1)Bull frontal double tap with Searcy 500 Nitro double.
2)Cow single side on brain shot,same rifle


More photos of friends elephant to come along with some photos of shamefully deformed WOODLEIGH SOLIDS




These two Woodleigh 570gn solids at the sedate velocity of my 500 Nitro both deformed on an elephants skull.My friends 458 Lott produced a much more spectacular failure with 500gn Woodleigh solids.The animals were killed promptly by the rounds so failure is not really correct but unsatisfactory deformation did occur.


The above 2 pics are 1)a bull taken by Dr PS with a single round from a 458 Lott and the lower photo 2) a cow taken with the same rifle,the anchoring shot broke the back leg but resulted in the worst failure of a solid I have ever seen.Pics to follow.

cant wait for more pictures great elephant's

FUN AS HELL!!!!!

Great shooting!!!

JW

Very nice!

Great Day!!!

Mine will come...

more pictures?

More stories while you're at it.

Interesting experience with the Woodleighs. I used Woodleigh solids in my .500 Nitro on five elephant in June and we recovered three of the bullets. Two were perfect and one was perfect except a small amount of lead was protruding from the base. All five shots were frontal brain shots. Velocity was around 2070 fps.

Picture of one of the recovered bullets is in the hunt report:

https://forums.accuratereloading.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/6321043/m/782106388

I suggest you send the Woodleigh solids to Geoff McDonald at Woodleigh bullets for an evaluation. Woodleigh occasionally has a problem with getting the temper of the bullet material correct. It is a fine balance between having metal that is too soft (causing bullet deformation) and too hard causing barrel damage or brittle bullets.

465H&H

'In what stage of the killing did the bullet fail?'

Kevin 'Doctari' Robertson

They certainly appear to have worked, but that degree of deformation does not inspire confidence.

I second what 465H&H said regarding having them evaluated.

I expect that Woodleigh would be very much interested in getting to the bottom of this.

Is it possible the bullet on the left was damaged when they dug it out? It looks almost like it was hit on the side with some sort of tool.

I have recovered plenty of perfect Woodleighs but once and a while a bad one.
I will probably persist with it.

There has never been a composition solid that will not bend or brad on occasion! Every bullt that hits an animal hits him at a slightly different angle, and what it hits on it's way through is different as well. Woodliegh solids are as good as that type bullet gets. I wouldn't hesitate to take on anything that walks the Earth with a good rifle, of a proper caliber with woodliegh solids, and/or soft points what ever is needed at the time!

As someone already said here, in what part of killing the elephant did the bullet fail?!

Finding the perfect bullet is like finding the perfect partner. At some stage you are going to have to compromise or spend the rest of your life searching for what does not exist.

quote:

Originally posted by Code4:
Finding the perfect bullet is like finding the perfect partner. At some stage you are going to have to compromise or spend the rest of your life searching for what does not exist.

Bravo

This is a 500gn Woodleigh fired from a 458 Lott(modest load)It was recovered from the broken back leg of a cow elephant,as mentioned in my first post.It is the last animal seen in the photo series above.It was so badly deformed the PH accused us of using softs!!!The opposite side of the projectile shows the jacket completely ruptured.

I've always considered Woodleigh ne of the best FMJs but the easy answer to that problem is to start using GS Custom FNMS.

wombat, I cleaned up your photo links; there were some mismatched tags.

George

What change in formula has caused the coloration change in the Woodleigh solids?

LEFT: .500gr Woodleigh solid from a few years ago
RIGHT: .500gr Woodleigh solid recently purchased

Bill,

You need to get the Brasso out and rub 'em both really good.

Wink

quote:

Originally posted by Wink:
Bill,

You need to get the Brasso out and rub 'em both really good.

Wink

Might make 'em increase by a calibre or two!

