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308 ammo advice


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Agreed, never even thought about the lead in the meat deal.  So curiosity got the best of me and I went down and weighed a recently recovered bullet from a nice buck I took back in December.  He was over 200 pounds and quite a ways off so the big 450 Hornady 250 grain ballistic tip bullet made full penetration but was just under the skin on the far shoulder.

It's pretty rare to get to recover a bullet but the shot was made at 205 steps and went thru both shoulders instead of heart/lung.

I weighed the bullet in the pic below and it's 237 grains, so there is 13 grains of lean floating around someplace.  Hopefully not too much of it was in the roast I made last Sunday.......Cliff

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I used to have a problem with 175 gr Sierra Game Kings breaking in half and leaving two messy wound tracks through the animal. Never weighed the bullets remnants, I should have. Hope they have fixed that, that was 35 years ago. I went to Noslers. Now it will be Barnes.

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1 hour ago, Boot_Scraper said:

I never thought twice about lead on my plate until i saw this:deer-x-ray-500p.jpg.c7b1fc15ac2181d11569ec6672567d58.jpg

It's an x-ray of a deer after being shot. As much as I love my Seirra Gamekings, i might have to swap over to Barnes TTSX's after my stash runs dry. 

Damn! That's not good. I'm going on the lead-free diet! Screw you, Jenny Craig! 308ar.com has just invented the next new diet craze! 

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On ‎1‎/‎22‎/‎2019 at 3:29 PM, Boot_Scraper said:

I never thought twice about lead on my plate until i saw this:deer-x-ray-500p.jpg.c7b1fc15ac2181d11569ec6672567d58.jpg

It's an x-ray of a deer after being shot. As much as I love my Seirra Gamekings, i might have to swap over to Barnes TTSX's after my stash runs dry. 

That's just seasoning brother. ?

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Yikes!  Can't believe than in all my years of taking big game it never even dawned on me that lead bullets could leave that much behind and so spread out as they passed thru the animal.

I've settled in on the Barnes 175 grain bullets for my 308's and sticking with them for hunting.  To date all I've shot with them is groundhogs but I'm sure they will perform well on deer and Elk........Cliff

 

http://www.barnesbullets.com/bullets/lrx/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1NCGOm5Upk

 

Edited by Cliff R
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MIlitarily, it became a big deal when I was at Fort Ord, and I left Planet Ord  in 1991.  The primary small arms ranges were on the beach.  "Green bullets" was a major push then.  Save the Monterey Bay Whales, and all that shiit...  

Edited by 98Z5V
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When I was shooting High Power and Bullseye matches for them got assigned to the SAI School so on the range daily.  Spent several years there in the mid-1980's and the topic of lead bullets and any hazards from them never came up once.  They did "gut" all the buildings on the base around that time and remove all the asbestos, probably spending about 10 zillion dollars on that deal, but no one ever came down to the range and dug all the lead out of the backstop wearing any sort of protective gear, etc........Cliff

Edited by Cliff R
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6 hours ago, 98Z5V said:

MIlitarily, it became a big deal when I was at Fort Ord, and I left Planet Ord  in 1991.  The primary small arms ranges were on the beach.  "Green bullets" was a major push then.  Save the Monterey Bay Whales, and all that shiit...  

when I was deployed to Afghanistan, a few months in they issued us these "eco-friendly rounds." one multi day mission and the bullets were corroding in our magazines! after that we got our hands on all the green tips we could and only used the eco-friendly rounds at the range. haven't really heard much of those bullets since I got out though.

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Another ammo story, a little off topic but interesting.

I was already a Small Arms Instructor back in the 1980's when we got our first shipment of M-9 pistols to replace our 1911 45's.  They also sent us ammo for them.  It was from Israeli Industries and marked TZZ on the crates.  I don't remember much else about it other than it came in 64 round boxes, not 50.

We started doing testing and training with the new Beretta 92's and they were fine for a while then we started having problems with them.  We didn't have any weapon failures but we got a message to stop using them as a couple of slides came off and injured the shooters at another range.  

We got another message to stop using the TZZ ammo and it was replaced with Winchester or Olin in 50 round boxes.  We sent all the M-9's in for repairs that we'd been firing with that ammo.  They repaired them and we started getting in our full allotment of new ones, and never had any more issues with any of them.

