sounds perfectly reasonable to me~~

i ahve never used partitions, because i do not hunt anything bigger than antelope or deer yet. if i were to go hunting elk or moose, partitions would be my first choice.

The 150gr Partition performs very admireably in whitetail and coyotes too...

The "buzzsaw effect" makes for almost instant kills and yet the core always seems to fully penetrate for two blood trails.

$bob$

Steve, you're right, Nosler is sort of damning their own alter-ego bullets in defense of their own Partition!

I'm being very honest when I say that the Ballistic Tip is an inferior hunting bullet in every way to the Partition, except for varmint hunting. In my experience, for all game from whitetails to eland, the Partition has been more than accurate enough for any purpose other than the gathering of statistical accuracy, and absolutely, 100% reliable under all conditions. I don't see the need for any other expanding bullet.

I haven't tried the Accu-Bond, but maybe one day I will. It HAS to be a step-up over the Ballistic Tip..........

AD

Bah!

HUMBUG!

I could write better ad copy than that!

Number one, if a bullet loses weight when upset, an amount of kinetic energy proportional to the loss of the mass on the bullet is not available for "work". It's used to deform the bullet, and scattered into the beginning of the wound channel.

Making a big crater right under surface of an animal is only a good idea on broadside shots, where there are vitals close to the surface. On "less than optimal" shots, like quartering away, there are no vitals under the surface, so all that energy used to make a big opening is wasted. Rather, a long wound channel, as wide as possible, is indicated. Incidentally, such a wound channel will also kill on an ideal, broadside shot. The reverse, of course, is not true.

Second, the hole in the animal (primary and secondary cavity) is essentially determined by two things: the shape of the nose of the bullet after upset (with the flat nose creating the biggest hole), and second, the velocity of the bullet. This favors very high weight retention bullets: you can start with less weight, and therefore travel faster, and these designs often have flat, blunt noses after upset. It's like a school bus going down the road, vs. a Ferrari. The Ferrari is going to disturb the air around it much less than the school bus with it's flat front.

So, weight retention is good (allows you to use a lighter bullet at higher speed), and flat noses after impact are good.

To compare bullet wound channels, see, for example, Harald's "shooting holes in wounding theories" at http://www.rathcoombe.net/sci-tech/ballistics/wounding.html JMO, Dutch.

PT is good bullet offering a very good combo of expansion of penetration.

BTs are nice too, but, like you, I always use the heavier ones. Prepare for jacket/core separation as I have seen it happen frequently, though I have never had one blow up or fail to penetrate plenty well to make a clean kill. Then again, I only use then on game under 400lbs and in non-magnum calibers. The 115 BT @ 2825 fps from a 250-3000 is an ideal combo for deer/antelope out to 250 or perhaps 300 yds, IMHO.

As some of you here might have guessed, I'm a dyed in the wool Nosler Partition fanatic. I use 'em for everthing from coyotes to wild hogs to deer and even elk.



I was perusing the Nosler website and came across this in the FAQ's. Much of what they say directly contradicts what some here think is important in a bullet for killing game.



Between the === lines is the direct quote.



==========================================

What are the pros and cons of weight retention?



As a bullet expands through an animal, the small pieces of lead and copper it loses come off at right angles to the bullet's path. This is caused by the centrifugal force of the bullet's rotation. These small pieces become secondary projectiles creating a larger trauma cavity which induces more bleeding.



An expanding bullet of high weight retention will generally have a large picture book mushroom. This large mushroom retards the bullets ability to penetrate and does not create as large a trauma cavity. Conversely, a bullet which expands too quickly or loses too much weight will not get to the vitals.



At Nosler, we feel a bullet needs both qualities. A nose which expands quickly for light bodied game or long range low velocity impacts. A partition or thicker rear jacket for weight retention, and a smaller mushroom for deep penetration.

===================================

I agree wholeheartedly with Nosler on this and will continue to fail to weight my recovered bullets (VERY few!!!). Everything I shoot with a Nosler Partition dies almost instantly and the core inevitably fully penetrates the animal with a good wound cavity.



$bob$



... please don't feed the trolls or closet liberals....

I have used Nosler's Ballistic Tip on a couple dozen head of big game and see absolutely no reason to use it anymore. It is largely outclassed by the partition as a big game "using" bullet and ought to fall into extinction because of it.



