Hie folks!
I`m going at my first buffalo hunt,and i wonder what you think is the best bullet choise fore cal 375 H&H.
I have an idea that Swift 300 grs or Barnes 270 tsx will work,what do you think?
And do i need FMJ bullets fore buffalo?

Best regards from the frozen north

I would imagine any premium of suitable weight would work but I would most certainly contact your professional and seek his advice.

Doc
From what I have read and heard from some of the PH's I have hunted with, the 270 TSX should perform quite nicely. Also, the 300 gr would work as well. Since I've never used a .375 on Buffalo, I wouldn't know if you would need a solid or not but it certainly wouldn't hurt to take some of the 300 gr solids along, just in case.

Doc,

I used 300gr TSX on Buffalo with excellent results.
Good luck on your Buffalo.

Six buffalo say swift got my vote.

300gr. Swift A Frame worked perfect for me.
20 yard frontal shot. He went about 40 yards and while waiting for us to follow, tipped over and died.

I like the 300gr. Swift A-Frame.

Solids may come in handy for a follow-up shot on a fleeing buffalo if it is running straight away, but you risk hitting a second buffalo if the solid exits (which it should).

George

your TSX in 300gr will punch a hope in a buffs head.
Your choices will work, but I like the 300gr TSX's better. They slice the flesh instead of smashing with lead tipped bullets.
The best on your upcoming safari.

Mike

300 grain Trophy Bonded Bearclaw. Federal Premium.

Why mess with perfection?

Jeff

I also like the 300 grain TSX...

quote:

Originally posted by Sevens:
I also like the 300 grain TSX...

Excellent choice, I have used them on many buffalo.

But, don't forget the new Cutting Edge Bullets - Non-Cons too!

Either will work. Solids will too. Best advice is to shoot him well. I'd druther shoot a cape with a Remington corelokt in the right spot over any premium in the wrong spot. The buff is real big, the point of aim, not so much.

TSX, Trophy Bonded, Swift A-Frame, Nosler Partition, Woodleigh Weldcore....any stiff, bonded soft point will work. If you handload, the CEB and North Fork bullets are hard to beat as well. The quality and toughness of today's softs made for African big game just about eliminate the need for solids on Buff. Some shoot a soft first, and then have solids in their magazine, to assure penetration on the multitude of angles that may be presented after the Buff reacts to the first shot. Have fun!

Federal Premium Vital-Shok 300-grain Barnes TSX. Frontal chest shot on cape buff at 40 yds with .375 H&H. Fatal boiler room damage. Great bullet. As with any shot... placement counts.

Either will do well, you need to find out which shoots better in your rifle.

Then you can add in whether or not it shoots to the same point of impact as your solid load does.

Solids are not needed for buffalo with the good soft points available now (both my experience and what all my PH's have told me), but if you have some for use with little things (duikers, etc.) they also are in the magazine if you have a elephant get mad at you. Elephant are really the only thing you "need" a solid for.

Any of you guys mixed CEB solids and A Frames or TSXs?

Doc: Lookey here now, lemme' just tell ya sumthin'. Buy yourself about eighty cartridges of Swift A-Frames. Within 3 shots your gun will be shooting bullseyes. That leaves you 77 cartridges. Shoot everyone of those as practice shots in a variety of positions. Get yourself some shooting sticks and practice shooting from them.

Don't be bamboozled into believing you simply have to load a premium bullet into your chamber and wallah you become Deadeye Dick. You have to practice. Perfect practice makes perfect execution when it really matters in the field, when Black Death is staring at you wondering if you got the chops to drop him dead in his tracks.

Now back to the bullets. After you've shot up all 80 practice cartridges of Swift A-frames, go buy forty more. Shoot three of them, just to make sure your gun still likes the load. Then DO NOT clean your gun. Put it back in the gun case. Make sure you lock it and put it on the plane. That leaves you 37 Swift A-Frames to bring to Africa.

