One of my customers asked me to post a question to you 375'ers. His shoots everything extremely well from 300 gr Barnes solids to 200 gr hornady lights. Under a MOA. BUt he has been unable to work upa decent shooting load for the "bonded bear claw" 300's. Anyone here found a similar problem with them? His PH recommended them for an upcoming buff hunt in Aug.
Any experienced input appreciated

As every rifle is different, it just may not like the bearclaws at all. I think he should give NorthForks a try since they seem to be accurate enough even with starter loads.

With the Federal standard velocity 300gr TTBC load my rifle shoots for real cloverleafs. Also, bullet preformance has been really excellent on game from impala to eland, with recovered bullets looking like they belong in a magazine add.

JPK

All my 375s shoot the factory Federal ammo with Bear Claws into very small groups. I have used them in Africa and Alaska and taken about 55 animals without one problem. However, I keep hearing complaints about the Bear Claws now being produced. I have not bought any in about two years so I may be using all older bullets. I believe there is a thread dealing with present day Bear Claws.

North Forks and 70 to 71 RX 15

Thanks, I'll pas the responses on to my customer. Seems a mixed bag of experience with them. But that's probably true of any bullet. I've seen some bullets (not 375's) that just seemed inherently inaccurate in any rifle/load and a few that seemed fine until I would get what seemed to be a bad box. Maybe the QC guy was asleep.
Not much experience with 375's except every one I've ever built seemed to be very forgiving of bullet brand type & weight and shot about everything you ran through it very well. From all the 375 fans I know that appears to be the norm. He might just have a bad batch of those bear claws. Anyone have an opinion of the Hornady interbond 300's?
Thanks again for the input.

brayhaven,I would say that it's not the bullet but the barrel.Some barrel brands shoot all bullets accurate and others don't.This has been my experience with various calibers.A Krieger barrel seems to like everything and there will only be small difference in group size and point of impact.

The Interbond bullets are extremely accurate in my Model 70, shooting 6 rd one-hole groups at fifty and moa or less at 100. I would not use them on dangerous game under any circumstances.

The Interbond in .375 and .458 has been discontinued by Hornady. Don't know about other calibers.

They also cause quite a bit of copper fouling.

I fired about 800 of them working up to a Buff hunt last year, but I had to use CR 10 on the bore about every hundred rounds or so. You could easily see the copper beginning to build up on the lands.

BTW, the Federal 250 grain TBBC was totally inaccurate in my rifle. 6" groups at 100 yds.

There are a lot of North Fork fans on this forum, and I haven't had the pleasure of trying them out yet, but the 300 gr. Swift A Frame performs flawlessly in my rifle.

First I must say that I have shot Buffalo with the 300 grain TBB. These bullets were purchased directly from Jack Carter in 1990, so not the new Federal version. Next I must say that I would not use that bullet again. Use the Swift 300 or similiar partitioned penetrating bullet. As to just loading for ccuracy, try 67 grains of IMR 4064, or maybe a tad more...

This information is not from personal experience but from a friend of mine that is a balistics expert and was one of the main writers of Lymann's reloading manual some years ago. He said that he has had some accuracy issues with TBBC bullets BUT he thinks they are a great bullet but what the TBBC can do the Swift A-frame can do and as a whole he found them to be more accurate. That said, I think you might have a finicky rifle. But let's get realistic here, your not going to shoot your buff at 200 yds (at least I hope not) if the TBBC's shoot two inch groups at 100 yds throw them in your bag and go to Africa. Try a load of 68 grains of R-15 behind the TBBC and see what happens.

Mike Brady's NF SSP is an improved version of the original Jack Carter TBBC. Both have monometal bases/shanks and bonded lead in the nose.

The full diameter grooved shank of the NF soft makes it more accurate in more rifles and it fouls less. It is a bullet that is forgiving of barrel peculiarities, unlike the smooth-sided TBBC.

The Speer-made TBBC's are gilding metal instead of the pure copper of the originals. The NF is copper too.

Just bonding some lead in the nose core cannot overcome other faults in a bullet.

There are no faults in a North Fork.