When it comes to rhino's that's a brain shot, right? LOL! Dutch.

dj -

i am no physicist, so i cannot be sure, but i doubt that nosler is going to rint something that could be so easily proven to be incorrect. they've been doing this for a lot longer and have many more testing facilities than any of us. the centrifigul force of fragments flying away from the main core of the bullet may or may not cause significant damage, but we all know that the trauma is there, and has been caused by something. this is as good an explanation as any other than i ahve seen.

as for the gun twisting out of your hand hypothesis, once again, i do not know for sure, but i would duggest that since the barrel is composed of harder metal than the bullet, the twisting is stopped by the barrel cutting into the bullet (grooves, rifling marks, etc.). this makes sense to me, but don't take my word for it; as i said, i am not an expert and could easily be wrong.

Well I was making a somewhat pedantic point but it does correct a common misconception. The rotational energy of a bullet is a very small fraction of a bullets energy (usually about 0.4%). I refer to "Understanding Firearms Ballistics" by Rinkler, it has the proper equations for the more hard-core physics nuts. Another pedantic correction is that the fragments don't go at right angles to the bullets path. You don't find fragments above and below an entrance wound - you find them on the other side. Look at the longer fragment tracks in Ballistic gelatin, they keep going forward. If they departed at right angles to the bullet path they would fly out of the blocks of medium!
Please don't think though that I'm in any way questioning the effectiveness of Nosler Partitions. They are the premium hunting bullet that all others should be measured by. I think that they are a superb balance of rapid upset and damage due to the fragmenting front core and penetration from the mushroomed shank.........DJ

Paragraph three describes a Partition to a tee but it seems as though they could be speaking out against the Accubond and Ballistic Tip in paragraph two.

Don't get me wrong, I know all three will perform flawlessly in there own application. It's just kinda funny how the promotional people come up with this stuff.

There seems to be new blood at Nosler. They now are selling a rifle as well. So far this is not as bad as Leupolds effort at dropping free service.



There is some energy in the spinning bullet. Perhaps there is temporary cavity and the particles fly thru "air" for a moment before hitting the boundries of the wound?



Barnes came out with a QT (quick twist) line of cartridges a while back. They had a 6.5 mm with a 5.5" twist and claimed great effect on game. No many remember that as it did not sell.

Physics was not my best subject in college. However even I can figure that "equal and opposite" implies that the weight of one object spun in one direction should have an equal effect on the weight of the other. Maybe I didn't say that well. The weight of a bullet being turned in one direction should have absolutely minimal influence on a gun that outweighs it by a factor of 10,000. No the gun won't spin in your hands. I would have to agree that the front end of Nosler Partition bullets tend to splatter on hard bone and become secondary fragments. Whether this has to do with rotational forces or the force of impact agianst highly resistant objects that are stationary is irrelevant . It should cause a big wound channel and leave you with a smaller lighter flat nosed solid to continue on for lots of pentration. Should be a good bullet choice for most lighter game or the big cats. For things that are willing to stomp or grind you into a strawberry jam immitation, I will choose Swift A-Frames or maybe North Forks.

I agree with the secondary wound channels . When I see complete penetration plus other vitals damaged by smaller bullet fragments, its usually a quick kill. On animals under 250lbs. I sometimes use Hornady interlock. From 250lbs to 1500lbs. of animal I use partitions. Over 1500lbs solids. Barnes and failsafes to me are semi -solids. (a term I made up)!See my post under hunting reports. I did kill a large wildebeast with a 180gr failsafe angled thru the chest ,also 2 Impala. The 1st a side chest shot , the 2nd a front chest shot that went the full length of the body.All animals ran aways before dying. I've seen poor results with plastic tipped bullets not penetrating big game. Our Canadian guides did not like hunters using Barnes or failsafes ,but our African guides did !

For things that are willing to stomp or grind you into a strawberry jam immitation, I will choose Swift A-Frames or maybe North Forks.

---

D Hunter LMAO thats some funny stuff.

O.K. so for all you Physics nuts out there here is my question. Does a bullet that holds its mass transfer more energy to the target than one that flys apart on impact even if you get a pass through?

