Another question for all 357 MAX fans.

[JSLHandgunner]

I live in Indiana so we are limited to case length no longer than 1.625" no shorter than 1.16" with a bullet dia. of 357 or larger for deer hunting. I see so much on the 357 max. What I want to know is after you ream a 357 mag to a 357 max. What kind of groups is everyone getting from 50-200yards? And what kind of damage or wound channels to expect? I have hunted with a 35 rem. XP100 handloaded with the 180ssp bullet. But I'm shooting a very hot load out of it to get the bullet expansion that I like. Otherwise I have had bad experiences that the 180ssp that is not loaded correctly will only punch a small hole through a deer. Making it very hard to find. I'm really interested in the max for a 175-200yard gun for whitetail. Any info. on the H&R rifle would be appreciated. Thanks, John

[Badnews Bob]

I really only use hardcast outta mine, With the 180 gr LFNGCs it will shoot two inch groups at 150 yards, This is leaving the barrel at 2000FPS or so and it flat knocks whitetails silly, It leave about a dime size hole all the way through while turning the lungs into mush, I have never had one go over 50 yards after hit. I can push the hornady XTPs faster with pretty much the same groups but I just don't load them much and have never used one on deer I think they would work very well on one thou,. My rifle did not shoot the SSPs well and it don't like bullets much over 180grs.  IMR 4227 is my favorite powder but AA 1680 works very well also.

BTW inside of 100 yards This rifle won't miss If you point it right.

[aromakr]

John:
I've just recently reamed mine so I can't give you expansion results, but can tell you I'm getting ever so slightly over 1" groups at 100 yds with the speer 180gr infront of A1680 with a Win small rifle primer. I get 2086 fps with as little as 19fps spread in velocity. My last 3 shot group thru the crony was 2086 - 2067 - 2086fps. I've handloaded 40+ years and never gotten that consistency in velocitys.  In fact I tried 10 different loads of A1680 with that bullet and the widest spread was 64fps. Love A1680 in that cartridge.
Bob

[yukondog]

Havent tryed any shooting over 100 yrds. but at that range I'm getting about
1 1/2" group with 158 xtp's wont know velocity till sun. when I go to the range,the horn 180 sspb I get lousey groups twist is to slow I think,inside 100 yrds. dead deer.