180 gr 30 cal Hornady Interlock

Charlie38

Charlie38

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Northwest (Prince Rupert), BC
I just shot a mule deer @ 200 yds with a 180 gr Hornady Interlock Flat Base out of my 30/06 @ 2800 fps(muzzle).
Does anyone know if they have changed this bullet? They don't have the extra ring on the jacket anymore on the new ones.
Shot the deer in the lungs, just hit one rib on the way in and the bullet COMPLETELY disintegrated! Just found parts of the jacket against the inside wall of the ribs on the other side.
I have used this bullet for years (old style with ring) and got pass through s with my 300 H&H @ 3000fps.
Used their 165gr Interlock last year(3006@ 2900fps) and shot two deer with them and had same shots with complete pass through s( 1 @ 30yds, 1 @ 80yds). What gives? Did they change the jacket thickness ?
 
Does the box have the same part #?

I have 150gr, 165gr and 180gr Interlocks, and all have the cannelure groove.
 
I think that they have changed the bullet. I have never had a jacket seperation before this year, and this year on my elk (though I had complete penitration, and I found it on the hide on the other side), the core and jacket seperated. The same thing happened to a buddy of mine on a deer. They are now missing the ring around the ogive of the bullet (not the cannulure), so I suspect that they probably changed other things as well.
Mike
 
blargon said:
Does the box have the same part #?

I have 150gr, 165gr and 180gr Interlocks, and all have the cannelure groove.
Click to expand...

part # 3070 same as old box. The small ring I was referring to was just above the cannelure groove. I pulled one of my old style bullets from my 300 and they have changed them.
The new ones look like they changed the jacket somewhat. Smaller lead tip and sleeker profile. I will have to hacksaw them to check the jacket thickness.
 
I just hacksawed one as I was waiting on the phone to talk with a tech at hornady. He states that the ring was only an ID ring, and that nothing else has changed in the manufacture of the bullet, though when I sectioned it, the core just slipped off, like it haden't done before, and the jacket seems thinner that it once was. I'm going to be sending the bullet with the failed core, the sectioned bullet, and 2 untouched bullets from the lot that I'm currently using to hornady for the lab to inspect. I'm suspecting that they changed the bullet, and it's manufacture more than they should have.
Mike
 
A few months ago, on another forum, someone said that his newly acquired 165 Interlock (30cal) bullets didn't have the Interlock ring inside the jacket, I sawed one of my old batch of Interlock and showed him the picture online with the ring showing, then he did the same and his picture showed, indeed, that his bullets didn't have the ring.

So, it look that Hornday has cut the corner and stopped producing Interlock rings in their bullets? But why would still be calling them 'Interlock'??
I found it was very good traditional bullets, but I switched to Accubonds and didn't buy any Interlock for some years now, but always had a few old boxes "just in case".
If they're not as reliable with the drop of the Interlock rings, that would be a bummer.
Maybe calling them or writing them would give some answers...
 
One of the best recovered Interlocks I've seen was from a large bull moose my partner flattened at a tad over 300 long paces. He was using factory Hornady Frontier .270 Win loads with a 140gr Interlock. The bullet entered just behind the left ear and angled across to the front of the opposite front shoulder where we found the slug during skinning. About a foot of the huge spinal column was mush and about 2 1/2 feet of neck was totally destroyed. Even after all that destruction, the bullet still weighed 120grs! He swears by Interlocks ever since.
 
Their Interlock 174gn round nose in .312" diameter is my favourite bullet for 303British, which is what I use for all my big game hunting. So far. I really hope they haven't screwed them up.
 
Both my bullet that had the core failure, and the bullet that I just sectioned had the interlock ring, but as I said in my previous post, the jacket just fell off of the core (this is different, as I used to destroy a screwdriver trying to remove the jacket from the core, it was almost like they where bonded), and the jacket seems thinner.
Mike
 
mike shickele said:
I just hacksawed one as I was waiting on the phone to talk with a tech at hornady. He states that the ring was only an ID ring, and that nothing else has changed in the manufacture of the bullet, though when I sectioned it, the core just slipped off, like it haden't done before, and the jacket seems thinner that it once was. I'm going to be sending the bullet with the failed core, the sectioned bullet, and 2 untouched bullets from the lot that I'm currently using to hornady for the lab to inspect. I'm suspecting that they changed the bullet, and it's manufacture more than they should have.
Mike
Click to expand...

Maybe that Tech should read THEIR OWN 2010 catalog, on page 11, about the Interlock bullets, they state an Interlock ring that help the core staying into the jacket, here's an extract of that page:
Hornady11.jpg
 
mike shickele said:
Both my bullet that had the core failure, and the bullet that I just sectioned had the interlock ring, but as I said in my previous post, the jacket just fell off of the core (this is different, as I used to destroy a screwdriver trying to remove the jacket from the core, it was almost like they where bonded), and the jacket seems thinner.
Mike
Click to expand...
Ah, glad to hear at least it did have the ring inside, but like you said, core slipping out by itself is VERY unusual...
 
Update........I just found one of the old 180gr interlocks with the ID ring laying around the house (yeh, I don't have a wife), and I just sectioned it. The jacket does in fact seem thicker, and although the core buckled from the jacket at the base, it is in fact stuck to the jacket up to that point, and I cannot remove it with a screwdriver. I have no camera, so I am unable to take pictures, but they do in fact seem look like quite different bullets.
Mike
 
I hope they haven't messed with it as have only 50 left. I dropped a small elk this year and the bullet performed admirably out of my 300WM. I wonder if there was a glitch with one lot? I had a lot of 154 7mm interlocks that seemed prone to separation but the next box was back to normal.
 
Had a 286gr Inter-lock come apart on a shoulder hit cow moose at 180 yards from a 9.3x62 last fall...............Harold
 
Hope they haven't f***ed with the 35 cals ! If they have Hornady will not be my go to bullet anymore !

I am going to section both bullets at work tonight ( I can't find my hacksaw ) and post pics of the 180 30 cals. Before and after.
 
Charlie38 said:
Hope they haven't f***ed with the 35 cals ! If they have Hornady will not be my go to bullet anymore !

I am going to section both bullets at work tonight ( I can't find my hacksaw ) and post pics of the 180 30 cals. Before and after.
Click to expand...

Excellent! I just don't have a camera. Things to look for (just to ensure that I'm not imagining things): 1)The core sticks to both sides of the front of the bullet in the old one, but not in the new one 2)the old jacket appears slightly thicker in the old one. 3)the cannular appears deeper in the old one. 4)at the nose of the bullet, the copper appears slightly thicker, with serrations where the expansion cuts are (it appears totally smooth on the new one, even though the cuts are still there). 5)The old one of course has the ID ring. Things that we can't see........have they changed the alloys as Speer had done to some of their bullets (I stopped using grand slams because they where no longer bonded, but the same price).
Mike
 
Well............I sent all of the samples off to hornady, hopefully they are able to ascertain something from all of it. Gee, it cost me about $7.00 to provide them with data, I wonder if they'll give me anything for that.
Mike
 
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