kills on elk with it that year. One of mine and one of a step sons. I doubt that is normal but you never know. I hunted with a 308 for a lot of years and the only bullet I ever used ws a 165gr Hornady inter loc. Never failed me. I shot Speer Hot Cores in a 7mm mag, again, they never failed me. In fact I recently got a box of 140gr Hot Cores to try in my 6.5x55. Been shooting Hornady so long with out any problem, I'm not sure why I doing it.
 
Don't think that 165 BT won't work on Elk. A friend of mine uses them exclusively in his .30-06 for elk, deer and black bear. I have a couple of rifles that I can go back and forth between the Accubond and BT. The impact is a little different, maybe an inch or two, so a little scope adjustment is needed if I really want to be accurate. I worked up both loads and they are usually within 1/2 to 1 grain of IMR 4350 to each other.
 
IMO if you're that worried about cost, do the bulk of your practice with the cheapest stuff you can find of the same grain. I think practice is more about form, trigger control, fundamentals, muscle memory, etc... Once you have all that down then making small adjustments to zero your hunting load should not be hard.
 
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