See, I am a big swift fan and like the new bonded bullets. I tried the noslers a few times but they dont do well out of my rifle. I have taken several deer both white tails and mule deer with swift bullets. All good shot placement, with one shot kills.

Someone seems to have missed the point of the "Vegematic" effect. There is little "energy" imparted when the pieces of copper and lead start slicing and dicing the game animal.

No more than cutting up meat in your kitchen.

Forget energy transfer in this scenario as the rotational forces causing the centrifugal force to rip apart the bullet need extremely little "energy".

This is just an added benefit derived from the spin that all rifle bullets have and need for "stability" anyway.

Also... What does it matter if the front of the bullet comes apart if the rear "Partition" stays intact and exits the animal on the off side? Uh... That's what it's SUPPOSED to do...

Herein lies the magic of the Nosler Partition. The greatest game killing bullet ever designed for North American (an much other) game. African game is often much tougher and a different set of rules can apply for the big nasties that bite and gore.

$bob$

Maybe I haven't given this subject enough thought. Is a bullet actually rotating very much travelling through an animal? A .308 bullet fired from a barrel having a 1:10 twist would most likely only make 1 to 2 revolutions travelling through the chest cavity of a deer or elk. I got into discussion with a fellow once who claimed the petals of a Barnes X bullet would "buzzsaw" through game. I just don't see how this can be the case.

Frontlander,



The 308 150gr Nosler Ballistic Tip bullet moving at 3000fps rotates at almost a quarter million turns per minute. That equates to about 4167 Revolutions Per Second. Considering that the bullet is decelerating at an incredible rate inside the animal and usually barely making it out the other side, it seems reasonable to assume that Nosler probably knows what they're talking about.



They likely make the best game killing bullets in the world (certainly amoung the most popular with those "in the know") and have been in the business a VERY long time.



I tend to believe them.



Some people are in denial... I understand that too....



Bullet RPM Reference



$bob$

Gents,

If the NP's shoot well in whatever rifle you are using for big game other than elephant and rhino you will be in good shape. I have used several other bullets and really like a couple of them such as the SAF and Trophy Bonded but if given only one choice it would be the NP every time. Massive tissue destruction and deep penetration just plain kill. Who cares what the bullet looks like or weighs after the animal is dead.

Regards,

Mark

I have use nosler partitions in my .338 Win.(225gr @ 2875 fps) for a long time. Shot 3 elk and 4 moose, 5 whitetail bucks and 3 black bears. The deer were shot while hunting moose or elk. Meat destruction in the deer understandably was far less then with my .270.
It is stupendous on elk and moose even with bone shots. Noticably more then with an 06.Often total penetration with exit on broadside shots on elk and moose. One 3yr. old bull moose was shot diagonally through the body from behind left rear rib forwards to between neck and shoulder with complete exit. Would 250's do more? May be. May be I even will try one day. Do I need to? Hardly think so.
To me the Nosler Partition is still the standard all other premium bullets are measured by. They are quite accurate, relative economical, do not foul barrels full with copper.
And....................most important.............they work!
Are there other good premiums?. You darn right there are. Are there that are much better under all hunting conditions?? Hardly so. Are the others as affordable? Hardly so.
Still I applaud the continuous devellopement and reseach in better bullets. It will be to all our benefit, because one day may be, we will be presented with the holy grail in bullets.

Nosler's are still the best in my personal book. They are pretty much all I use for all my hunting. That said.



The buzz saw affect is a bunch of horse pukky. A bullet leaving a rifle with a 10" twist will rotate once every 10 inches. So if the animal is 20" wide, the bullet will rotate only twice as it enters and penetrates that animal.

Im not a big partition guy, but Ill give credit where its due. Its obviously a great bullet with a proven track record, but I also give Nosler much of this credit for their tactfull (effective) sales ploys. Personally I dont get too excited about the penetration of a half a bullet shank with virtually no mushroom. Ill take a smidge less penetration from a grand slam with a mushroom still intact. If Speer pushed their "premium" as agressivley as Nosler has the partition it would have just as good a track record. JMHO.

