2 Guns need 1 load

[Lloyd Smale]

Paul i sure know what you mean my eyes have been failing fast in the last couple years. Ive got to get my but to the eye doc and get some glasses. Im getting tired of shooting blurry dots.

[Redhawk1]

Would using a BUSHNELL Holosight  be more accurate than iron sights, and accurate a little farther than iron sights (assuming one does sufficient practice). I sure appreciate all the info on this site.

I find a good red dot like the Ultra-dot to help tremendously. Once you have your gun sighted in, you just put the dot where you want to shoot.  

[PaulS]

I just want to revisit the original question one last time.
I looked in my load books to check out what kind of velocity one could honestly expect from a rifle and a 45 Colt. If we load the Colt up to 44 mag velocities, which is possible and even done in Rugers and Contenders, then we can expect to get a 300 grain bullet at close to 1500 fps from a Marlin 1894. We can expect just under 1200 FPS with the same bullet from a handgun (again 44 magnum velocities).
MY opinion is what follows - my opinion from MY experience. I competed for two years in the Hunter's Pistol competitions at our range and tied the club record before I quit competing. I did this with a 6 inch Ruger revolver in 357 magnum. The targets were chickens at 25 yrds, pigs at 50 yrds, turkeys at 75 yrds and rams at 100 yrds. The targets were scaled for the ranges. I never rang a single target - if I hit it, it went down. My best round (the record I tied) was 39/40. My average was 35/40. The most often missed target was turkey. I have hunted deer with my 357 and don't after doing it once. Even at 50 yrds it is too little gun for the Cascade White-tails. That is MY experience and I base my opinions on it.

A 300 grain pistol bullet at 1500 FPS is, in my opinion, too little fire-power to use against an elk. At 1180 FPS from a pistol it is a good round for deer but not elk. While both of these bullets might kill an elk under perfect conditions at close range I don't believe that I would use them to hunt Cascade Mule Deer much less an elk. Maybe the elk and deer are smaller in some states but the animals that I have seen need (and deserve) more power and a cleaner kill than those velocities represent. And those are 44 magnum velocities which are higher than the listed maximum loads in any of my manuals for the 45 Colt. I am not an armchair hunter and I have been shooting and hunting for 40 some years. I have shot steel targets with the same loads I use for hunting. I am obsessive about accuracy and clean kills. I don't believe that the 45 Colt is capable of consistant clean kills on animals the size of the elk I have seen.
My opinion doesn't mean anything to anybody and I am OK with that. I just feel the need to express it when confronted with information that seems to be either dangerous (overloaded ammunition) or fantasy.

There! I have expressed my opinion - I'm good.

[Camel 23]

I just feel the need to express it when confronted with information that seems to be either dangerous (overloaded ammunition) or fantasy.

Then you better get a hold of Hodgdon because they are listing heavier bullets going faster than the numbers that you have posted.  I would hate to see them loose a law suit and go out of business because I really like their products.  But they probably have done some testing of their own.

http://www.hodgdon.com/data/pistol/45coltlil.php

[Lloyd Smale]

