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Ladies and Gentlemen, We are going to be testing our solid bullets hopefully next week, in the meantime, I thought of seeing how our new HP would expand when shot into the sand bags we have at th end of our shooting tunnel.   We have made the HP deeper in these new ones, hoping they might expand more than our original ones. The old ones had a hole of 3mm diametr drilled into them, to a depth of 9mm. The new ones have a 2.5mm hole, but at a depth of 14mm. The above bullets have retained all their original weight - actually, they might have lost a grain or two, but with some sand still stuck to them that did not show. The line of bullets on top of the target are all solids, in 0.366, 0.375, 0.416, 0.458 and 0.585 caliber. Walter keeps shaking his head at the accuracy of these bullets, and does not seem to understand why he keeps missing with them! He was looking through the spotting scope while I was shooting: Walter, after the first shot, "You missed the bullseye, you only got a 9. More like an 8, but I will give you a 9." After the second shot "You missed the bullseye again! But you almost hit the first bullets hole. Try again, you might get lucky!" After the third shot "Bloody hell! You and Roy will give me a very hard time when I miss this year!" I said "I will load you a few rounds, and you can practice" Walter "I don't need the practice. If I had a shooting bench in Africa I will shoot just as good as you are! Or even better, why don't you ask Roy to bring the buffalo here, and we will put it in the tunnel. I promise not to miss then!" | ||
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Saeed, What is the coating on the bullets??? One sure cannot complain about accuracy... Mike  | |||
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I assume Walter hung the target...since it is upside down. Mike Legistine actu quod scripsi? Never under estimate the internet community's ability to reply to your post with their personal rant about their tangentially related, single occurrence issue.  What I have learned on AR, since 2001: 1. The proper answer to: Where is the best place in town to get a steak dinner? is…You should go to Mel's Diner and get the fried chicken. 2. Big game animals can tell the difference between .015 of an inch in diameter, 15 grains of bullet weight, and 150 fps. 3. There is a difference in the performance of two identical projectiles launched at the same velocity if they came from different cartridges. 4. While a double rifle is the perfect DGR, every 375HH bolt gun needs to be modified to carry at least 5 down. 5. While a floor plate and detachable box magazine both use a mechanical latch, only the floor plate latch is reliable. Disregard the fact that every modern military rifle uses a detachable box magazine. 6. The Remington 700 is unreliable regardless of the fact it is the basis of the USMC M40 sniper rifle for 40+ years with no changes to the receiver or extractor and is the choice of more military and law enforcement sniper units than any other rifle. 7. PF actions are not suitable for a DGR and it is irrelevant that the M1, M14, M16, & AK47 which were designed for hunting men that can shoot back are all PF actions. 8. 95 deg F in Africa is different than 95 deg F in TX or CA and that is why you must worry about ammunition temperature in Africa (even though most safaris take place in winter) but not in TX or in CA. 9. The size of a ding in a gun's finish doesn't matter, what matters is whether it’s a safe ding or not. 10. 1 in a row is a trend, 2 in a row is statistically significant, and 3 in a row is an irrefutable fact. 11. Never buy a WSM or RCM cartridge for a safari rifle or your go to rifle in the USA because if they lose your ammo you can't find replacement ammo but don't worry 280 Rem, 338-06, 35 Whelen, and all Weatherby cartridges abound in Africa and back country stores. 12. A well hit animal can run 75 yds. in the open and suddenly drop with no initial blood trail, but the one I shot from 200 yds. away that ran 10 yds. and disappeared into a thicket and was not found was lost because the bullet penciled thru. I am 100% certain of this even though I have no physical evidence. 13. A 300 Win Mag is a 500 yard elk cartridge but a 308 Win is not a 300 yard elk cartridge even though the same bullet is travelling at the same velocity at those respective distances. | |||
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The coating is spray-on moly. The targets were put up by ojne of our geniuses. He almost never puts all of them teh right way up. One day he put the targets up, and stood there at the end of the tunnel. When I asked him why, he said "Mr. Walter told me to wait here!" Apparently Walter told him to read the score as he shoots!? | |||
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Saeed, Impressive accuracy and expansion. Have you had a chance to try them on game yet? ______________________ Age and Treachery Will Always Overcome Youth and Skill | |||
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These are our new design, and we hope to try them in Tanzania next August. We have tried the original ones with the shorter HP and they worked extremely well on buffalo.   | |||
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Saeed, Nice accuracy! Does that spray-on Moly keep the copper fouling down? My .460 takes forever to de-copper - looking for a solution. Thanks, Jeff | |||
