At the risk of provoking waves of nostalgic sentimentality.....

I've come into some boxes of old WW silvertips as follows:

.257 100 gr ST
.277 130 gr ST
.308 150 and 180 gr ST
.338 250 gr ST
.375 300 gr ST

To be clear, these are most definitely not the new ballistic silvertips.

All I have to go on is what Jack O'Connor wrote about some of them. I know he didn't like the .375 300 gr ST.

I mostly load Core-lokts (my basis of comparison) and am happy with results on game, but am wondering if these old STs are comparable.......or if I should just use them on paper?

TIA,

Sam

I have some of the 257, 100gr and 130gr, 270's. IMO, they are pretty much like any cup and core bullet. If you don't push them too fast they work great. I use them in a 257 Roberts and a 270WCF. Velocities are just under 3000fps, and performance is excellent.

I would not care to try them at 3200+.

No experience with the hearvier ones you mentioned.

FWIW, I think they make a cool looking cartridge...probably because that's what I grew up with~!

I'd still buy them for the Roberts if they were available. Given how they worked in the Roberts, and .308W, and the old .30-30, I'd probably give them a go in others as well.

I've used Silvertips (.358) with success on Whitetail Deer. Quick expanding and big exit wound. May not be optimum on heavy game.

My favourite bullet for my .358 Winchesters has always been the 250 grain Silvertip.

That is not a high velocity cartridge, but with that bullet it is definitely a good killer for deer in the woods, where you want to be able to find the downed animals close to where they were when you shot them, or even DRT still in their own tracks where they were when you fired at them.

In use they seem to me to expand very much like the older 130 grain Hornady spire points did when driven at about 3,100 fps muzzle velocity from a .270. Small hole going in, a "two fists" size hole coming out, mush in between, on chest-hit mule deer.

So the consensus here says I wouldn't be giving up too much to the Rem CLs. Well, I loaded some 150s for the Ruger RSI and put 3 in a bit over and inch at 100. Accurate enough, haven't chrono'd but I know I'll be lucky to get 2550 fps from that barrel. So I won't be pushing them too fast.

They certainly are, even today, the flat-out coolest looking projos I have ever loaded. And all those cannelures - heck, even the 150s have three.

Sam

that lower velocity will help you make the bullet work better.
the silver tip is an expansion initiator.
like the plastic ones used now days just 75 years ago.
anyway the lower velocity will allow the bullet to open and pass through due to momentum.
faster speeds make the bullet open a bit too violently, as the others pointed out.

They are the same bullet as the Winchester Power Point with a very thin alluminum shim over the lead tip

The silver tip is not a power point with a metal cap.

I have used the 300 gr Silvertip in 375 H&H to take a wide selection of game, and was never disappointed. Examples include whitetail deer, Elk, Gemsbok, African Wildcat, African Porcupine, Greater Kudu, Cape Eland, Bushpig, Limpopo Bushbuck, Brown Bear, 2 Muskox, Polar Bear, several Ringed Seals, Roan, Reedbuck, Lord Derby Eland, plenty of Baboon, Harnessed Bushbuck, Western Hartebeest, and lots of Ground Squirrels. I think that's a fair sampling for my opinion that the 300 gr Silvertip was a fine soft point. I wonder what O'Connor shot with it before giving his opinion.

quote:

Originally posted by Lamar:

the silver tip is an expansion initiator.
like the plastic ones used now days just 75 years ago.

Quite possibly, but at the time they came out they were touted in some Winchester ads and a number of magazine articles as a point protector...to keep the points from starting to mushroom from battering from recoil while in rifle magazines.

In the '50's, I recall them being touted by Winchester as a tougher bullet. The Tip was supposed to retard/delay expansion (in addition to protecting the bullet point as mentioned by AC).

I have read that at some point they changed the design and went from some sort of tin alloy to aluminum, which likely changed the expansion charactoristics.

When I frist started deer hunting many moons ago I got a 250-3000 model 99 take down with a brand new box of winchester silver tips.

I just loved that ammo it killed deer just fine nothing like a fine rifle and a brand new box of ammo to make a 12 year old happy.

Take your pocket knife to it....I have, it pops off

Allum shim over the tip....just a bit thicker

Lead tipped cup and core bullet.....simple

quote:

Originally posted by SG Olds:
I have used the 300 gr Silvertip in 375 H&H to take a wide selection of game, and was never disappointed. Examples include whitetail deer, Elk, Gemsbok, African Wildcat, African Porcupine, Greater Kudu, Cape Eland, Bushpig, Limpopo Bushbuck, Brown Bear, 2 Muskox, Polar Bear, several Ringed Seals, Roan, Reedbuck, Lord Derby Eland, plenty of Baboon, Harnessed Bushbuck, Western Hartebeest, and lots of Ground Squirrels. I think that's a fair sampling for my opinion that the 300 gr Silvertip was a fine soft point. I wonder what O'Connor shot with it before giving his opinion.