Paul everyone is intitled to there opinion and has the right to use what there comfortable with in the field. Personally ive seen 300 grain CAST bullets shoot end to end through hogs and give complete penetraion on bison at 1100 fps. IVe only recovered one cast bullet in a deer. That one was shot at an angle threw the front shoulder of a 150 lb whitetail and was taken out under the skin in the opposite hind quarter and it was cast out of ww and deformed. Im sure if it was a little harder i wouldnt have recovered it either. Larry Kelly with 44s and Ross Seigfried with 45s have taken cape buffalo with simular loads and have gotten complete penetration through both shoulders. John Linebaugh and his wife have killed alot of game with the 45s at 900fps and its never once let them down. YOu have to consider one thing when talking cast bullets out of handguns. They kill by penetration not expansion. Take a look at the wound channel a 180 3006 creates. It will be bigger in diameter then the handgun wound channel but not nearly as long. Shocking power does not kill. Wound channel and hemorging kill. Im a bow hunter also and an arrow has absolutely no shocking power but has killed the largest animals on the plannet. How? by cutting flesh and bleading out an animal. Something an arrow does better then even a bow. Tramatic wounds such as a high powered rifle make cause the body of a human or animal to somewhat shut down blood flow at the wound area. The less tramatic the wound the less its slowed. That in my opinion (for what its worth) is why handguns and arrows kill better then they should. Thats why also i preach the old school thoughs on handguns and dont have much use for velocity in the equation. A slow moving big bullet will usually penetrate and kill better then a faster moving smaller bullet in them. Your poking a bigger hole that will bleed more. We do alot of penetration testing with handguns and rifles. In our test media which is bone and wet print. Granted not an animal but probably a tougher test then any animal a 45 or 44 loaded to 1100 fps will usually penetrate 2-3 times more then a 06 or 7 mag class of gun. I have no doubt in my mind (because of actual testing, not heresay) that at handgun ranges i could place a bullet in a going away elk in the rump and hit vitals if the angle is correct. Thats another thing that cast bullets do well. The bullet will in most cases track a straight path through an animal. Now before you jump on me i dont condone shooting any animal in the but and wouldnt. Even if it were the trophy of a lifetime. But its good to know if you have to put down a wounded animal. Now heres the fine line. Ive witnessed the failing of cast bullets if pushed to fast and that is my only consession on this point. Out of a rifle a cast bullet can be pushed to fast. What is to fast. IMO about 1500+fps. A few years ago i was with my buddy when he shot a red stag which was about 700 lbs with a 50 alaskan shooting one of my 480 lfns cast out of 5050 ww-lyno. at about 2000 fps. The bullet was shot into one shoulder and was found under the skin in the oposite shoulder. Granted the animal died very quickly. But we were both shocked to not get complete penetration. We then tested that bullet at both 2000 fps and 1400 and at 1400 we actually got more penetration. The problem with cast is once the deform even in the slightest ammount penetration will go south. Paul you are not the only doubter out there. Even at deer camp some of the guys shook there heads when i started handgun hunting. But after they witnessed what a handgun will do they have a completely differnt outlook on it now and a couple of them including even my old man will occasionally strap on a handgun. Now i may get some flak for this but what im preaching is strickly for cast bullets. I see no use whatsoever for jacket bullets when game gets bigger then 200 lbs and even then i personally dont use them. Not that they dont work and wont kill but your giving up way to much wound channel when they expand and stop in game and if they dont exit your giving up having two holes for an animal to blead and it makes for tougher tracking. From my buddys experience list. He was guideing pig hunters at a local pig hunting ranch and had a client shoot a 300 lb pig two times in the shoulder and once in the guts with a 41 mag using siera hps the pig took off on a run and the buddy poked it with a 41 special (he had permission from the hunter) he shot it in the hind quarter at an angle and the bullet came out the front shoulder and dropped the pig. The load was a 220 cast swc at 1000fps. Neither of the shoulder hit hps made it through the shoulder into the vitals. Pigs can be tough on a bullet. Every bit as tough as an elk. Personaly id have no qualms at all about hunting an elk (within handgun ranges) with a 45 using 250s at 1000fps. I know for a fact the bullet would reach the vitals. Now push that 300 grain bullet to 1400 to 1500 out of a rifle and you can see why i believe its capable of taking an elk at 150 yards. What you have with that gun and load is ballistics very simular to what the buffalo hunters desimated the buffalo heard with in the 18oos and ive havent saw to many people that ever said that the 4570 isnt big enough for elk. I guess the buffalo hunters just were never told that they needed jacketed bullets a 3000 fps to kill an animal. Again Paul im not posting this to argue with you. ITs just some fact from real world experiences to back up what ive said. Like i stated YOU YOURSELF need to be confident in what you hunt with and will do better with a gun your confindent in.

[PaulS]

Then you better get a hold of Hodgdon because they are listing heavier bullets going faster than the numbers that you have posted.  I would hate to see them loose a law suit and go out of business because I really like their products.  But they probably have done some testing of their own.

http://www.hodgdon.com/data/pistol/45coltlil.php

The loads that they list are right in line with the loads I was quoting from - the velocities are a bit higher than the loads that I chronographed from my 10 inch barrel though. I have found that there are few loads listed in the manuals that give quoted velocities in my guns - Sierra and Hodgdon are almost always 2 to 300 FPS faster than the load gives me when I load them in my guns.
Besides, I doubt that Hodgdon is going to care about my opinion any more than anyone else does. It is just my opinion.

[PaulS]

Lloyd Smale,

Your experience and your opinion differ from mine - OK!
My test medium is Salt water in a Fackler Box. It gives more repeatable results (proven) than paper and there is a formula that is used to convert the data to ballistic gel. Just as in your tests it is different than live tissue but it gives good comparisons between bullets at the same velocity or the same bullet at different velocities. The results are repearable time after time. With paper results will vary with the water content, time it is soaked and "staging" time. (the time between removal from the water for placement and how long it sits before it is fired into.) The man who invented the Fackler box (Fackler) is one of the foremost terminal ballisticians of the twentieth century. Living bone is pliable and resilient while dead bone becomes brittle a short time after death.
The idea that a bullet moving 1000 FPS causes a different bodily reaction than a bullet at 3000 FPS is a novel opinion - I have never heard that before. I do know that lead bullets are supposed to penetrate farther that the jacketed counterparts - Jacketed bullets are made to expand and continue to penetrate. Most do that very well. They are also made from alloys of lead that are engineered to stay together in a manner that is necessary for penetration. You get a larger wound channel with a jacketed bullet than you do with a lead bullet. Lead bullets get their wound channel from going through what tissue they do hit but the channel is only one caliber - with the expansion of a jacketed bullet the wound channel grows to the size of the expanded bullet. I have recovered few bullets from game and I don't use hard cast lead. I have seen the wound channels and they are impressive - I have never seen the wound channel of a hard cast lead bullet - I would assume that it is smaller because of the tests I have seen in ballistic gel and the tests I performed in my Fackler Box. Again no live game to compare it in. There is a comparison between my tests with jacketed bullets and live gave - and a remarkable similarity in the expansion in the box and in game.
Your opinion is based on experiences that I have not shared. Your opinion is as valid for you as mine is for me. You show respect for mine and I do the same for yours. As long as your results work for you as well as mine work for me we will continue to have opinions that are different - Thats ok.

