I have just finished reloading and Gina and I will be leaving at midday tomorrow for a week of field testing. On the menu is springbuck, blesbuck, bwb, gemsbuck and kudu. It is hard work, this field testing, but someone has to do it.

I was asked by a bunny hugger in the circle of friends once, how I could get it done to shoot the poor animals. I told her I have this incredible scope on my rifle. I drew a picture of the crosshair and told her that, as soon as the animal is correctly lined up, the animal disappears, a row of biltong appears hanging from the horizontal bar and the rifle fires by itself. She has not broached the subject since.

Aother mean-spirited question from another vicious bunny hugger, well handled by Gerard.

Such a brainless question deserves a bit of levity, and nothing more, in hopes of disarming the rudeness of the situation. They don't really want to understand anyway.

Any other good responses to verbal assaults by greenies?

Who said something like this?:

Q: Why do you hunt elephants?

A: I like the sound they make when they fall.

quote:

Originally posted by Gerard:
I have just finished reloading and Gina and I will be leaving at midday tomorrow for a week of field testing. On the menu is springbuck, blesbuck, bwb, gemsbuck and kudu. It is hard work, this field testing, but someone has to do it.

Hopefully some photos for the web site will result, with some post-mortems documenting the effectiveness of high velocity monometal. Wish you had a .395 GSC for the larger stuff. Maybe next time.

Good luck on your field testing Gerard! Its a tough job alright! LOL

Cheers,
Canuck

quote:

Originally posted by RIP:
Who said something like this?:

Q: Why do you hunt elephants?

A: I like the sound they make when they fall.

I believe Klineburger said that to a lady on the plane on the way to Africa.

Back in 2002, I took a very light blonde bear with chocolate circles around each eye. It loked like a stuffed animal when it stepped out of the jack pines. The bear was small and beautiful - and still is in my home.

When asked how I could shoot such a beautiful creature, I first explain that the light blonde color phase is one of the rarest among black bears. I then tell them "it was much too rare and beautiful to be allowed to live." I always follow that with a smile.

Done it a bunch of times.

You might ask them how they feel about the leather shoes, belt or coat that they're wearing, or the make-up that they have on, or the leather seats they have in their home or car. Or maybe about the burger, steak, chicken or meat pie that they consumed for lunch or dinner, or the bacon or ham for breakfast, along with the eggs. Ask them if they know that 99 % of an animal is used in or for such things as making plastics, medicines, household and industrial products, including soap, paint, detergent, cosmetics, wallpaper, glass and plastics, tires, seat coverings, antifreeze, oil, toothpaste, buttons, and the list goes on and on. My wife had some handouts on that a few years ago for her school class and if I can find them I'll post them. Suffice it to say, you can't function at all in this world without having some tie to the use of animal parts and products.

quote:

Originally posted by RIP:
They don't really want to understand anyway.

That my friends sums it up. They don't want answers to their questions, they simply believe they can make you feel bad by asking. The irony is the truth lies in things they never actually thought of not what they think you never thought about.

Good luck Gerard. I'm sure you'll have interesting and informative results to share soon. I'm looking forward to it.

One of the young guys with the group last week works at an advertising agency. He put in for a week's leave. A number of people asked him where he was going and, initially he said going hunting. He became so fed up with taking the fallout that he eventually just said he is going camping.

Last week was a blast! We are still putting together some details and pictures but it was a good week. Gina organised her own hunting, starting at Kendrew Estates and I spent the week there. I will add to the pages as we get the details.

The hunter is home from the hill!
Good show, Gerard. Of course I need no convincing of the merits of your bullets.

Fine tuning of expansion characteristics of the HV's, eh?

Now I want to go see the dinosaur tracks at Kendrew Estates, have a meerkat pup climb up my pant leg, harvest some meat with a .395 ... and use windshield wiper fluid instead of water in my vehicle when crossing the divide in winter!

Check out the big bore forum for some pics of what the GS Custom barrel profile looks like when installed on a Dakota 76 African action.

Send bullets, please.

Just this weekend when a neighbor asked if I had been to Africa several times, I said yes. The follow up was what for, and I said I had shot 14 elephants.

"Isn't that illegal?"

"No."

"But isn't that illegal?"

"No."

"I thought that was illegal."

"No."

But 500g,

Surely you know that the Elephant is an endangered species, on the brink of extinction. And after you shoot them what happens? After all you couldn't eat elephant...

Blah Blah Blah...

Gerard,

Thanks for posting the details. Differing ammounts of meat damage are very interesting to me at the moment. I'm building a 260rem for home and Africa while trying to work out the best possible configuration to minimise meat damage.

Rgds,
FB

quote:

I was asked by a bunny hugger in the circle of friends once, how I could get it done to shoot the poor animals.

A friend, who had served honorably in Vietnam, upon arriving home from his tour was accosted by a woman at the airport railing at him, "How can you shoot those defenceless children?" Totally taken aback by this assinine question, he replied, "It's easy, just aim lower and lead 'em less!"

quote:

and use windshield wiper fluid instead of water in my vehicle

That is amazing. Do you guys have stuff like that over there?

Gerard,
Have you donned your Kevlar chest waders and climbed back into the crocodile pit yet?
Crack that whip. Whip it good.

Gina's page is updated with the Impala added.



RIP,
I found that the crocodile pit has a deep end as well and the waders leak. Not to worry, I am sure the light at the end of the tunnel is not an approaching train.

Field testing Have you come out with a new and improved variety?

Yes we have a new improved version of field testing. It is not for public release though. We are keeping it for our exclusive use and have been using it for five years now, iirc. The difference between the old version and the new one is that we used to enjoy the old one but the new one is even more fun. I suppose the new version is difficult to tell apart from what you would call a hunting trip. Sorry for confusing you.

I was refferring to a new bullet not a field testing method.

Apologies, I misunderstood. We constantly improve existing products, evaluate new products and confirm that existing products are where we want them to be. Above all, evaluating a variety of products under similar conditions is most useful. For me, the interesting aspect of the past week was confirming that some small tweaking of the HV design has not resulted in any change in the way the bullet is loaded. There is no need to redevelop load data when going from the old bullet to the new.

Very interesting about the penetration angle change on a couple of the specimens. I've seen that once before myself.

I wonder if the bullet's initial unexpanded center of gravity location has anything to do with it?

Gerard,
That Gina is a lovely daughter, skillful huntress, and savvy business woman. However, I hope she can see fit to increase production of the .395 Trio of bullets.


It is easy to be confused by shootaway. He consistently strives to baffle or provoke.

Regarding the 150-grain .270 bullets of nonbonded cup&core make that change course in animal: The freak occurence of two on the same hunt seems to have a similarity of angle of incidence on rib cage.

Maybe the bullets are somewhat long for caliber, and got asymetrically deformed abruptly on striking the ribs and either came apart or tumbled off wildly due to the irregular way they were deformed on impact, bent, flattened, or fragmented?

It seems the monometals were more reliable.