Recently bought 338 cal 200 gr bullets. The box contained three bullets with white tips knocked off. Is this common with your purchases of the nosler accubond bullet?

I would take pictures, send the pics and the lot # to Nosler, to let them know that they have a problem. It might be a one time thing but it might be that they have a production line failure that they don't know about. The worst thing that could happen is you get a thank-you letter and you could end up getting a new box of bullets.

Pauls thanks for the info. I will follow up with nosler but thought I would poll the thousands of reloaders for
more data first as well as to give them notice of what I have seen.

There was a report on another website that stated there were some issues with the AccuBonds tip falling off, but I can't seem to find it. From what I recall it was with bullets made about 3-4 years ago. Maybe you got a bad batch of bullets. Probably best to contact Nosler with the lot # to determine if you got the bad ones.

I just got some 165 grain 30 cal bullets that had a few tips missing. I contacted Nosler and they said they were aware they had a problem and gave me a number for customer service.
Called the number, left a message and they never called back. Apparently they aren't too concerned with customer service.
On a side note, I loaded and fired one of the bullets without a tip and it landed with the others in the group. I don't know what terminal performance would be but suspect it to be like any hollow point.

Thanks guys! I will be calling them today! I will speak to someone as I have this feeling that at over $4.00 a shot for their own branded ammunition reloaders are getting squeezed out of the loop. I will report back!

To my mind the Accubond tips are just a new version of Remington's Bronze Points. It was not unusual to have the Bronze point come loose enough to be able to turn with the fingers but I never heard of one falling off. When plastic vs. metal, metal wins.

Did the tip come outor break off? Coming out would be a result of improperly crimping the tip into place and would be a production line problem; breaking off would indicate brittle material.

Receiving slightly brittle polycarbonate from their supplier is the most likely cause of the problem. Still, it is Nosler's problem and they should be willing to solve it for a customer.

I once found a broken tip in a bag of seconds (Ballistic Tips). However, this is one out of thousands of BTips and Accubonds I've used, so their track record has been very, very good.

From Nosler customer service! Bullets made in late 1990's, I bought them last week! They had a problem back then and he asked me to press the tip down on a table and he would replace the ones broken. I had twelve break. He said it had ran from 3 to 12-15 per box. He will send me the twelve plus "a few"! Also he said they had recently run three shifts for a month making the new long range AB in 338 190 gr and sold out in less than an hour ! Big box stores bought them all. Demand among us hunter/shooters/resellers/hoarders is staggering!! Very nice man and satisfied me.

FYI the tips on these fit flush with the flat top on the hollow point. They do not fit inside the hollow area. At least the ones that came off were fit flush to the top.

Super glue them back on or ignore the bad ones and use them for practice. I have never had one fall off but I don't use many. I have used lots of Hornady plastic tips with no fall offs but I think they are crimped into the bullet.

Here is an illustration of an Accubond that I pulled off of Nosler's website. So far as I am aware, all Accubond and Ballistic Tips polymer points have a "root" extending into the jacket of the bullet.

I had this problem with Barnes TTSX 2 years ago. The tips fell out of 3 .277 cal. bullets. I called and they took my information. 5 days later I had 20 new bullets in the mail with an apology and a thank you for the information. I was impressed.

quote:

Originally posted by muygrande:
FYI the tips on these fit flush with the flat top on the hollow point. They do not fit inside the hollow area. At least the ones that came off were fit flush to the top.

It appears (sounds like) your tips broke off rather than fell off.

As shown in Stonecreek's photograph, there should be a stub attached to the tip.

Perhaps you ought to contact Nosler's customer service to request an exchange for your faulty bullets.

Actually as noted above I did contact nosler and they did admit to having some
problems long ago of which mine were a part of and I have received twice as many replacement bullets as I determined were bad. I think the polymer used was brittle and shrunk
Out of the hollow point allowing the tips to fall or snap off.

What muygrande said. I was just about to state that Nosler did in fact have issues early on with a fluxing agent as i recall that embrittled the polycarbonate tip. I sent them lot numbers of various calibers I had they indicated back to me which were affected and sent me replacements. Keep in mind this was in the 2008-2009 timeframe. Just dont want to start a panic.

I've had the same problem with 200 grain Accubonds. They were seconds, if that's any excuse.

I couldn't figure out why my cartridges weren't feeding properly from the magazine of a Blaser R 93. First I blamed it on the magazine but then found that a tip had come off, fallen into the magazine well and raised the magazine just enough to cause the malfunction.