[Camel 23]

Pauls,  I have found that the loads that they list are pretty much in line with what my chony records when using cast bullets.  Jacketed bullets on the other hand do record slower as you stated.  I also noticed that on Hodgdon's website they are not listing H110 for any 300 grain bullets or smaller anymore.  It seems as though they are trying to promote their Lil' Gun powder which gives a higher pressure and slower velocities.   :|

[Lloyd Smale]

paul i did state that you do have a right to your own opinion as do I. I do however have a long list of very experienced handgun hunters. Men such as John Linebaugh Terry Merbach John Taffin Jim Wilson Brian Pierce and just about anyone thats anyone in the handgun hunting field that will argue with you on the effectiveness of cast bullets in the field and there superiority over jacket bullets. Old Elmer Keith figured out something many years ago and it still stands today. I guess to if the jacket bullets were so much superior to cast in a handgun that youd here of a cape buffalo or a elephant or even an american buffalo that has been killed by a jacketed handgun bullet. But theres not to many EXPERIENCED HUNTERS and im not talking ballistisions that would ever even attempt it. Theres only one copper bullet capable and thats kelly Slepps solid brass bullets. Cast bullets kill because if cast properly there consistant. They drill a hole ALL THE WAY through an animal and thus a longer wound channel. Granted the wound channel is wider with a jacket bullet but the longer wound channel a cast bullet cuts more then makes up for the width. They will consistantly break heavy bone and continue to track straight something no jacket bullet will consistantly do and one thing i no for fact is that dead is dead. An animal with a hole through the heart is a dead animal. Same with the lungs and liver. A bigger hole in the heart doesnt really mean squat.  Like i stated ive personaly witnessed jacket bullets fail miserably at reaching those vitals. Never yet have a seen a cast bullet fail to penetrate adequately. Like you said we differ in opionions. When im proven wrong ill admit it but i doubt if thats going to happen. Im now done with this post. Im here to help people that need advise not to get into a pissing match with you. Best advise i can ever give any handgun hunter that wants to find the real truth about bullet performance is to go to a linebaugh seminar where ever type and just about every caliber gun is put to a pretty tough test and then they would see how useless and inconsistant jacket handgun bullets can be. THE END>

[Mikey]

Abearir:  use hardcast with gaschecks and you won't ever use any other.  Lloyd is right, period.  Cast bullets perform better and more consistently than jacketed.  The only jacketed slug that performs like a cast bullet is a solid.  Gaschecked slugs have always given me better accuracy than jacketed slugs.  

For the game you intend to hunt and the calibers you intend to hunt with I would recommend you peruse the LBT and Beartooth Bullets websites - each carry a fine line of hardcast, gas-checked slugs and the Beartooths have performed as desired for me on Elk and Boar.  

Jacketed slugs often do not penetrate to the vitals if they hit major bone and often deform and course away from vital areas.  Yes, they may expand and provide larger wound channels to some degree but a flat nosed hard cast slug cuts or plows right through.  One of the fellas said they only cut a one diameter hole whereas the jacketed slugs expand - there is a lot more to it than that when that flat nose plows on through bone and vital organs.  

Check some websites and get the slugs that are best for both guns - you will be happy.  HTH.  Mikey.

[Graybeard]

I still prefer my JHPs on deer but when the game gets larger, tougher or more dangerous it's heavy cast bullet with wide meplat time for me. The cast works fine on deer too but I just can't seem to prefer them there as the .429" 240 JHPs have done so well for me on son many.

[Scott T]

I have gotten to the point where I shoot heavy bullets at reasonable velocities.  I don't worry too much about penetration that way and a hole, particularly a big hole, through an elk or any other animal is gonna let cold air in and blood will be running out.

No reason why the .45 Colt, when loaded to it's potential will not kill all that needs killing.

Frankly, I would not be hesitant to take on an elk with my Marlin 357 carbine and a 180gr cast bullet over 15.7 gr of LilGun.  I would not try a shot from the rear, but I could make that bullet whistle through his chest if I get a broadside shot.

For handgun hunting, I have pretty much settled on a .500 Linebaugh with a 400 gr bullet at 800-900fps.  I cannot keep it in a hog from any angle and I don't think I could keep it in anything else either.  I might put more steam on it for a big bear, but not much, certainly not over 1100fps.