I just tried to locate the O'Connor quote. I'm getting age-related CRS, but am certain about the gist of it b/c I clearly remember having the discussion with a fellow who was off to Africa in the '80s. He asked what factory loads to bring and I steered him to the 270 gr PP based on O'Connor. The PP worked to perfection. Then, your experience sounds alot deeper than O'Connor's probably was with that bullet.

Anyway, looking through my books I did find a slightly negative take on the .338 250 gr for elk due to too rugged construction (pg 159, The Hunting Rifle), along with alot of positive words concerning the 130 gr .270 ST and deer. Only .270 I have is a safe-queen M-70.

Guess I'm going to have to load up some 180 STs for the '06 as well and try them (or maybe the 150 gr in .308 WCF) on deer......if my son will kindly leave me something nice to shoot this season.

Sam

I am amazed anyone would find any weight of Silvertip in any bore diameter "too tough for elk".

Though the aluminum cap on what was originally a basic soft-nose bullet design in every other way did help prevent nose-battering in the magazine, most shooters of the day seemed to find the Silvertip not nearly as sturdy a bullet as the Peters Belted bullets and their corporate twins, the Remington Core-lokts.

The Peters bullets had an additional belt around their waist on the OUTSIDE of the jacket to help lock the core into the cup as the front half of the bullet expanded when travelling through an animal.

The Remington Core-Lokt had an almost identical belt in the same place for the same purpose, but on the INSIDE of the jacket.

The original Silvertips have NO such strengthening and tend to shed their cores pretty consistently. They also have nothing mechanically similar to a "tapered wedge" in their noses to help them expand either. Or at least none of mine do.

(One of the Remington bullets long did, however. It was their "Bronze Point" design.)

That's one of the reasons that in my above post I compared the Silvertips to the original Hornady Spire Points, which had no belts for strengthening nor wedges for enhanced mushrooming either.

The Silvertips are great bullets for lower velocity workhorse type cartridges (like the .358 Winchester, .35 Remington, .300 Savage, and so on, but I personally wouldn't use one from a .300 Mag or anything like that on a hunt where deep penetration from odd angles or through bones larger than ribs was critical to me. They do fine for .270's, '06s and other cartridges in the 2,550-2,850 standard factory velocity range, if you don't mind them often shedding their cores inside the animals.

Sam

My experience with the 300 gr Silvertip in 375 H&H should not be stretched to cover any other cartridge or bullet. For example the bullet might fail but would definitely perform differently in a 375 Weatherby. Also I suspect that a 270 Winchester firing a Silvertip would be different. I think the variables are bullet weight, speed, and diameter.

Alberta Canuck,

I have a rather extensive collection of 300 grain Silvertips dug out of various animals shot at various ranges. I have not recovered nor have I ever suspected a slipped bullet. (lead separated from gilded metal)

I am always amazed at how bullets perform. For example. My Derby Eland was 250 yards away and going away at a very slight angle. The Silvertip entered immediately in front of his left thigh/hip area and was recovered as a perfect mushroom in the front right lobe of his lungs. That's like 5 feet of penetration including the stomach. So when I was lining up to shoot a Grants Gazelle at the same angle with a 416 Rigby and 400 grain A-Frame (a fantastic bullet in my more limited experience). I thought I was going to turn the poor thing inside out. I was wrong, at 75 yards the bullet was perfectly mushroomed on the hide after going through less than 3 feet of gazelle? Goes to show me that one animal is not a test to draw any conclusions from.

If you have complete factory sealed boxes of Silvertip bullets you should not even think about shooting them. There are a lot of ammo collectors out there and vintage ammo is generally worth a lot more as a display item than as something to be shot up.
I just picked up a Winchester "Bear Box" of 300 H&H magnums loaded with 180 gr, Silvertips. One of the top rare Bear Boxes behind the 275 H&H, 7.65 Argentine and the 9x57 Mauser. Based on "real" auctions, mine are about a $200 item. Your bullets would excite a lot of interest if "virgin". Sell em' don't shoot em'
IMHO the Silvertip is a decent non bonded softpoint but it a'int no Barnes, Swift, or Nosler Accubond.

quote:

Originally posted:
Goes to show me that one animal is not a test to draw any conclusions from.

I completely agree with that thought.

Although no generalization is anywhere near specific to every instance, and may vary considerably in its accurcy depending on circumstances, the OP's question did sort of ask for a generalized response. That's why I used the term "often" when referring to Silvertips shedding their cores. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't.

Like any statistically described thing, it may happen 100 times in a row one way, or 100 times in a row exactly the opposite. But, as with Silvertips, I suspect the norm is more like "not completely predictable, but this seems to be about what one can expect..."

And one of the reasons the Silvertip was dropped for a while was that it was less dependable at staying intact in overall use than was its major competitor, the CoreLokt. And the market apparently reflected that in sales volume.

