Super-Duper-Whamo-Ammo

[MTT TL]

I just recently started reloading. But for 20 years used the off the shelf federals from Walmart at $15/box.

Guess what? The deer never knew.

[kraigwy]

I'm not a fan of super duper ammo. I really see no need. Last fall I took my elk rifle (Model 70 270 win, 150 Hornady pushed by 50 grns of 4350) not a hot load but I dont like if for deer. My grandaughter had my 257 roberts. I shot a doe with the 270 and above load, neck shot that damn near took its head off. All with cheepie components. I dont think it would have been any deader with barnes or noslers.

As far as my heavy guns. I shoot cast bullets in my 416 Rigby and 458 Win. I make my own jacketed bullets for my 375 H&H.

I dont believe you need fancy high price bullets, you can always shoot even the big guns cheaply.

But hey, to each his own. Somebody is buying them.

[James R. Burke]

How do you buy a custom bullet for a rifle it never been shot thru? Just myself I think a truly custom bullet is one you made up yourself for just that rifle. The best brass for it, the best working pimer for it, the best working powder for it,and the best bullet for what your going to use it for. Of course the best and correct c.o.l. for the bullet your using or the one that gives you the best groups. The cost of that .416 ammo is alot cheaper than going to Africa to shoot a elephant. But it sure was fun the play around with, and blow a 350 pound black bear over the bait pile. In the base of neck, and out the rear quarter, without to much of a mess.

[SavageSniper]

First, I don't understand why someone would have someone else sight in there rifle. Takes away from the experience. Why don't they just give you the rifle and have you kill the deer for them too. Something tells me they don't skin the deer either
As for the top shelf ammo, I played with that years ago. The green and yellow box stuff works good for me.

[Hog Buster]

Why would anyone have someone else sight in their rifle? The answer is fairly simple. They doubt their ability to do so properly. In most cases this doubt is never openly stated, but in a few it is. So they let someone who is more skilled get their rifle shooting in the black.

It's been my experience that many hunters can't hold a 4 inch group at 100 yards from a rest. Many shoot worse than this. The reasons for this lack of ability are many, sight picture, trigger control, lack of practice and on and on. They're looking for an edge. Letting someone more skilled at shooting zero their rifle may give them that edge.

Enter the Super-Duper-Whamo Ammo. The mythical ability of this ammo is widely touted on TV shows and in magazines. Ah ha, another edge!

I have an edge, or two.........Bang.......Instant gratification.........Well, maybe not......

You don't have to skin what you don't kill.

[Shorthair]

Why would anyone have someone else sight in their rifle? The answer is fairly simple. They doubt their ability to do so properly. In most cases this doubt is never openly stated, but in a few it is. So they let someone who is more skilled get their rifle shooting in the black.

I would have to say that a person who cannot hit a target in a controlled environment, rested, etc, will have much greater difficulty doing so while confronted with unanticipated variables encountered in the field, and as such should be discouraged from walking afield with a firearm. It is a fool's mission for them to believe that any component "of superior quality" will give one any edge without having the basic skills required to actually hold the crosshairs on the black.

[Mobuck]

I have bought and hunted with premium factory ammo several times. The main reason I did was the ammo was discounted to the point it was about the cost of the bullets alone. The factory ammo accuracy with the same bullets I was reloading proved to be adequate. Maybe not quite as good as my loads but definitely good enough to do the job. i also do a fair amount of scope mounting and sighting in customers' rifles and for this I use the cheapest factory ammo I can buy. I wouldn't think of using my handloads in an unknown rifle. My liability would get dropped quicker than a hot rock. I've ceased to be concerned when a shooter leaves his rifle for me to sight in and doesn't even ask what type of ammo I used to sight it in. I started putting a hangtag on that tells what ammo, range, and suggests the owner testfire.
If a whiner returns for another such job, I require he provide the ammo he intends to use.

[sc928porsche]

Sight your rifle in with what you are going to use for hunting............simple.

[Christchild]

The original idea behind this post was to find out how many deer hunters use, or have tried Super-Duper ammo. Apparently not too many.

When You say "Super Duper Whamo Ammo", are You meaning Premium or Magnum?

One thing I definitely did/do is spend the extra dollars on premium components. I prefer 110 gr. Barnes TTSX and 150 gr. Norma Oryx, and my stock of rifle bullets shows it (my entire stock of rifle bullets are .277" for .270 Win.). I have a few other brands and weight, but my time is short, so I'll post again later, a list of my entire stock of rifle bullets, to show You what I mean.