You're gonna shoot two buffalo right. That's four bullets. The first shot and then the insurance shot X 2. That leaves you with 33 for the rest of the safari. That's all you need.
Don't overpack and don't bring too many bullets. Keep it simple. Swift A-Frames. All that FMJ stuff just complicates the safari. Forget about that. You shouldn't go on safari and be worried about what bullet you have loaded in your gun. K I S D. Keep It Simple Doc

Buffalo hate Swift A-Frames. I've punched them 25 times with A-Frames, not a single one has lived to talk about how hard that first punch was.

Shot a buff in Sept. at 100 yds., frontal chest.
Used Fed. Prem. 300 gr. TSX, he cut a u-turn made 50 yds. & died.
Between 3.5 & 4ft. of penetration.
Everybody was happy except the buff.
Had TSX on top & 3 solids down.
Best of luck on your hunt!

I've killed 20 buffalo on 3 continents. 9 of those were taken with a .375 stuffed with 270 grain A-Frames. They seem to do everything a soft can be expected to do.

trophy bonded dear claws worked well for me, but like Bwana Moja says, if you don't make a good shot it doesn't matter what you shoot em with.

300grn Swift A Frames get my vote.

And the bullets of 350 grain Woodleigh. Is it a good choice?

Oscar.

I took nice west savana buff by 350 gn woodleigh four days ago. One shot in heart 100m , it was runing. After 50 m it droped. I'm still hunting, and I droped by this bullet LDE and roan also during this trip. Nice bullet .

I would make my first shot with 300gr tsx with follow up shots in magazine loaded with ceb solids. solids are nice for the second shot if you have to shoot him in the ass as he runs away

I also find interesting the bullet of 380 grains of Rhino Bullets. Bullet is a considerable weight for the 375 H & H Magnum and I imagine that for close shots should work pretty well.

Oscar.

quote:

I would make my first shot with 300gr tsx with follow up shots in magazine loaded with ceb solids. solids are nice for the second shot if you have to shoot him in the ass as he runs away

You and I think alike. I have been to Michael458's house and seen what these CEBs do and it's amazing. If I were shooting a 458 Win Mag solely for buff I's use the 450 Solids and 420 Non-cons but with a 375 H&H and plains game out there along with the buffalo I think the TSX and CEB solid would be hard to beat. And solids only if the PH said bring them. I think it has been shown the TSX will do anything to a buffalo that needs to be done.

Shoot whichever PREMIUM bullet your rifle likes. Ask your PH about his opinion on solids. Some like you to have them, some don't.
If he wants you to carry solids, find one that shoots near your softs (within an inch or two at 100 yards is fine).
And practice, practice, practice.

Thanks fore reply folks
Think i will trye Swift or Barnes,will use the one that my rifle like`s best.
Will also load some solids(just in case).
Due to training,yes will shoot many (hundred) rounds with the rifle before the hunt,have plenty of shooting ranges were i live,moving targets and so on

Balder, is Svein's old Brno going to Africa once more? That gun is a relic for all norwegian hunters

Jepp Maral you got it

Now that is cool an African rifle returning to Africa for another safari.

Mike

Think i have found the right buff load,my rifle works wery well with 270 grs Tsx at 2500 fps......just have to find a solid that i can load to hit in the same "hole" as the Tsx......just in case

I just got back from Botswana on a plainsgame hunt and used the 375 on everything from Giraffe to Steenbok. We were able to dig a few bullets out of various species and I was extremely disappointed in one of them.

I was shooting Federal Premium 300 Grain TSX and one of them went all the way through a Red Hartebeest and looks like I could shoot it again. It is perfect. It did not expand or do anything and that worries me. I shot several animals on the trip with no problems but I am worried after seeing this bullet. I will try and get a pic and post. I would like others thoughts on this.

quote:

Originally posted by Bwana Bunduki:
300 grain Trophy Bonded Bearclaw. Federal Premium.

