Anyone else use the Winchester Powermax 30-30 hollowpoints?

TheCoachZed

TheCoachZed

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I have had these sitting around for a while because I thought they were the last I would ever see on local store shelves, but now walmart has them.in again at a reasonable price.

I have only fired them at the range. Anyone here ever took a deer or bear with them? They look ... effective.
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Used them in a Marlin 336 a couple years back on a decent 8 point Whitetail. Shot was only about 30 yards to the lungs and bullet expansion was tremendous. The deer never took another step but I never did use them again for two reasons. Firstly I felt the amount of damage done was a bit overkill (no pun intended), and I had 2 rounds in that box misfire. Not sure if it was just a bad batch but I have never had a misfire from the blue box Federal brand so I went back to them.
 
I have not tried that particular ammo. I use 170 gr in my 30-30 when I use it. Although, I have not hunted with it for quite some time. I believe I was using the Hornady Leverevolution ammo at the last.
 
I had poor results with them in a .308WIN. They were EXTREMELY accurate in my gun, but they lacked penetration power on a small deer. A fawn, quartering towards, at about 60m, failure to exit. Deer died, but no exit. An exit wound is of utmost importance to me.
 
Interesting. I was thinking they might be a good round to use over bear bait, due to rapid up-close expansion.
Hirsch said:
Used them in a Marlin 336 a couple years back on a decent 8 point Whitetail. Shot was only about 30 yards to the lungs and bullet expansion was tremendous. The deer never took another step but I never did use them again for two reasons. Firstly I felt the amount of damage done was a bit overkill (no pun intended), and I had 2 rounds in that box misfire. Not sure if it was just a bad batch but I have never had a misfire from the blue box Federal brand so I went back to them.
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TheCoachZed said:
Interesting. I was thinking they might be a good round to use over bear bait, due to rapid up-close expansion.
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If I had no interest in eating said Bear and the range was close (since your mention bait I'm guessing it will be) then I would definitely us them. The exit on my Whitetail looked large enough for an apple to go through, the lungs were absolutely mush, and the deer pretty much bled out where it fell. If you got a pass through on a Bear then I can't imagine these rounds producing anything but an impressive blood trail, and if it doesn't pass through then it should perforate more than enough goodies to put him down quickly.
 
Hirsch said:
If I had no interest in eating said Bear and the range was close (since your mention bait I'm guessing it will be) then I would definitely us them. The exit on my Whitetail looked large enough for an apple to go through, the lungs were absolutely mush, and the deer pretty much bled out where it fell. If you got a pass through on a Bear then I can't imagine these rounds producing anything but an impressive blood trail, and if it doesn't pass through then it should perforate more than enough goodies to put him down quickly.
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Maybe I'll try it out in the fall. Probably use a slug gun this spring, as I'm running out of time to whack one long-range at CFB Gagetown, thanks to work on the boat.

However, I'm kinda not feeling the slug gun love anymore, so I'd be happy to move it along if I found something else that dropped them as quickly up close.
 
The 150 grain hollow point bullets for the 30-30 have been commercially loaded for a hundred years.
However, the standard soft point 170 grain bullet, with lots of lead exposed, as loaded by the major ammunition companies throughout the history of the 30-30, is the hands down winner of 30-30 bullets, by all the old time experienced hunters.
Even Jack O'Connor once wrote that the 30-30 with that time honoured bullet killed game better than a 30-30 would be expected to.
 
Soft points are perfect. Winchester PowerPoint, federal powershok, rem corelokt, Hornady whitetail or custom, federal vital shok (partitions).

For a bit longer range; federal fusion and partition, hornady leverevolution or winchester premium ballistic Silvertip.

Most important is what shoots best in your gun.
 
To answer your question, I haven't actually shot these. J did read that they worked just fine.. to me they seem like something I would use similarly to a winchester ballistic Silvertip. I would keep those shots in the midrange of a 30-30.. say 75 to 125 yards.
 
H4831 said:
The 150 grain hollow point bullets for the 30-30 have been commercially loaded for a hundred years.
However, the standard soft point 170 grain bullet, with lots of lead exposed, as loaded by the major ammunition companies throughout the history of the 30-30, is the hands down winner of 30-30 bullets, by all the old time experienced hunters.
Even Jack O'Connor once wrote that the 30-30 with that time honoured bullet killed game better than a 30-30 would be expected to.
Click to expand...

Agreed, and the 170 gr. Winchester Silvertips used back in the day worked well, without wrecking much meat. The 170 gr. Remington Power Points worked just fine as well.
 
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