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Jeff, I have used spary-on moly before, but that was from a different company - I forgot its name. That one we used to spay it on with a spray gun, and then bake it in an oven for about an hour at medioum temprature. This one is from Outers - I think, but I will confirm this tomorrow. It does not need to be baked on, as it seems to stick very well. I normally never clean my rifles while on huntging, and do that once I am back home. It seems to tale me about 10 patches to get my barrel clean. | |||
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Saeed: Progress.  Not that the Old Walterhog was deficient, I just like the looks of the expanded bullets better with the New Walterhog. 85 grains of H4350 is the accuracy load that gives 2728 fps in your rifle? 88 grains of H4350 gave 2790 fps on those dead buffalo, eh? I have a .375 Lapua in the works that will have a case capacity identical to your .375/404. Thanks for the reloading data. Now on to the penetration testing.  Thanks for sharing all this information. BTW, there are some that would say you are crazy to use a 300 grain monometal .375 when you could be using a 270 grain.  I will patterning my .375/300gr loads for the .375 Lapua after yours, using GSC HV and FN and Barnes TSX, all in .375/300 grain. You make it a no-brainer for me. | |||
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PS: My new barrel is a N0.6 Dan Lilja fluted stainless. Would accuraccy be improved by having Walter machine a ring around the end of the barrel and paint the ring red? Many thanks again for showing us the way to kill buffalo, and anything else from zero to 500 meters, with one bullet weight in .375 caliber. | |||
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Any plans for a .416 250gr? | |||
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RIP, With the current lot of powder, I am getting 2660 fps with 85 grains of H4350 and the above bullets. I have not done much load development, as it seems whatever load I use I get reasonable accuray. All you have to do is get Walter to breath on your rifle, it will shoot like a house on fire after that! Kazoo, Welcome to the forum. We can make bullets to any size and weight, but I honestly cannot see any reason to go down to 250 for the 416 caliber. I will post the weight of all the above bullets tomorrow - apart from the 375 and 585, the rest are lighter than normal in the respective calibers. | |||
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Saeed, That looks like a fabulous bullet for both hunting and target shooting. If I recall the pics of Generation 1 of the Walterhog bullet, it seemed to shed its nose in an animal, leaving a cylindrical bore diameter slug to do the penetration. I also recall that the penetration on game with that design was very deep. The current design seems to be retaining its petals and will face more resistance in game if that is true. Is it your intention to avoid shedding the petals to get a more traditional mushroom shape? Have you thought about how much penetration you would need to give up or would be willing to give up to maintain a standard mushroom shape? | |||
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Saeed, Just got my first big bore a Ruger RSM in 416 Rigby. Have been looking at the Barnes manual and saw 30 cal bullets ranging from 110 to a heavy 250 grain. So I thought, the lightest being less than half of the heavy what if one would be able to obtain and work up a load for the 416 that is half the heavy bullet. That would put it at about 200- 250 grain. I thought how ideal to have a 225 or 250 grain bullet with the same recoil of the 400 but zipping at a high velocity for pronghorn, deer, and antelope. I know people use the 350 for a universal weight but I can't prevent the stretching of the envelope and really overlapping my light rifle, which I'm thinking will be a 270 WSM. | |||
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500grains, I personally have no problems with our old design - they killed everything I hit withem. It has been Walter who has been pestering me that those bullete did not expand enough in teh smaller game animals. He basically blamed his bad performance on the bullets. He suggested that we take some of the old ones and some of the new bullets to Tanzania this year - if it was up to him we would have to take a different type of bullet for every different animal we shoot!? - it must be his German blood, those Krauts like to complicate matters beyond my comprehension! The old ones penetrated almost double the distance the Barnes X did when we shot them into wood panels. I think teh Barnes X penetrated 27 pieces, while our old bullets penetrated 42, with hardly any deformation at all.  | |||
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Here is the weight of our solid bullets. 0.585 - 750 grains 0.458 - 470 grains 0.416 - 380 grains 0.375 - 300 grains 0.366 - 286 grains. | |||
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Saeed, That is a big change in switching lots. Is this the "New H4350 Extreme", or could it be the "Old H4350" ... ??? Whatever ... anything from 85 to 88 grains of H4350 of whatever lot will shoot just fine, eh? I'll start there with my .375 Lapua. Your bullet weights are perfect for caliber, except for the .458/470 grain. I am now fixated on 450 grains for the .458. Just my personal bias. However, I am sure anyone could make do with a .458/470gr, especially if Walter has breathed on them.  | |||