The CoreLokt has been made continuously for about 70 years because hunters found it a dependable, relatively predictably performing bullet. As a long time Olin (Winchester) stockholder, I am not joyfully happy about that, but that's bullet history the way it is.

Once the new comined technology Silvertips evolved, it is my understanding they have become very, very dependable.

I used the 200 gr Silvertip in my .358 Winchesters since 1964. The sale of that bullet was discontinued and when it was we switched to the 180 Speer and other bullets.

I shot quite a few bucks, mostly at woods ranges, with that bullet handloaded. The bullet was effective.

I have never shot a deer with any factory load.

If I could get them again I might hunt with the .358 W. out of nostalgia.

quote:

Originally posted by just-a-hunter:
AC,

I also thought the two interlock rings on the above picture were meant to try and keep the lead in the jacket... I guess they arent that effective?

Todd

I guess I'll have to say the "REALLY OLD" Hornady Spire Points instead of just "Old". The original Spire Points didn't have interlock rings...just a copper alloy jacket and a lead alloy core, though I think most of them had a crimping cannelure which basically did nothing toward keeping jacket and core together after impact and expansion.

The first real step many smaller bullet makers (smaller than Rem, Win, Western, Peters, CIL, and Sav back then) made toward keeping the cores in place was tapered thickness jackets which got thicker toward the base, to slow expansion down as the jacket peeled back and the core mushroomed.

It has been so long since Hornady changed from "Spire Points" to "Secant Ogives" that I can't recall off the top of my head whether they ever had Interlocks at all on the Spire Points.

Seems to me they didn't, but they could have. I could go look it up, but as this thread is about Silvertips and it is almost bedtime, I'm not gonna.


BTW, the original Spire Points (which were also used in the original Weatherby factory ammo) had a sharp angle where the "bullet nose" started to taper from the full bullet base diameter toward the tip, and basically followed what appeared to be a straight line with no curved ogive at all from there to the tip.

They were very simmilar to a "cone-point" 9m/m Luger bullet in shape, and could just as easily have been called Hornady Cone Point bullets.

I have a small collection of recovered silvertips. shot a moose at 100 yards. About 1975. Gun pre 64 featherweight 3006. 180 silvertip handloads muzzel velocity 2750. Three shots two recovered against the far side hide. third penetrated right thru. Recovered weight 71%. Stupidly sold gun.

Buck deer Also about 1975. Shot about 100 yards. Gun pre 64 270 featherweight. Bullet 130 gr silvertip. recovered weight 98 gr. Also have another 130 silvertip that weighs 98 gr, but cant remember exactly what I shot with it. Those were my silvertip years. Eventually went to something else that had better advertising and more gun writers writing about it. I lived in Edmonton at the time, and I remember being in a sporting good store when a rancher / guide
brought in a pre 64 standard weight in 3006 to trade off on a sako in 7 mag. I tried to buy it but the store wouldn't sell it to me as one of the guys behind the counter had first right. Any way I talked to the rancher it was his only rifle and he had never had a failure of any kind . He had shot deer elk moose and bear, and had loaned the gun to many of his clients who had never had a failure also. except some misses. His bullet. Winchester 180 gr silvertip factory loads. They just plain worked. Asked him why he wanted to trade. He said he just wanted to and he hoped the new rifle would be as good as the one he just sold. Bit of a gun trader in all of us.

I used the 300 grain .375 Silvertips to take lion, leopard, eland, greater kudu and lesser kudu. I used the 180 grain .30 caliber Silvertips in my .300 H&H to take wildebeest, hartebeest, sable, impala, Grant's gazelle, Thompson's gazelle and gerenuk with absolutely no complaints as far as bullet performance is concerned.

My eland was about 250 yards away, broadside. He turned at the first shot, quartering away and the second shot hit him in the hip joint, immobilizing him.

He was dead from the first shot by the time we got to him and the second bullet was recovered from the socket of his hip joint. The first shot had taken out heart and lungs and was recovered under the skin on the off side.

My experience with the 250 grain Silvertip in the .358 has not been as successful. The only white tail I have shot with it, flinched and ran off. He piled up about 200 yards away, but the bullet had not expanded and had exited, leaving virtually no blood trail. I think I will stick to 225 grain bullets for that particular rifle.

I have a bunch of .30-30 type 150 grain Silvertip bullets that I used in a Ruger Model 77 MKII in 7.62 X 39 m/m rifle. I necked sized the IMI or Winchester brand cases and used 23.5 grains of IMR-4198 powder with the 150 grainer S.T. Velocity was around 2,200 FPS and I've harvested several Whitetail Deer with this load. The 150 grain Silvertip worked fine on Deer sized game, getting each with one shot in the heart/lung area + one head shot. Ranges averaged around 100 yards or less.

I think they look cool! Years ago when I was a young cop, I carried nickel cased silver tips in my 357 mag. They looked mean!!