I'm heading out on Sunday the 13th to Idaho for a double Black Bear hunt at the Flying B Ranch. Taking the 9.3X74R out for the first time on an actual hunt. This will also be my first test with the CEB Non-Cons. Report to follow.

All loaded and ready to rock!

Good luck on your bear double. I have no doubt the NonCons will prove devastating. Full report expected upon your return.

quote:

Originally posted by LionHunter:
Good luck on your bear double. I have no doubt the NonCons will prove devastating. Full report expected upon your return.

Mike,

I just hope my autopsy abilities are up to snuff!

Good luck on your hunt. Bring back lots of pictures.
Bill

Best of luck Todd! And have some fun!

M

Have a great trip Todd. Look forward to hearing all about it.

Sam

Great stuff. Good luck and happy hunting

Have a great trip Todd.

Good luck with the hunt, Todd.
Looking forward to again hearing how Michael and Sam's tests do indeed reflect bullet behavior in game.
Stay well

Just got to the Flying B Ranch outside of Lewiston Idaho today. Chris Sells (New Guy) of Heym is here finishing up the stopping rifle course he instructed this weekend. I videoed some of the clients. If I can get it edited in a timely manner, I'll post it here. It's a pretty interesting couse, complete with a buffalo charge simulator.

The Flying B is a super nice facility and man is there some pretty country around here. Can't wait to get at the bears starting tomorrow.

Since there is internet service at the lodge, I hope to have some info shortly. Should be lots of fun. This was supposed to be a horseback, pack in, spot and stalk hunt originally scheduled for April of this year. I had a buddy that planned to come along and hunt. He had some health issues which caused us to push the trip to May, hoping he would get better. He is still under the weather so at this late date, it turned into a baited hunt. Should be perfect however for the little double.

Hi Todd:

How come you did not apt for the bullets with polymer tip?

Good luck on your hunt, enjoy.

Will wait to hear the report.

Best regards

Malek
Good hunting/shooting and God's best

quote:

Originally posted by malek:
Hi Todd:

How come you did not apt for the bullets with polymer tip?

Good luck on your hunt, enjoy.

Will wait to hear the report.

Best regards

Malek
Good hunting/shooting and God's best

Malek,

No tips on these simply because I purchased them back before the tips were available. I'll be using the tips from my next purchase going forward.

So for an update, I shot a small to average color phased bear yesterday. I'll post a hunt report after the trip but here are some pics for now.

Nice place, the Flying "B" Ranch:



First bear of the trip. Hopefully, a big one for the second. Still trying to figure out who the OLD MAN in the photo is! Damn, there is a lot of grey hair there!



Two recovered petals. The entrance wound was large enough for me to put my fist into. The ENTRANCE wound! Obviously, the shank passed all the way through. Bullet performed as others have reported on this forum. Exactly the same.



All on video. Chris Sells also got a bear of about the same size. Lots of bears here.

Nice bear Todd - way to go! That one should make a dandy rug.

Way to go Todd!
I have to give that bear hunting a try.
Congratulations and good luck with the next one

Congrats. That's a nice black bear?

Looks like a bear-y good time!
He could not bear up to being shot with a non con.

Hey Todd:

Looks like you having a good time, nice bear/pelt. As you mentioned hope the second one will be a monster.
Can't wait to hear the details of the hunt and the full report on the performance of those noncone .366 pills.
Incidentally what kind of loads / velocity are you getting out of your Chapuis?

Best regards

Malek
Good hunting/shooting and God's best

Great Todd, look forward to hearing all about it.

Very nice spring cinnamon!

No bears the second evening. One yesterday at the bait that never gave us a good look at him. A fun hunt yesterday however as we rode horses up into the high country, then had to climb a bit to get to the bait site. Got back around 1:00am. Heading out to try again today.

When in doubt knock them out!!!!

Well, I just arrived back home today from my adventure in the dark forrest of Idaho. Unfortunately, I didn't get a shot at a larger bear than the one taken on the first night.

First let me say that my stay at the Flying B Ranch was a great experience. A very pretty place geographically, top notch facility from the standpoint of all that is offered. A beautiful log structure lodge, well appointed throughout, remote enough to "get away from it all" but high tech enough to stay connected, depending on your needs and desires.

They offer an extreme long range metallic shooting range, complete with a Steyer 50BMG sniper rifle with Night Force Scope, and the proper instruction on how to use same to hit targets way out there! Mucho fun!! A challenging sporting clay course, complete with a variety of high end shotguns to play with. I had so much fun shooting clays, I came home with a new SxS 28ga shotgun. Not something I planned on but this was a SCI donated hunt that I purchased. These donations should work as advertisement for the outfitter and as mentioned, I had a hunting partner that was supposed to come along at full fare, but due to health reasons, he fell out. I hoped that purchasing the shotgun in the pro-shop would help offset the lost revenue they had expected. I needed it anyway. Notice, I said NEEDED, not wanted! Heh, Heh!

After the stopping course participants had departed, my guide, Arby, the ranch manager, Scott, and I went out and burned up a few boxes of ammo shooting the buffalo charge simulator with my 9.3X74R Chapuis Double, a Merkel 140 double in 470NE, and a Weatherby Custom 416 WBY. Lots of fun until we burned up the motor in the charge simulator. Got all the charge shooting as well as the long range activities on video. Maybe I'll be able to work it in somewhere.