Why mess with perfection?

Jeff

quote:

Originally posted by LittleJoe:
I just got back from Botswana on a plainsgame hunt and used the 375 on everything from Giraffe to Steenbok. We were able to dig a few bullets out of various species and I was extremely disappointed in one of them.

I was shooting Federal Premium 300 Grain TSX and one of them went all the way through a Red Hartebeest and looks like I could shoot it again. It is perfect. It did not expand or do anything and that worries me. I shot several animals on the trip with no problems but I am worried after seeing this bullet. I will try and get a pic and post. I would like others thoughts on this.

How did you find it if it went all the way through?

quote:

Originally posted by LittleJoe:

I was shooting Federal Premium 300 Grain TSX and one of them went all the way through a Red Hartebeest and looks like I could shoot it again. It is perfect. It did not expand or do anything and that worries me. I shot several animals on the trip with no problems but I am worried after seeing this bullet. I will try and get a pic and post. I would like others thoughts on this.

There are frequent reports of monometal bullets failing to expand. Because these reports are largely anecdotal it is impossible to say just what this failure rate is, but it certainly appears to be greater than with lead core bullets.

Any bullet can fail to function as designed -- the question is what is its failure rate? Bullets like the Nosler Partition have been illustrated to have an extremely low rate of "non-performance", whereas the non-performance rate for monometals (regardless of manufacturer) is somewhat -- significantly, it appears -- higher.

You pay your money and you take your choice. There is a level of risk to everything, so those who are willing to risk the higher failure rate of monometals are welcome to do so, provided they understand that such risk exists.

quote:

Originally posted by Matt Graham:

quote:

Originally posted by LittleJoe:
I just got back from Botswana on a plainsgame hunt and used the 375 on everything from Giraffe to Steenbok. We were able to dig a few bullets out of various species and I was extremely disappointed in one of them.

I was shooting Federal Premium 300 Grain TSX and one of them went all the way through a Red Hartebeest and looks like I could shoot it again. It is perfect. It did not expand or do anything and that worries me. I shot several animals on the trip with no problems but I am worried after seeing this bullet. I will try and get a pic and post. I would like others thoughts on this.

How did you find it if it went all the way through?

My thoughts exactly. If it went all the way through, it should have been lost!

You see these comments every once in awhile on the TSX but I have never had one fail to open. One thing I think is happening with these reports, and Retreever hit on it a bit, is that the TSX slices it's way through, often causing a smallish exit hole. Many may think that because the exit hole is small, it didn't open. I continue think of the ballistic gelatin demo on the Barnes website of the TSX passing through. The exit hole is cut instead of pushed away but the gelatin block behind it nearly explodes at double the size of the block, all the while showing striations where the bullet is cutting as it spins.

I've had a couple of Partitions fail; meaning the rear portion broke apart into schrapnel. It's the specific reason I started shooting Barnes. I disagree with Stonecreek's statement that the Partition has been illustrated to have an extremely low rate of "non-performance" as compared to the monometals. I've seen the Partition fail, never seen the TSX fail and that is over a wide variety of game in a wide variety of rifles.

Last year I shot 4 buffalo with the 270 grain TSX. Small sample size but it seemed to work very well, indeed.

Traditional dogma is that you use 300 gr bullets. I had a hard time forcing myself to go to 270gr. What finally convinced me is that Randy Brooks uses the 270 grain. I figure that if anyone is in a position to get feedback on performance, it's him.

The 270 TSX will outpenetrate any conventional 300 grain bullet, hands-down. A lot of tissue destruction as well.

Seven buffalos with 375 and 300gr Swift A Frame. PHs are happy with the TSX but I will not change a running system.

I did not clarify very well in my post. When I said all the way through, it went the entire length of the animal, through the hind quarter all the way up through the front quarter and stopped between the front shoulder and the skin and that is where we located it. It did not exit the animal. Sorry for the confusion on this.