No one ever owned up to it but I believe that the TZZ ammo was designed for Uzi's and way too hot for the M-9 pistols.  I still remember night firing on the range and the fireball from that ammo was considerably greater than the from the ammo that replaced it.......Cliff

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7 hours ago, Cliff R said:

We started doing testing and training with the new Beretta 92's and they were fine for a while then we started having problems with them.  We didn't have any weapon failures but we got a message to stop using them as a couple of slides came off and injured the shooters at another range.  

Yep.  Initially, they rated slide life at 5,000 rounds.  Then it dropped to 2,500, then 1,250.  If you're only shooting (peacetime qual requirements) 50 rounds a year, that's a 20+ year lifespan on the slide.  So, that made it "okay." I always hated the M9.

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The M9 is a Pistol you love to hate.

Ugly, bulky, wimpy caliber but they are very accurate and reliable.

Our 45's were old and a high percentage of them needed to be replaced.  They were "sloppy" and unreliable.  The slides on many of them spent quite a bit of time in the big vise in the Armory and we "peened" a lot of the frames, then hand fitted them back together to tighten them up some.  Beyond that we didn't mess with too much, and left the trigger pulls heavy and creepy, stock feed ramps, etc.  Even so you I couldn't run a single relay without multiple failures to feed, jamming up/stove piping, etc.  All the instructors were also armorers and we knew how to build Match grade weapons, but you have to be careful applying your skills to Service grade weapons, if someone gets hurt and you "modified" them in any way your head could end up on the chopping block.

The Beretta's were dead solid reliable.  Very rare to have any troubles on the firing line at all with them.  The biggest PITA was that the Marksmanship and PPC course was written for a weapon with a 7 round magazine.  Our magazines were not marked at 7 rounds so when you loaded them close attention was needed so you put the right number of rounds in them. 

I put in a "beneficial suggestion" to modify the course for fully loaded magazines and until it was adopted I made up a "jig" and drilled a hole in all our magazines in the precise location so when they were being loaded you knew when they had 7 rounds in them.

When the M9's showed up I was already shooting 45 in Competition and knew the accuracy they were capable of, plus all rounds were single action.  I could shoot the entire 50 round PPC course from the 50 yard line with any of the better 45's and pass it with 225 or higher (250 max score).  The Beretta's proved to be very accurate and I could shoot as well as or better with them for either course, and pass both from the 50 yard line as well.

From an instructions perspective the M9's really cut down range time and much easier to qualify entry level personnel.  Less recoil and the bullet gets out the barrel quicker so jerking the trigger and "anticipation" had less effect on how far off the mark the rounds would go. 

With a 45 if you anticipate very much at all the worms in the dirt in front of the target are putting up little white flags!  The same shooter with an M9 piston is shooting them target in the groin or just to the right or left of it.

The Beretta got the contract because of the price, not because it passed the testing better than the other participants......at least that is what we were told.  I'd have rather had the Sig, or even the M & P's over the Beretta.......FWIW.......Cliff

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Since this is a 308 ammo topic I'll add this.  Back in the 1980's Federal supplied a lot of ammunition to the Military.  So did Lake City and Olin.  Lake City is top shelf, Olin not too bad.

Federal, at that time was "bottom of the barrel".  Especially their 12 gauge 00 Buck loads.  I could fire five rounds from 50 yards at the target, walk down and only have a hand full of hits center mass.  Take the same 870, load it with Winchester and fire 5 rounds and obliterate the target with nearly every pellet accounted for.

Never did figure out that deal but we avoided Federal ammo, especially for training.  We'd leave it in the bunker until Servicewide messages came out to expend it, then all the instructors would have a Range day, which of course included a cook out and adult beverages afterward.......

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Yeah, Federal ammo had a very bad rep in Minneapolis, where it was manufactured back then. It was also a lot cheaper then Winchester and Remington at the time. That spot on the bottom rung has been taken now by HSM. Though I found some good HSM moly match a few years back.

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15 hours ago, Cliff R said:

From an instructions perspective the M9's really cut down range time and much easier to qualify entry level personnel.  Less recoil and the bullet gets out the barrel quicker so jerking the trigger and "anticipation" had less effect on how far off the mark the rounds would go. 

Trigger jerk, recoil anticipation and heeling were three things I always trained people for prior to pistol qual.  By watching where their own impacts land, they could identify what they were doing wrong, recognize that, and make corrections for it.  That was hardly ever taught at a PMI in the early and mid 90s, but I made sure they knew it.  When they see their own mistakes, and remedy it - it's just like a self-licking ice cream cone...  :thumbup:

Edited by 98Z5V
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