Anybody with experience using the African Grand Slam Speer bullets for Cape buffalo or the like? They seem quite well designed from the Speer reloading manual pics. AIU

Don't know how they are presently, but I cut them length wise and compare the bullets I might use. For jacket thickness.

Mike

My partner had one fail on an Elephant two weeks ago in Zim. It came apart and lodged in the Eles jaw; complete separation.

I can wholeheartedly endorse the CEB #13 after I used it on my Ele during the same hunt.

If you do a search you will find all the info you need.
Created here on AR IMHO are the best bullets in the world. Do some light reading on the 200 page long thread "Terminal bullet performance". It pretty much wrote the book on bullet performance in game.

I've sectioned a few of them and I can definitely say they are not bonded. Just a thicker jacket.

This was my one and only experience with Speer AGS and it was with a 375H&H in 2003 on my first safari. Having read everything I could get my hands on and a fledgling member of AR I loaded the 300gr AGS at 2400fps per Kevin Robertson's recommendations. The AGS were soft and upset quickly and loaded to 2400fps they lacked penetration. My buff was quartering to at 85 yards and I placed the first shot a little high at the neck/shoulder junction. He ran off and we found him standing broad side after an hour of tracking. I placed the next shot on the shoulder and he ran off again. When we found him again I placed a third shot just behind the shoulder and he finally went down and I gave him the coup de grace. Note that I used only softs as my PH said "You shoot softs, I'll shoot solids".
On the post mortem we found that the first shot had not penetrated more than about 12-15 inches and so had not reached the lungs. The second bullet broke up on the shoulder but did not break the shoulder. The third shot was recovered in the ribcage and did not penetrate the ribcage on the offside.

This is the bullet that hit the shoulder. My PH said they would be good lion bullets.
I have no axe to grind with Speer, I had used them exclusively in rifle and pistol competition and NA hunting up to that point but if they haven't changed their design since 2003, I'll stick to Barnes or Woodleighs. YMMV

I don't like them for buffalo, hippo or even Lion, but they are good bullets for animals the size of elk. I have used them a little and I have seen them used often, mostly early on in my hunting career, both in Afria and the USA.

Speer makes the trophy bonded bullets and they have an excellent reputation for the thick skinned stuff as far as soft points go.

That said, I personally think there are better bullets available for DG and all the big stuff for that matter.