[kaylorinhi]

I have purchased a box of several different types, some were as much $1.75 a round, I plan to see how they shoot out of my weapon then start reloading the best several until I find the Magic Formula.

As for the Zeroing, I don't know if I could, ethically speaking, give that gun to someone who can't shoot good enough to get it where they want it and allow them to fire it at a creature. Not any of us are perfect but that sounds like recipe for missed and wounded animals?

"Give a man a fish, teach a man to fish"

[damien1988]

funnie this should come up the week i get my new rifle while at the gun store they tryed soo hard to sell me the super duper whamo ammo i ended geting a box of fedral a box of rem and a box of win in all the rifles i have sighted in i have never had a problame wirth the cheapo stuff all i do is find what holds tightest groups and work from the by deconstructing the 15 left in the box mesure all the powder indivdualy the in mass work out a avrage and start from there has allways worked for me i am not the worlds biggest reloader soo i dont go into the fully custom stuff close enuf is good enuf for me

cheers damo

[James R. Burke]

I still find the ones I make the best. You can do so much with them. But like everyone is saying it does not matter if you cant shoot. That is why when I got my wife into deer hunting we done alot to practice, and still do. You can see the confidence in her. She knows only to take well placed shots, and knows if she does get good shot placement it's a dead deer. She knows that rifle inside and out. But you need to be able to hit what your aiming at, and be confident in your ability. There are know doubt some real good factory stuff being made, but it wont help you be a better shot.

[rodwhaincamo]

I bought premium ammo for a rifle I was lent to hunt with. I was unfamiliar with it and wanted the benefit of higher quality.
I am getting involved with handloading and would use the "semi-premium" bullets like SST and BT because of their superior BC. I would use premiums like Scirocco Bonded, TSX, AccuBond, or InterBond were I using a minimal caliber for the task or were I hunting a tough or dangerous critter.
In my hanguns I've always used the premium stuff.

[bamaranger]

When I help out at the check stations, I often ask deer hunters what ammo their using. When they first came out, the Failsafe was pretty popular, then too same for the Nosler Ballistic Tip for reloaders, and the Win-moly equivalent, the Ballistic Silvertip.

With the jump in ammo prices, I'm seeing a lot of guys saying, "Remingtons from Walmart, plain old Winchesters, cheap Federals, etc" I believe prices are driving guys back to std bullets.

Very little brass on the ground at the public range near home, either.

[Christchild]

Very little brass on the ground at the public range near home, either.

I talk to people just about everywhere I go. A few months ago at the range, I spoke to an older guy who saw me scrounging brass. He told me that the government wants all range brass picked up and thrown away or destroyed...they don't want it reloaded. I CAN NOT tell You if his words were simply "hear-say" and not valid, or if it was right, but like You, BamaRanger, I have seen very little range brass. I HAVE, however, heard it "jingling" in the trashcans at the range...and I can NOT tell You that I haven't tumbled range brass that was obtained from said trashcans, either...

My stock of Barnes, in addition to all of the others, are in the list below. All are for .270 Winchester (.277"), as the venerable .270 Winchester cartridge is my "bread and butter"...

*11 boxes of 50 Barnes 110 gr. TTSX
*2 boxes of 20 Barnes 150 gr. MRX
*7 boxes of 50 Barnes 130 gr. XFB
*3 boxes of 50 Barnes 120 gr. Banded Solids
*3 boxes of 100 Norma 150 gr. Oryx
*2 boxes of 100 Sierra 90 gr. Varminter HP
*4 boxes of 100 Sierra 135 gr. MatchKing
*1 box of 100 Hornady 130 gr. Interbond
(Not all of these boxes are full, of course )

I "invested" my money this way when things were financially superior to the current times. The Barnes TTSX and Sierra Varminter have been the most accurate and not finicky.

Another piece of info, for anyone who may not know... The Barnes TTSX and TAC-TX are the exact same bullet, as well as the TSX and TAC-X. Same bullet, different label, different price.

[Legionnaire]

Where would I start? Easy. I'd pick up a couple different weights of factory loaded Remington Core-Lokts appropriate to the game I'm going after and see which grouped best in my rifle. If I could find one that shot better than the others, and that under two inches, I'd use that. For example, my 700BDL .30-06 likes the 165 grain factory loads -- shoots right at one inch, which is plenty good for my purpose. 150 grainers open up a bit in that rifle.

