I finally got the article (Thanks Dad! Apparently nobody shoots around here....).

The penetration tests were interesting. I really wish he had included some NorthForks and the 200 AccuBond. Too bad the 180 InterBonds weren't available. The Scirocco did surprisingly well--much better than it has in my tests. I wish he had shown cross sections of the wound channels.

And the BC test--great stuff! It really showed how superior the plastic tipped bullets are to their blunt-tipped bonded counterparts for long range work.

As I expected, the Swift and the Hornady strutted their stuff showing they are the sleekest of the sleek, beating the Nosler handily. Too bad neither make a 200 or they could unseat the Nosler as the BC King of hunting bullets (for 30 caliber at least). But in like weights, they will have an advantage--if your rifle likes their pickier aggressive secant ogives.

And I was really happy to see he included the 180 TSX in the test. I've been berated here before for stating Barnes pulls their advertised BC's of most of their X bullets from deep within their sphincters as most are simply physically impossible, but here's another side-by-side test to add to the "Here me now, believe me later" files.

Of course no "advertised" number is going to be perfect as actual numbers will vary a bit with different rifles and conditions...and Hornady is obviously underrating their plastic tipped bullets quite a bit (as many have known for a long time and enjoyed it)...but Barnes' numbers are "off the charts" wrong--the wrong way.

They advertise the 180 TSX as having a substantially higher BC than the Swift and way higher than the Nosler...and yet the Nosler thumps it very soundly and the Swift beats it like a red-headed roundnose.

Don't get me wrong, they're fine bullets for their purpose. I used X bullets for many years--but one of the reasons was because I thought they had such high BC's (until I actually started shooting at long range). They certainly aren't horrible BC-wise, they're going to be much better than the semi-spitzer types of similar toughness.

But every time somebody who uses them wonders out loud what the hype on the plastic tipped bullets is all about, "Because the X Bullets still have higher BC's" it just makes me want to scream! THEY DON'T! YOU'VE BEEN DUPED!

Sorry for the rant. I feel better now.

My accuracy is excellent to 350 yards, I don't have any business shooting any farther than that. Good shooting.

Arts,

That was my take on it as well. Give us a bunch of information (that most of us already knew), but don't hang your hat on any conclusions. Kind of the chicken turd way out of it if you ask me.

Personally I got a lot of what I consider real life usable information from Jon A's post when he tested the accubond bullets in his .300 RUM. Maybe all the bullets were not tested there, but alot more "real" data to draw from...and it was free

My beef is that he never concluded the article--no conclusions, no "final analysis", no recommendations (+ or -). So, basically we all already knew what he said, but he's supposed to be an authority (whether he is or not is a different topic), so why leave the article dangling in an unfinished state? No refereed journal would accept such. That is uncompleted research.

I suspect one bonded core bullet is about like another, they all seem to work very well indeed...and a lot better that the old conventional bullets of yesterday...

I'm betting the new bonded core core-lokt is going to be a real dandy, the old core-lokt was a fine bullet and with a bond it should rate super premium..

Todays bullets are simply the best and failures are far and few between..I was around when most bullets failed from time to time, and it was not acceptable...I appreciate all the companies that have improved these bullest to such a degree...

The downside is we don't have much to talk about today as to who makes the best bullets, so some folks just make up stuff!!