I recently came by a .416 Remington rifle. Since the least expensive bullet available for it is the 400 grain Hornady RNSP, I bought a box with which to work up loads, give the scope a preliminary zeroing, and check for accuracy. I assumed that if I ever got serious about using it for something like Cape Buffalo I would switch to one of the "premium" bullets in the same weight.

But is a different bullet necessary? How does the conventional cup-and-core Hornady soft point perform on large game at the relatively modest muzzle velocity of 2400 fps? Does anyone have any actual experience with this bullet, particularly with buffalo?

BTW: I'm able to get it to 2400 fps with no signs of pressure and accuracy is not bad at all, perhaps running 1.5" at 100 yards.

There was a reason that in the old days the PH's recommended solids for buffalo.

Cup and core bullets can separate the jacket and have issues with straight, deep penetration. Every PH I have talked to wants you to use premium softs, and then there is some debate whether there is a place for solids with buffalo.

Given that ammo costs are the least of your issues with a buffalo hunt, I think your initial idea is the better one.

If you want names. Fine.

Hilton Nichols and Alister Norton both said don't do that. In fact, Alister said he would take any of those bullets away from a client.

I have not used the Hornady InterLock bullets in my .416s.

But I did kill one Cape buffalo using a .458 caliber, 500 grain Hornady InterLock soft point, cup and core bullet. Velocity at impact was probably around 2,150 or 2,200 fps.

It was a perfect, broadside shot. The bullet expanded pretty violently and lost about 130 grains of weight, IIRC - but it sure as hell worked.

Here's a photo of the expanded bullet, which completely penetrated the bull's heart.



Here's another view of it.



The bullet struck no big bones, but just the rib cage on one side. It was found inside the rib cage on the other side.

I'm afraid that this bullet might not have worked as well if a heavy bone had been struck, or if more penetration, such as from a raking shot, had been needed.

For Cape buffalo, I now use only premium bonded, or monolithic, expanding bullets.

I shoot lots of the Hornady 400 gr interlock softpoint out of my .416 Rigby, they seem to be very accurate and are deadly on pigs. However; I used Barnes TSX and banded solids on my last buffalo and plan on using them again on the next one....they shoot straight and penetration is not an issue....I shot the buffalo in the chest as he faced us and the bullet (TSX) penetrated the full length and all but one broadside followup shots passed thru as well (one slug was found in the backbone).