Only if I found that none of the inexpensive factory loads grouped well would I start the search for something that did.

[guntotin_fool]

Funny thing, despite Roy Weatherby's fortune in advertising, velocity does not kill. A hole in the heart from a 290 FPS arrow or a 2900 bullet will generally kill just about as fast.

I have found a far better result in my older years shooting moderate cartridges at moderate velocity than ever shooting "magnums' at super velocities. (NOTE< this is game hunting, not varmint killing. Ain't not a thing wrong with turning grass rats and like into bits and mists.)

I just spent a few weeks with an older gentleman who had gotten tired of being beaten up by his favorite 06, getting him used to a new 35 whelen. Well hold on, you say, thats not steppin down, well it is when your back to throwing a 225 grainer at 2100 fps. He's got a big smile on his face, he's accurate out to 250 yards, and no deer hit with 225 grains of soft lead and copper is going to leave the scene. The two south missouri hogs he just shot died on the spot.

My deer hunting lately has all been with a 180 grain RN .308 bullet meant for a 3030 being shot from a .300 savage. 2250 Fps kills deer nicely and leaves virtually no blood shot meat. My brass stretches not at all, my 60 year old rifle loves the lower pressure, and my shoulder has yet to voice a complaint on the lower recoil. (not that a 300 savage is a kicking brute anyway.)

[TXGunNut]

I tried some factory loads recently for my .30-06 to humor myself before sending a rifle back to WW. They didn't believe the rifle had a problem because all I'd shot through it were my pet loads.
So I bought some good stuff and some garden variety stuff. Shot a five round group with each of four types of ammo. Yep, you guessed it, I spent over $100 to satisfy my curiousity. Only one would come close to my factory loads. One round from a manufacturer I often recommend even had a primer FTF! Very disappointing! I've decided that the rumors are true. Accuracy standards for ammo companies and rifle manufacturers are probably in the 3-4MOA neighborhood because most hunters are not capable of doing any better. Quite frankly most hunters may brag about longer shots but a 3-4MOA group is adequate for shots on large game inside 100yds, where most successful hunting shots actually take place. If expensive ammo gives a hunter confidence and his rifle is reasonably well sighted in then we have a good chance for a favorable outcome.

[Gunplummer]

The velocity thing, yes I think they load them up hot, depending what it is. I acquire or repair guns I pick up cheap and don't want to reload for. I was shooting a .243 model 99 savage and bought a box of Federal,a box of Winchester, and a box of Remington. Neither the Federal or Winchester would shoot under 3 1/2 inches @ 100 yards. I had sticky extraction, which you get on lever actions loaded too hot. The Remington was right in there and really extracted smoothly. As far as paying more for super expanding bullets, the factory stuff I tried does not shoot that great, and I never had any luck with accuracy when reloading them either. Most of the teflon pointed stuff shoots good, but its not much more than a hollowpoint anyway. Would I pay more for super duper bullets? No, I would rather hit what I aim at with standard factory ammo.

[publius]

I think it's a combination of 2 things. We handloaders tend to be very careful about our loads, powder charge, seating depth, etc. 2nd is the projectile, bullets with higher copper content tend to be less accurate. We handloaders have seen this with partitions, A-frames, barnes x, etc. They don't want to conform to the barrel like a lead bullet. a barnes bullet either likes your barrel or it doesn't. If your barrel is slugged to the exact same dimensions of a Barnes x it tends to shoot really well and if it's not, well.... most are not.

[Hunting Jim]

When I bought my Browning 338 back in 1994,I purchased one box of Rem. 250gr PTD Soft PT, One each of Fed. & Win. equivalent loads. I then tested them. I liked the Rem. loads and went back and bought the whole case and a partial of another, all with the same lot number.I've shot two moose, and two deer with that big gun. Now I'm trying for an Elk. I've yet to see a legal one here in WA. State. I can hand-load 250gr loads for this rifle using Nosler bullets, but I can't get much more accurate than those original Remingtons. They give me a 1 1/2" group at 100yds. My opinion is that, if using factory loads, find a bullet weight the rifle likes,then find the brand and lot number,and buy as much as you can. Practice as much as you can using the same ammo as you do when you hunt.