So back to the bears and the CEB Non-Cons. We only had the one bear to work with. Several others came into the baits but either didn't hang around long enough to fully evaluate their size and hide quality, or they came it too late to be able to tell much about them. Spring was in full bloom and there was just too much fresh greenery available for the bears, making the bait sites secondary. And about the baiting, rest assured, this was no lazy hunt. We took horses several miles into the mountains on a couple of days, just to get into position to make an extended and STEEP climb to the bait site. Arby is very protective of his horses as well and as such, doesn't allow them to be ridden down hill in the dark, except in emergencies. That being said, the 3 to 5 miles ridden up the mountain, was followed by 3 to 5 miles hiking down the mountain in the dark, leading a horse, on the way back. We finally got back to the lodge between 1:00am to 2:30am on more than one occasion.

All in all, it was a great combination of working for the hunt and a relaxing experience at the same time. Very enjoyable. The resident Chef turning out 5 Star meals, 3 times a day didn't hurt either!

We spotted a Cinnamon colored bear about 3:00pm on the first day while Arby was showing me the ranch. We stalked to within 100 yards of it and decided to pass as it looked to be a sow (legal if no cubs) and a bit small. While sitting the bait later in the day, we saw a large Black colored bear appear on a ridge about 400 yards above us. He was heading toward the bait as if being pulled on a string. Very shortly after that, another Cinnamon colored bear appeared in the same place. The red bear was quite a bit smaller than the Blackie but when they arrived at the bait, we looked them over thoroughly and noticed that the larger bear was 80% rubbed. He had hair on his head and a 6 inch wide mohawk all the way down his back. The rest of him was bald! Not much rug opportunity there!

Talking it over, we decided to take the smaller color phased bear to get one in the salt so to speak, then focus on a larger specimen the rest of the week. As mentioned, it wasn't to be. I ended up shooting the bear twice with the CEB Non-Con bullet. I was using the Trijicon 1.25X4 with post and triangle reticle. I've shot that scope extensively at the range, but this was my first animal with it. At the range, it's easy to place the tip of the red glowing triangle at the 6 O'Clock postion of the bullseye. But when time came to take the shot, I instinctively covered my POA with the entire dot, causing me to shoot high and spine the bear. Just to make note, the shot was 116 yards with the little double rifle. Anyway, the bear got into some thick stuff and as we approached, it raised up on it's front legs and I finished it off.

Obviously, I was using more gun than there was bear to catch the bullets. I recovered 2 petals from the first shot into the top of the shoulders. On both entrance wounds, the bullet sheared and destroyed massive tissue and bone. I literally placed my fist into the entry wound on the shoulder. Everything inside the chest cavity was mush and soup. How the bear was able to raise up on it's front legs when we approached, I'll never know. It wasn't going anywhere however as there was too much damage done. At the impact, the bear was flattened onto the ground for several seconds. It later rolled a bit and fell off a small ledge into the thick bushes below. One interesting aside, the entrance and exit wound in the meat and bone were large as stated but the entry and exit in the skin itself were about 9.3 in diameter. Why this would be, I don't know. But it didn't blow a huge portion of the skin away as I've seen done when a TSX exits.

I had hoped to put the bullet to a bit more of a test but I'll say that all my range work with it has produced exceptional accuracy. The high shoulder shot was shooter's error pure and simple. In fact, back at dinner that night, Chris Sells mentioned that he had the same issue with that scope design, placing the entire triangle on the POA instead of focusing the apex at the 6 O'Clock position. Definitely something I'll need to test again.

All in all, I'd say that the Rifle, Scope, and Bullet worked perfectly with the exception of the placement of the scope triangle. Again, shooter's error, but if I can't control this on future hunts, I might conclude the design is less than ideal. Time will tell on that one. I'm heading to NZ in June but will not be taking the CEB's this time just because I already have done extensive testing with the TTSX bullets in the particular guns I'll be using. My next outing with the CEB's will be October with Alan Shearing in the Zambezi Valley for Buffalo Bull and Tuskless Elephant. Stand by for that one.

Cheers for now!

Todd

Excellent report, sounds like you had a great time, this is good! Congrats on the bear. I love bears, love to shoot them! Sometimes, hate to hunt them however, especially in Alaska, I don't do well in wet and cold. But yet, I keep going back, something about bears I suppose!

Scope! I believe I would have the same exact issue with that post and triangle deal. This is why I never opted for one. I do have the Trijicon with the cross hairs and have found it to be a good piece of equipment, and durable thus far.

Your observations with the BBW#13 NonCon on thinner skinned critters is exactly what I observed a month ago on the plains game. Large entrance wounds, massive damage to internals, mush and soup, and large wound channels through lungs and tissues. Smaller exits of course as the blades have done their job where they should have, in the vitals, but it seems anything in the way of the bullet is destroyed, bone, tissue, anything. As for the skin, yep, same story, no massive damage to skins or hides regardless of caliber. You see, blades don't shear on impact, the bullet has to penetrate 1.5-2 inches, blows inside the chest cavity wall mostly what I found on zebras and such, blowing out the entrance of the chest cavity wall, and proceeding through vitals. Then on exit, it's just the remaining bullet, the broken beer bottle edges and they cut their way through the skin far side it appears. I saw exactly the same thing with the .500 350 Raptor and the 9.3 210 Raptor.

quote:

Everything inside the chest cavity was mush and soup. How the bear was able to raise up on it's front legs when we approached, I'll never know. It wasn't going anywhere however as there was too much damage done.

Todd, that is an easy one to answer! It's obvious to me this bear had not read the Terminal Performance Thread--He had no idea he was just supposed to lay down and die on the spot!



I won't clutter your thread with this,it's on the terminals, but I have the LVSP on the new wide cavity .510 530 BBW#13 NoNCon, did it yesterday--LVSP 1500 fps. This should work very well with 500 Nitro starting at 2100 or so. A big improvement over 1800 LVSP of the original cavity. I am very pleased with the new cavity in both .500 and .510. Just FYI---

Great job, congrats, glad you had a good time!

Michael