Hello
I am a 50+ years reloader and have run into a strange problem. 270 win. in a savage 110 action, glass bedded and free floated. re-scoped and wanted to sight in. Started with sierra130 grain with 59 gr. H4831 SC fine tuned to a little less than an inch. switched to lead free nosler.130. about 4.5 inches scattered. regroup different loads still over 4. switched to Barnes 130 same load group to <inch. back to nosler 3 to 4 " is this normal? anyone else shoot nosler lead free?

I have no experience of these bullets, but, I have no idea why they are making these?

Powdered copper inside instead of lead??

Crazy idea.

The worst accuracy I have ever had from bullets was from Winchesters Black Talon.

They were absolutely awful!

It looks like someone who has nothing better to do is dreaming up silly ideas on bullets.

Has these bullets been tested in hunting conditions?

For now I will stick to lead core bullets of a good quality like Nosler, Hornady and Sierra. You need the mushroom to have a proper kill.

I understand that there is such a thing as lead poisoning - but I don't understand the hysteria that some lawmakers, do-gooder groups and some hunters have succumbed. If a well constructed bonded lead core bullet is fired into the chest of a game animal it will retain about 95% of its weight. So of the 130 gr 270 bullet that would mean that about 6 grains of lead is lost into the tissue, the preponderance of the tissue being blood shot lungs and will be left at the kill site- some states require the gut pile to be either buried or removed- removing further the 6 grains of lead.

Given the exemplary qualities of lead core bullets, I do not see any advantage for the villainizing of lead.

quote:

Originally posted by Ray B:
I understand that there is such a thing as lead poisoning - but I don't understand the hysteria that some lawmakers, do-gooder groups and some hunters have succumbed. [ . . . ]

Given the exemplary qualities of lead core bullets, I do not see any advantage for the villainizing of lead.

IMO, it has less to do with lead poisoning and more to do with chipping away at the number and types of tools shooters and hunters have access to.

Barnes started making lead free bullets years ago, and now we have so many copper made bullets.

They all perform exactly the same, which means excellently, in all types of game.

I read the advertising blurb on these Noslers, and it seems they are looking for a problem that does not exists, and trying to solve it.

They say they are fast expanding.

We have been using copper bullets - both Barnes X and our own Walterhogs, shooting every size animal in Africa.

Never had a single failure.

And they are all lead free.

California is going no-lead next year, condor areas are already there. I've started changing over to Barnes TTSX as the blue bullets are long out of production and I only have a few of them left. I went to the Lytle Creek range two weeks ago to start evaluating handloads, looks like the new ones will be not too far from Partition bullet trajectories. I haven't seen the Noslers at Bass Pro Shops, and there aren't many other local sources for reloading supplies. I am surprised at the number of centerfire bullets on the shelf with lead cores, maybe the expectation is that people will hunt out-of-state with them. I dunno.

The worst part of this mess is requiring no-lead for 22 RF; there do not seem to be any acceptable substitutes. Accuracy from the two or three no-lead alternatives leaves a lot to be desired. I am left with the belief that ideologues wrote the law in ignorance. I've never seen fragments in small game shot with a 22 RF.

Tom, it wasn’t “ideologue ignorance”.....it is designed as “incremental” eroding of our “Rights”! memtb

I had an argument with some here regarding lead poisoning from birds shot with 22.

He asked me for copper coated bullets, and when I skied why he told me because of lead poisoning!

I told him I am 68 years old, have had a mouthful of lead air pellets every day when I was young for several years - I still carry pellets in mouth now too.

We used to shoot birds all year round, with both 22 and shotguns.

We had to pick shot pellets out of our mouths as we ate those birds - mostly we use #8 and #9.

I have never been sick enough to go to hospital, or stay in bed all day!!!

His anser was “there is definitely something wrong with you!”

He also complains about all the chemicals we use in our workshop and shooting range!

Lead poisoning is real and serious. It is also difficult to absorb enough lead from the solid metallic form of the element (shot, bullets, etc.) to have a detrimental effect on your health.

The reason that birds are susceptible to lead poisoning is that the pellets or fragments they pick up often go to the gizzard (along with small pieces of stone and sand) where all of that solid material grinds against the food they eat to start the digestive process. This grinding can result in lead molecules getting into the bird's bloodstream where the lead can have detrimental, even fatal, effects.

This is the reason for the non-lead shot rule for waterfowl -- even though the problem typically only occurs with diving species and then only when the bottom of the water body is hard or sandy, not so much if it is mud where the pellets sink in and aren't readily picked up by a duck.

Animals like coyotes eating gun-killed carcasses are highly unlikely to be affected by any lead they may consume since it will shed very few molecules as it passes rapidly through their digestive tracts.

Lots of answers but gentlemen you've become bling because of your political whines. The question had to do with an apparent inaccuracy of a brand of bullets as compared to others of similar construction. You become so busy making any laws or suggestions look evil that you cannot read and understand simple questions. This is apparently the wrong froum to civilly discuss reloading questions.

quote:

Originally posted by Dick:
Lots of answers but gentlemen you've become bling because of your political whines. The question had to do with an apparent inaccuracy of a brand of bullets as compared to others of similar construction. You become so busy making any laws or suggestions look evil that you cannot read and understand simple questions. This is apparently the wrong froum to civilly discuss reloading questions.

You got all relevant answers, as related to your question of lead free bullets not shooting so well.

On both the inaccuracies and the reason behind why this all came about.

If you think any of the answers here were uncivil, may I suggest you stay away from the Internet.

Best of luck.

quote:

Originally posted by Dick:
Lots of answers but gentlemen you've become bling because of your political whines. The question had to do with an apparent inaccuracy of a brand of bullets as compared to others of similar construction. You become so busy making any laws or suggestions look evil that you cannot read and understand simple questions. This is apparently the wrong from to civilly discuss reloading questions.

