I'm going to South Africa in July and was wondering if anyone has tried the new E-tip by Nossler/Winchester on african or any other game yet? Rich.

Anybody even fired this bullet. I need to find an accurate factory bullet, preferably lead free (and the Fed. TSX doesn't work so hot in my rifle) as the brilliant minds in California have or are about to ban most lead hunting ammunition due to the chance that one of the handful of California Condors might eat one while consuming a gut pile and die of lead poisoning. Wonder if that means I can't hunt condors with lead shotgun pellets? Rich.

rholden

Yes it does, and those California Condors don't taste like chichen. More in between Spotted owl and Whooping Crane!!

Steve

MMMMM spotted owl, yummy. Kind of off the subject, but I did a bit of reading about these condors. There are about 300 living birds, 155 of those are not in captivity, soaring the sunny Ca skies, wolfing down bullet riddled animal corpses. So far their "conservation" cost has averaged nearly $117,000 PER BIRD. Geez. You can have your dog or cat cloned for $50,000. Maybe they should just clone a few thousand of them, seems a lot cheaper. There was also a comment that they have trained the released birds to avoid power lines so they don't get fried. Why don't they train them to avoid eating lead core bullets?

Oh yeah. Anyone with input on the E-tip bullets for African game? Rich.

Rholden,
I received some from Nosler when they first came out and loaded them in my 300 Win Mag and they shot well. Used their data for their other 180gr. bullets. I checked the performance on media and they expanded perfectly. However, I have not shot any game with them yet.

Everytime I see the E-Tip I think about that Nosler ad they ran when the Barnes X came out. It featured a photo of John Nosler circa 1950 at a benchrest and him quoted as saying, "You've got to have a lead core!" Guess it isn't so important after all.

Maybe not, perhaps old John knew from whence he came...I have no problems with lead cores in bullets, they still work and work well.

i think John Nosler was forced into the mono wagon , no by choice, i rather have a well desined lead proj than a momo proj...they are more predictable , just have a look at the long bumpy history barnes bullets have had as far as consistencey goes
at least nosler got it right the first time around ....a massive hollow point under the tip so they get reliable expansion, more than can be said for barnes
Daniel

In reference to the lead ban in California, there is now another proposal to ban the use of all lead in condor areas. This would include shotguns, muzzle loaders, pistols, and rimfires. Anyone care to point out a non lead .22LR round? There have been rumors of other areas in the southwest adopting the idiotic ban. Nosler likely saw the potential of some nasty writing on the wall, and jumped on the "lead alternative" bandwagon.

I believe the current law that comes into effect on July 1st already includes handguns and rimfires. (The game wardens I've talked to have no clue how to enforce any of it but that's for another thread). Maybe I've interpreted the law incorrectly but it looks to me as its illegal to "possess", not just hunt with, bullets containing lead. And the law was written to say that only "lead free" bullets are legal... not copper bullets. I'm told copper has about 2 to 3% lead, therefore its NOT technically lead free. Please correct me on any or all points I've missed if someone out there is well versed on this.

Before it happened when I brought this up on forums I was brutally shot down because "nobody cares what happens to Kalifornians" and I was "paranoid". The condor is just a front, I'm afraid this lead ban will spread like cancer (from the coasts in like other wacky legislation). There's already talk of it spreading to other states and while it may not go through quite as smoothly as it did here there is a ton of bad press about lead right now and it seems really easy to ban it. Good luck getting any politician to come out as "pro toxic metal". Name the creature or the cause, lead can be shown to be harmful to almost all organisms with properly skewed data.

You may see my "life time" supply of lead hunting bullets show up on the classifieds before long. We lost... and it looks like we'll continue to lose (shotguns next) but some of the rest of you should learn from our sad fate and fight while you can. If they can't take away our guns they'll take away our ammo... the end result is the same. The opposition seems to be able to agree on what they want to fight for, let's see if we can agree on something as well.

Kyler

Kyler,
After reviewing the Dept. of Fish and Game site, it appears they are banning all lead projectiles. I think the original Ridley-Tree Condor Preservation Act only included centerfire rifles and pistols, but that the DFG added on the others to the regulations themselves. I recently signed a petition at my local gun shop in opposition to the additions. The final regulations are absurd. See this link: http://www.dfg.ca.gov/wildlife/hunting/condor/docs/LeadInformation.pdf
I love the way they "understand" that there are no rimfire alternatives.....but tough shit. I also like the part about the original bill including a rebate coupon for purchase of non lead ammo, but they didn't fund it so tough shit again. They do have a table of approved non lead bullets which include Barnes and the E-Tip.

So, has anyone hunted with the E-Tip ?