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Saeed, At what range did you recover those bullets? Here are two 600 grain Woodleigh Protected Point bonded soft points I recovered from a sand bank today at 100 yards distance. These were fired from my .500 A-Square at just under 2,400 fps. I had to dig a good foot or more into the bank to get these.  As you see, the jackets were peeled back to the bases, and lead was stuck to every shred of copper. I think that this kind of expansion is what I want on a buff with other buff behind him in a herd. Mike Wilderness is my cathedral, and hunting is my prayer. | |||
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The powder we used is the old H4350, and the bullets were recovered from the sand bags at 100 yards. We should have our penetration box ready this afternoon. I will post photos of it. | |||
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MR, What was the weight retention? Minkman | |||
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100%! | |||
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Saeed, It seems amazing that the copper holds together that well, and deforms in such an "organized" fashion. What particular copper/alloy are you using, if not a secret? ------------------------------- Will Stewart / Once you've been amongst them, there is no such thing as too much gun. --------------------------------------- and, God Bless John Wayne. NRA Benefactor Member, GOA, N.A.G.R. _________________________ "Elephant and Elephant Guns" $99 shipped “Hunting Africa's Dangerous Game" $20 shipped. red.dirt.elephant@gmail.com _________________________ Hoping to wind up where elephant hunters go. | |||
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Will, I was surprised myself at this too. The rods we are using are supposed to be pure copper, and our hardness testers confirm this. The bullets we used last year were moly coated with a process that required them to be baked in an oven. This process seems to harden the copper slightly - about 6% as far as we can determine. These bullets are coated with spray on moly made by Hoppes, and it does not require any baking. Roy and Alan are coming next Saturday, and we are going to test the penetration of these bullets in our brand new, scientifically designed, penetration box. It was the brainchild of Walter. He apparently spent endless nights trying to work out a repeatable way of testing these bullets. His final design is a box with 3/4 inche wooden baffles, seperated by 2 inches of wet sand. Seriously though, our intention is to see how the same bullets behave at different velocities. WE will start from around 1800 fps, and work up, with all the above bullets. WE also have some of our HP bullets from last year, which we are going to shoot against the newer ones you see above. These are only in 375 caliber though. | |||
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Saeed, Please do not look inside Walters box, its full of live goats, If you will look out the west window that man on the hill that is screaming and yelling at you is the herder!! Ray Atkinson Atkinson Hunting Adventures 10 Ward Lane, Filer, Idaho, 83328 208-731-4120 rayatkinsonhunting@gmail.com | |||
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Not quite! Unless Saeed is referring to the Walterhogs, in which case I do believe him! For the Woodleighs, the after-sand-impact weight retention was 299.3 grains for one and 298.8 grains for the other. So, make it fifty percent--and very consistent, too. Not bad given the bullet and that I shot it into sand. Mike Wilderness is my cathedral, and hunting is my prayer. | |||
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Saeed, Old H4350 makes sense. The New H4350 Extreme is a faster powder, significantly so, and the most temperature insensitive. I think the H4350 Extreme is the best powder in the world for the most applications by me, i.e., if I could have only one rifle powder, it would be H4350 Extreme. MR, That is too much expansion! That Woodleigh would be better at lower velocity (2150 fps) like a .500 NE. It is amazing that the bullet retained 50% weight in the sand bank. That speaks highly of the bonding. But, the bullet is too soft for a 500 A2. IMHO. Did you not dig deep enough to find an XLC? It will probably look more like Saeed's new bullet. Much better! | |||
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MR, PS: Fantastic photography! | |||
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RIP, My wife took the photo with a Nikon D70--a great camera, I think. I kind of like the photographer too. As for the expansion, you need to know that I shot these slugs into sand the consistency of nearly cured concrete! I doubt that I would get anything like that kind of expansion on a buff. And Woodleigh does specify an impact velocity range for this bullet of between 1,800 and 2,250 fps. But I do agree that I am probably pushing the envelope with this bullet, considering that I really don't want or like to shoot a buff at more than 40-50 yards or so, and closer if possible. Once I get the sights to work on my rifle, I am going to see if I can get the 570 grain Barnes X and the 600 grain Woodleigh solid to the same POI at 25-50-100 yds. I had to give up on finding a 570 grain X-bullet or a 600 grain Woodleigh solid after digging with my bare hands for a couple of feet in very dense, wet sand! Mike Wilderness is my cathedral, and hunting is my prayer. | |||
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Please tell walter to stop fiddeling about with that dead buffs nether regions. Its simply not dignified. | |||
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The Accurate Reloading Forums THE ACCURATE RELOADING.COM FORUMS Hunting African Big Game Hunting An Update On Our Walterhog Bullets
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