Pardon me, Dick. It was I who brought that consideration into the discussion and I apologize for doing it. I did at least preface my whining with some recent information about reloaded copper rounds that I shot a week ago.

There is a copper 22 RF round from CCI that is kind of inaccurate also, a much-lighter bullet with higher muzzle velocity. I suspect it is also a composite, maybe not solid copper.

I'll theorize that the lighter specific gravity means that the bullets are longer and need either more velocity or a tighter rifling twist to be stabilized the same as a shorter lead-core bullet of the same weight.

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:
Barnes started making lead free bullets years ago, and now we have so many copper made bullets.

They all perform exactly the same, which means excellently, in all types of game.

I read the advertising blurb on these Noslers, and it seems they are looking for a problem that does not exists, and trying to solve it.

They say they are fast expanding.

We have been using copper bullets - both Barnes X and our own Walterhogs, shooting every size animal in Africa.

Never had a single failure.

And they are all lead free.

Maybe 20 years from now we might find some clever guy who would tell us that copper bullets are poisonous too!

quote:

Originally posted by Reloader270:

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:
Barnes started making lead free bullets years ago, and now we have so many copper made bullets.

They all perform exactly the same, which means excellently, in all types of game.

I read the advertising blurb on these Noslers, and it seems they are looking for a problem that does not exists, and trying to solve it.

They say they are fast expanding.

We have been using copper bullets - both Barnes X and our own Walterhogs, shooting every size animal in Africa.

Never had a single failure.

And they are all lead free.

Maybe 20 years from now we might find some clever guy who would tell us that copper bullets are poisonous too!

Oxygen is poisonous too.

But we cannot live without it!

Just my friend Walter says; getting old sucks!

I tell him it beats the alternative!

quote:

Originally posted by Reloader270:
Maybe 20 years from now we might find some clever guy who would tell us that copper bullets are poisonous too!

Copper is a biocide, commonly used in bottom paint on ships to discourage barnacles and such...

it's used in pipes because it kills microbes too.

BTW birds don't 'grind down' lead pellets the worst they can do is mash them flat before pooping them out.
they will however knock off the oxidized coating and absorb that chemical that is what causes the problem not the lead itself.

Dick, am I right in thinking the Barnes bullets you used might also be monos, and that these gave excellent accuracy?

If so, I'd put the Nosler's bad performance down to just being a bad example of a bullet that does not suit your rifle.

I've had trouble with another brand of mono, not because of accuracy but throat and COAL/case-capacity issues. Except for the .22RF, I imagine time and diversity will sort it out - says a man who has just entered the world of cast bullets.

My suspicion would be that being lead free these bullets are too long for the rifling pitch in your rifle?

I had a 6mm Remington that would not shoot Nosler Partition at all well. After two hundred yards the bullets were going sideways on through the paper.

I think Nosler offers two types of lead free bullets.

Their sintered core lead free varmint bullet... I have never used that. The guys who I know who have despised that bullet. They shot that badly for them.

Their E tip bullet... that I have tried in .30 and I think I also tried a .25, but don't really recall.

I gave the .30 the old college try. 4 different rifles that work well with many bullets, including Barnes.

While hornady gmx don't shoot as well as the Barnes they shot a lot better than those e tips.

I could never get them near published velocity and they patterned rather than grouped- and were very bad at causing a lot of fouling. Probably worse than the old Barnes x bullets before the coatings or the relief cuts they use on the TSX.

I'm not sure why it's so bad for me, as Nosler's ballistic tip is usually one of the more accurate ones, and I've always gotten acceptable accuracy with plain old partitions.

In short, I wrote them off as not worth the effort 7-8 years ago.

Barnes makes only lead-free bullets, others make a few to satisfy a small segment of their market. Barnes has been making lead-free for years, others are giving it a try. Who do you think will make the better lead-free bullet?

In .270 130 grain the only lead free bullet I see is the E-tip.

Are these factory first or factory second E-tip bullets?

I bought some 182 grain, 30 cal, "factory seconds", E-tips that I loaded in my 300 Ultra. I was getting right at an inch with them at 100 yards but I really felt my shooting was excellent and thought the groups should be smaller.

I weighed the rest of the bullets that I had (about 200) and they weighed anywhere from 179 grains to 182.1 grains.

Maybe that could be the issue the OP has.

Or maybe his rifle just doesn't like E-Tips.

I had a couple rifles that would shoot any cup and core <1 1/2" but would shoot Barnes X at >3.5".

Like Saeed, I'm a big fan of Barnes copper bullets and have been using them for for almost all my centerfire rifle hunting starting about 15 years ago.

To the OP's original question, I've never found a Nosler lead free bullet that I could get to shoot as well as the Barnes bullets in my guns.

I also can't find any 22 lr lead free bullets that will shoot as well as the cheapest lead 22 lr ammo.

quote:

Originally posted by RMiller:
Or maybe his rifle just doesn't like E-Tips.

I had a couple rifles that would shoot any cup and core <1 1/2" but would shoot Barnes X at >3.5".

You should try the TSX or TTSX. They are some of the most accurate bullets I have ever used.

Currently I use 55 TTSX in my 223 wssm and 80 TTSX in my 25-06 and they both hover around an inch at 100 yards.

I shoot nosler e-tips in several rifles and have found loads for all of them. Did you just substitute the bullets you tried or did you work up with each? I have found lead free and e-tips in particular are sensitive to seating depth.

Just a thought, but the E-tips are a very long bullet kind of like the Berger's. I wonder if the twist is not fast enough?