Yup, these be them. The rifle worked flawlessly, and while these did their jobs, I was a bit disappointed. I had to settle due to a big rush at the last minute and used off the shelf ammo (Federal Premium Safari-510gr Woodleigh WCRN). Next time I'll have a bit more time and load up some Swifts or Rhinos.

They worked and did there job brilliantly.....woodleigh's are some of the best bullets you can get. Congratulations on your fine hunt.

I'm man enough to admit when I'm wrong. I just thought the bare copper from the inside of the bullet was a sign of jacket/core separation. The retained weights were good. Neither hit bone, and the ragged bullet looks a bit odd for this fact. Hey, they worked.
I'll stick with the rhinos for the top of my mag for dg, but the more I kick them around, I guess the Woodleighs are okay.

at an average of roughly 90% weight retention, I would say that those are bonded as hell. Magazine ad picture bullets are fired into controlled mediums until they get ones that look just "perfect". I would be tickled with the performance. Hell, I always liked the old ~65-70% retention of the Partition

I have some Woodleighs that actually have the lead still on the peel back, but lead is very soft and prone to actually wear off or scrape off to the copper I suspect...It is unusual to see any bonding of lead on the peeled back jacket, except on a very slow bullet where expansion is not violent IMO.....and even when you do, it is very little and makes not one iota of difference...

EXCEPT in advertisment wherein they always display bullets of exceptional expansion ?? They are all guilty of that one, but hey wouldn't you do the same?

Actaully, I didn't load these up. The rifle was sent to me by Savage in the eleventh hour for field testing in Africa. I don't even own a set of winmag dies, so I had to go with what I could get. I ended up with 2 boxes of Remington High Velocity 510gr and one box of Federal Premium. The woodleighs are from the Feds, I wouldn't hunt rabid squirrels with the rems, but they were good for range tests. I couldn't tell you the speed (we didn't have a chrony in the lowveld), but I would guess 2100fps or so as they struck 5 inches higher than the rems with the same hold. Distance on target was 100m for both shots. The first shot went thru the top of the heart and both lungs, no bone at all, and ended up in the skin on the other side. Second shot was behind ribcage (quartering away) went thru paunch into liver, stomach and lung, ended up under the skin in the chest.

hh,
Can I ask what velocity were they loaded to in your 458 and at what distance was the animal taken?

Karl.

Ray,
I don't disagree that both bullets did their jobs, but my concern is more about the bonding issue. Every other bonded core bullet I have recovered has had the lead actually "bonded" to the copper. The copper on these is exposed where the mushrooming occured. I like Woodleighs, but I was just concerned about the separation. Trust me, the giraffe died well, but I only questioned the lead/copper sep.

Humm,

Both bullets did thier job and the (remainng) core is still attached to the jacket, not in several pieces/places as in an un-bonded bullet. Looks like they are a WAD (works as designed). If you want a bullet to work as a solid maybe you should use a solid ;-)

Maybe I don't understand why you are upset. What where you expecting from these bullets that you didn't get? or don't like? Really I'm interested in your input and not trying to bust your chops

I've never hunted/shot a giraffe but as I understand it they are one tough critter and it appears to be quite dead...

Roi

One of them is a bit roughed up, but the cutting edges aree ragged and probably raised hell internally, and as a matter of fact was probably more effective than the other one, which is a perfect picture mushroom....I don't know what your after but I see no bullet failure in either bullet..more like good performance and quick kills....

I don't care what bullet you use, not every one of them is a perfect mushroom, but I'd say that Woodleigh is one of the most consistant bullets on the market...and in the 458 they must make a bullet that works in the sickly 458 Win. and still work in the Ackley and Lott etc., not an easy task...

At any rate I'd say both bullets passed muster....

HHMag,

Those bullets are not bonded.

Ive been using bonded bullets since 1978 (Bitterroots) and have seen a few. After that, Trophy Bonded, Swift, North Fork.

There is not even any bonding compound on the inside surface of the copper. No bonding whatsoever there.

It takes over 600 degrees to melt lead and over 900 degrees to bond lead. Either they forgot the solder, or did not have enough heat.

Like any industrial process, accidents happen especially when you are starting up a production run. Thats where facotry seconds come from. Id say thats what you have.

It is deffinately not bonded.

Andy