Again I do consider them a very good bullet, just not my cup of tea.

About 7-8 years ago I got really excited when I bought a bunch of 30 caliber Grand Slam bullets on closeout at a nearby Wal-Mart in Tallahassee Florida.

I paid $5 per box for 150's, 165's, and 180's.

After several years and approximately 10 rifles I had failed to find even one rifle they would shoot accurately in. I've been too dadblamed stubborn to throw them away so in the last few years they've been used for barrel break-in which is a sad ending for a premium game bullet as tough as the Grand Slam.

Once they were included with several game bullets in terminal ballistic testing at very high velocities in my 30-378 Weatherby.

I can't remember ALL the bullets we tried that day but I remember that we never did successfully tear a Grand Slam apart. In pine trees, sand, wet phone books, and straight down into saturated sand the Grand Slam hung together like a real trooper.

Nosler Ballistic Tips exhibited classic mushrooms but tended to then come apart in grand fashion with jacket core separation happening at the drop of a hat. We concluded that animals would rapidly die but a larger part of the meat would be pulverized.

The Partitions didn't fair much better with total disappearance of the front of the bullet forward of the core but the rear core seemed to stay together like a pure solid except in the most extreme conditions.

At the end of that day we concluded that the Grand Slams seemingly outperformed the Partitions and Ballistic Tips in the retained weight and refusal to come apart sense like the gunwriters raged on and on about at that time. Yet to this day I have never fired even one GS at game due to my failure to get reasonably good accuracy out of them.

Interesting to note... We were given a partial box of old 165gr Solid Base bullets for the testing that day and they seemed to hold together somewhat better than the Ballistic Tips but we couldn't figure out why as they appeared to be identical.

We also tried out some X bullets and they performed erratically but none of them ever came apart and some exhibited classic "petal peeling". They fouled my barrel so horribly that I had to finally use CR-10 to get the copper out... UGH... Never used them again.

I just keep killing game with Partitions and wondering why they kill as well as they do. They defy the classic weight retention and mushroom rules the gun writers have shoved down our throats but they kill very well and I can usually eat right up to the hole.

I have only had one Partition recovered in all the years I used them and I wasn't the one that cleaned that buck. It was a 145# whitetail that was 3.5 years old (biologist checked) and I shot him from 35 yards away as he was running straight at me. He was just rising from jumping a small bush and was about to jump another when my 150gr Partition running at about 2850fps from my 308 Model 7 took him right straight on through the heart.

The bullet traveled the full length of that buck and was recovered from right under the skin of his left ham. We didn't weigh it but it looked like a small cylinder with no mushroom and a bit of deformation that made it look a bit like it was bent.

That buck like many many others expired immediately in his tracks and never even flinched. The guy that cleaned him said it looked like the bullet never varied from a nearly perfect straight track through the deer. He wouldn't return the bullet to me because he wanted it for his collection. He'd also had never recovered a Partition until that one.

btw... The reason he cleaned the deer I killed was because I killed it in front of his deer hounds and according to the "rules of the forest" the shooter that brings down the buck get's a ham and the "horns". Those antlers (8 point)are on my wall and that ham (not the one the bullet was recovered from) was very good eating... <grin>

$bob$

Buzz saw, centrifugal energy, bla bla bla. Call it what you will. Check out some bullet tests on ballistic gelitan and youll see that there is nothing more "dynamic" about the partitions shedding of its frontal core than any other jacketed bullet at the peak of its distructional force.

The only new spin here is their sales pitch.

"The Partition sheds a good bit of weight and jacket material during those two (or more) revolutions. We may never really know exactly where they go but I still find Nosler's explanation plausible and find at least some jacket material dispersed outside the classic wound channe."

I agree with that. But some think this is a dremal tool effect which just is not the case. I remember when some
were reporting greater killing power with an 8" twist over a
10" or 12" twist, again horse pukky.

"These small pieces become secondary projectiles creating a larger trauma cavity which induces more bleeding." This is the same statement that the Lab folks use for M193 5.56mm ball rounds on impacts above 2700 fps.