Friday evening, I killled a Whitetail buck at darn near point blank range as he fled the scene. I led him a little much and the bullet hit the front of his shoulder, smashed through the spine and exited the offside about six inches behind his ear. The wound channel was healthy, but under control, and I might have lost a couple of Big Mack's worth of meat, but the old boy plowed a furrow any sodbuster would be proud of. Would a Ballistic Tip have done the same? I don't know, but I'd trust that job to a Partition anytime.



Saturday morning I shot a Mule Deer buck with the same bullet. He stood between 334 and 344 yards away angling steeply towards me. I hit him on the point of the shoulder and the bullet continued on, completely destroying the top of his heart. He hobbled about five steps and fell on his nose, and I've seen the same results on Elk, Moose, Bear...........



I really find it tough to argue with a bullet that is this versatile and am eternally convinced that his city slicker cousin offers absolutely no advantage. Unless of course your trying to save a bit of change for a coke on the way home. I also think that the Accubond is a poor design, as a versatile all around bullet, and reports comming in seem to bear this out. A Partition it isn't.



Chuck

The Nosler partition is a great bullet, but i have never used one on an animal.I have used a 120gr Barnes X loaded in a 6.5X55 swede in a M700 on three doe whitetails and the devestation was incredible, even on a small one about 80lbs.The X bullet doesnt "shed" any lead in any way, obviously, so why does it kill so good? IMO its becasue of two factors 1. it loses little or no weight 2.the cross section of an expanded X bullet is flat, like a plow, i believe that that flat surface disrupts move tissue and causes more of a permanent wound channel.Think about it a curved mushroom from a lead bullet is more sleek than a flat surface(kind of like the meplat of a large cast bullet)of the homogenous X.

Many people who dont butcher their own animals would look at an X killed critter and think that it didnt expand that much. Once again i beleive that the higher velocity(because of weight retention) and the sharper petals cut through the off side instead of tearing through it. Once the animal is skinned then one can truly appreciate the terminal effects, yet with out the bruising and blood shot meat of a ballistic tip at high speed.To me the Barnes X and TSX are without doubt the best bullets ever invented, just solid copper with a little hollow point, how simple, yet deadly.

dutch -

you are probably right, but i couldn't shake that mental picture of a bullet trying to plow up a rhino's kazoo, and had to write a post around that thought!

9.3x62,

You might very well be right but we DO find pieces of jacket material far enough away from the wound channel to give a least a little bit of credence to the rotating vegematic theory.

I dunno... The wound channels on a NP are really pretty large but never huge. I just can't figure out how they kill so well and surely from almost any angle as long as the heart, lungs, liver, or spine are in the wound channel. They invariably exit too if you don't go through more than a mile or so of bone and flesh...

I also don't take credit for figuring out their lethal effects. An old benchrest shooter/gunsmith took me under his wing about 13 years ago and he got me started on them. I'd used them before but since then I've used them almost exclusively in centerfire rifles for medium to large game.

I'll be trying out some Ballistic Tips this year too but they'll be heavy for caliber and my curiosity has gotten the best of me. Also I use BT's in my Encore pistols.

$bob$

Tas, I think that's being a little overly simplistic. Not only am I not willing to restrict myself to perfect broadside shots -- where I hunt elk and deer, that would basically mean "no shots", I'd be willing to argue that a quartering shot is a "better" presentation than pure broadside.

Secondly, the world is not perfect, and what starts out as a "perfect broadside" can turn into a quartering shot in the fraction of a second it takes me to send the bullet to the intended address. Animals move, and people need time to react. My wife's antelope was that way this year. One little step, and a broadside turned into a quartering towards shot.

Quartering towards and away puts a shoulder in line with the vitals. That, if the bullet has the ability to penetrate, will put the wound channel through the vitals, and break a shoulder, as well. If you are hunting elk on the edge of hernia gulch, anything to slow them down is a very good thing, indeed. Ditto for hunting deer in the rain forest, or in Southern swamp lands.

In quartering shots, there is quite a bit of distance before the bullet enters the vitals. I just don't see the benefit of waisting a lot of energy there. JMO, Dutch.

Me, I like penetration and weight retention. FailSafes get my vote.