GeorgeS thank you.It has resulted in a couple of photos being duplicated-my error.
Bill C you are right,they have changed,I noticed it myself.What is more the recent 500 Nitro projectiles no longer fit my Searcy-ie if crimped into the crimping groove they are too long!They have to be seated deeper to allow them to chamber-go figure?
Shakari-I have tried 3 times to purchase from GS and each time I have fobbed off one way and another so I gave up.

Wombat,

Try sending Gerard a PM here......... their ordering and delivery is usually very good.

Admittedly, I'm in Africa, but I've never had any problems with them at all............

The bullets really are good and worth perservering for.

I will try again but I was left with the feeling that one-off orders were not worth their while

I'm sure that's not the case......although he might well have an agent in Oz anyway, in which case you could order that way.

quote:

Originally posted by Bill C:
What change in formula has caused the coloration change in the Woodleigh solids?

LEFT: .500gr Woodleigh solid from a few years ago
RIGHT: .500gr Woodleigh solid recently purchased

I think the one on the right is the pure,soft,type of copper and the other is some blend.

Bronze maybe?

Woodleighs have steel jackets and quite a thin plating of guilding metal. The colour change is obviously just due to a slightly different plating of the steel rather than a change in material.

The important features are- a thick nose, and a re-inforcing washer at the base of the jacket to hold the core in

...



clad with 90/10 gilding metal alloy - aka Red Brass, Commercial Bronze, Gilding Metal

Composition:
Copper 89.0 – 91.0 %, Iron 0.05% max, Lead 0.02% max, Zinc balance (~10%) - more Zn the more brass like - less Zn the more copper like

Wombat
If you are having problems getting GS Bullets please send me an e-mail. I have set up the distributorship for them in Kwa-Zulu Natal as that is all I use now. If any of you guys are having trouble getting I will be happy to help you out as I think you will be very happy when you do finally get them. I am sure Gerard will not have any problems with that if he has not helped you out himself already. I carry stock for 458, .416 and 375, will be carrying stock for my 500 soon too. So it wont be too much of a stretch to get some across to you guys.
Email me at mail@gscustomkzn.com and we can figure something out.
Chat soon
Ian
0027 76 837 3801

quote:

Shakari-I have tried 3 times to purchase from GS and each time I have fobbed off one way and another so I gave up.

Wombat,
We have received a number of enquiries from Australia and New Zealand in the last year or two. The situation is that, for an individual to import bullets into Australia, you must have an import permit and we must have the import permit number before we can clear customs at this end. We used to send parcels to Australia direct and, at a particular point in time, they stopped showing up at destination.

The customers did not get them, we did not get them back and, when we tried to claim, we were given the information that importation of "weapons of war", by an individual, was no longer allowed without an import permit. So, we made refunds and wrote off the loss towards our education fund.

If this was not properly explained when you contacted us, I apologise for that but now you know what the hassle is. We do have a distributor with the required permits in place in NZ and he is setting up distribution for Australia as well. Dealing with officialdom has not been a greased lightning process but he told us yesterday that all is going well now and stock should be available in Australia soon. How soon exactly I do not know but you can contact him at martin@smartbest.co.nz and he will keep you informed.

With the increased pressure on the shipping of components for reloading, we have moved as fast as we can to set up dealers within the borders of as many regions as we can. Small parcel shipping is expensive as it is and dealers who are sent bulk orders gets the price down and that is always good.

Here is a list.

quote:

Originally posted by Bill C:
What change in formula has caused the coloration change in the Woodleigh solids?

LEFT: .500gr Woodleigh solid from a few years ago
RIGHT: .500gr Woodleigh solid recently purchased

I e-mailed Geoff McDonald of Woodleigh and asked about the color change. Here is his reply

"We questioned our suppliers about this, and even had the cladding tested.

We are assured that the alloy of 90% copper, 10% zinc is within industry tolerances for alloy 220.

It disappoints us that there is a color change."
Regards,

Geoff McDonald.



465H&H

On this same hunt we found some 70lb tusks from a long dead elephant which seems to have died from natural causes.They were handed to the authorities