I shot a white tail deer last evening with the Remington Model Seven in 6.5-284 that I had built for my son. This rifle has been featured in several posts on these boards if you are interested in its features. Suffice to say it has a 20 inch custom barrel and pushes the fine 129 grain Hornady SP to 2950 FPS with sub MOA accuracy.
I was hunting an area of steep foot hills covered in laurel and hardwood forest laced with deep open creek valleys growing in honeysuckle and biars. Our land is centered around a huge creek that winds thru thousands of acres of logging cut-overs in various stages of growing back, ideal deer country.
About 4:00 I caught sight of a doe moving fast thru the hardwoods on the hill next to mine. I was in a tree stand overlooking a creek bottom that contains a deer highway. From my stand I saw her cutting across the next hill top about 175 yards away. As I watched her I spotted a deer following. Then I saw a glint of polished antler on his head. If he had continued moving at that pace he would not have offered a shot. However, he paused with his head behind one tree and his rump behind another. All I could see was a front shoulder between two trees at around 175 yards! (That, my friends is why MOA accuracy is important) I knew he had horns so I settled the Model Seven on the rifle rest of my stand's rail and squeezed off a shot.
At the shot the buck just fell over!! It was if he had been pushed over! I have been practicing "aim small, miss small" so I had been looking at the point of his shoulder closest to me when I fired. As he fell over he slid down the other side of the hill but never moved! I climbed down and walked/climbed over to where he was laying. The bullet had struck EXACTLY where I was aiming. I briefly felt his shoulders and both were broken! No exit wound but I could feel the bullet under the skin on the ofside shoulder.
The deer weighed out to 157 lbs field dressed. When I skinned him out I found the 129 grain SP had entered the closer shoulder, fractured the humeral head, expanded to around .50 caliber, devestated the neck base with a huge .50++ hole and hydrostatic shock, blood, bruising, and continued on to shatter the off side shoulder into a blood soup mess. Sharp chunks of the off side humeral head were blown into the lungs, neck base and muscle tissue. The perfectly mushroomed bullet was found just under the skin on the offside shoulder. Nearly perfect performance. I have no doubt the bullet would have exited if not for the job of shattering both humeral heads. This performance is nearly identical to .270 and heavy bullet 25-06 hits I have made on similar size game at that distance.
Early conclusions indicate that perforance will be a little better than a hot loaded 6.5x55 with the same bullet (which is excellent). I think, however, I would opt for a semi-premium 140 grain bullet if the game was much larger, like a mule deer, black bear, hog, or elk especially if I plan on breaking down shoulders ect.
The only problem now is that this super sweet little 20 inch Custom Model Seven with .270 ballistics is going to be hard to give up. I may have to start building another one......for me!
