Hornady 165gr Interlock performance

The Baron

The Baron

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I’ve shot a couple of deer with a 165gr Hornady Interlock from my M305 (.308), MV about 2,600fps. This year was an “average” sized whitetail buck, est. 160-170# field dressed. Shot was downhill about 40 yards, bullet entered high rib just below the spine and exited mid rib on far side. He was DRT, so can’t do any better but the exit must have been the core only as I found the cup base and another fragment of jacket totalling 48.3gr on the off-side hide. I’m surprised and a bit concerned about the jacket separating, but have a hard time complaining about the results with zero tracking and meat damage almost nil. Thoughts?

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it's a cup and core bullet with the interlock ring
the interlock will sometimes hold the jacket on the core but without bonding you can't ask for it all the time
 
My brother killed a pile of moose and deer with 162 Interlocks out of a 280 , little or no tracking , completely satisfied with them.
I have used them in a 7X57 with the same results.
Cat
 
Seems like it worked to me. Hopefully dogleg is along shortly to put your mind at ease. From what I've read here he's killed more critters with these bullets then most will ever kill in a lifetime.
 
The Hornady Interlock bullets of today are not the same as the interlocks made 20 years ago.The older dull red box never exhibited core separation.Now that is expected and common although they swear nothing has changed ,I beg to differ.The jacket integrity has been compromised somewhere along the way to save $$$$$$$$.Had a 286gr 9.3x62 turn inside out on a cow moose shoulder and fail to penetrate at 180 yards broadside.Started a small war here on this topic that involved sending sample bullets to the Hornady lab for testing.They worked wonderful in ballistic gel but not on moose.I buy all the old red box bullets I can find at gunshows.
 
That's pretty normal in the range of possible outcomes for that bullet at that range from a .308. Bullet integrity gets worse when they're fired from something faster like a .300 mag. A fairly significant portion of the hunting public like fragmented bullets dumping all their energy into the game, but I'm not one of them. That type of standard cup and core bullet is pretty effective on deer, but I won't use them on bigger stuff.
 
mbogo3 said:
The Hornady Interlock bullets of today are not the same as the interlocks made 20 years ago.The older dull red box never exhibited core separation.Now that is expected and common although they swear nothing has changed ,I beg to differ.The jacket integrity has been compromised somewhere along the way to save $$$$$$$$.Had a 286gr 9.3x62 turn inside out on a cow moose shoulder and fail to penetrate at 180 yards broadside.Started a small war here on this topic that involved sending sample bullets to the Hornady lab for testing.They worked wonderful in ballistic gel but not on moose.I buy all the old red box bullets I can find at gunshows.
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hornady was not willing to listen about my test either ... do not even think about gmxs lol
 
Use Noslers or Woodleighs. You most certainly can complain about that bullet performance. If you had hit a shoulder blade you might not have recovered your deer.
 
Normal range of performance - close shot, bullet came apart, deer DRT
Hornady interlocs have been reliable deer killers in 7x57, .280 and 30-06 for me, but one or two has lost a portion of the bullet along the way.
Probably not a good Elk or Moose bullet choice, but so what.
 
Hornady did send me free bullets from Korth ,but more of the same that were NFG really isn't addressing the issue more like a bandaid.
 
medvedqc said:
hornady was not willing to listen about my test either ... do not even think about gmxs lol
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So the GMX's are no good either they gave me two boxes of those too!Can't win. I pulled all the remaining Hornadys I had and replaced them with 286gr Partitions.
 
Some "so called premium" bullets do not expand reliably on deer - how is that going to improve results?
There is probably no magic bullet for all velocities and all circumstances.
 
Did the job. No they are not big bone busters. But on good shot placement your .308 will take any thing in North America. Shoulder shooters should go to the range more.
 
What's the problem ? One could argue a bullet fragmenting and cutting is likely to cause more damage than one that looks pretty when it stops. All I've ever used in my 7 mm and it's killed a ton of game.

Grizz
 
They are a great deer bullet. I use them in my 2506 and nothing kills faster. I wouldnt try shoulder shooting a bear or moose with them but for ribs theyre great. I prefer heavier bullets at modest velocity and the interlocks in slower velocity rounds are great. They expand well at a distance and although they may come apart up close they still penetrate deep enough for a quick kill. Plus they are one of the cheapest bullets on the market
 
Am thinking I'll stick with the 165 Interlocks for deer, but because my shots will be so close (rarely ever over 100y) I'll try to slow them down a touch more to around 2,500-2,550 fps MV. I'm sure I can find a decent load as far as accuracy and reliably running the M305 goes.

Interesting to hear the comments about the older/red box Interlocks vs. new. Before I tried them I had Googled a lot and reviews on game were very good - but now I wonder how much of that was based on the old version. All I can say I've shot two medium sized deer with the current version Interlocks and both were DRT with exit wounds, so... so far, so good.
 
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Interlocks for me have proven the same performance as yours since my use from the 80s. Great deer and elk medicine. But the results you posted are normal for the distances you describe. If you want to keep them holding together under 100 yards then yes, download them .... or consider 180gr interlocks. In the 308 you may find the 180s hold together much better. As you noted, in those ranges nothing is really lost in performance.

The only issue I see is all the lead micro fragments that shot gunned through the deer body and may be present in your meat. Even though you note no meat loss, that lead must have gone some where, and not all of it exited. Consider reviewing some documented scans of bullet fragments taken from cull deer in the US. Google mono metal bullets vs lead core bullets and you will see some of that work posted. In those tests in all cases, lead was found in the Burger meat. It was an eye opener for me and changed my tactics from lead core to TSX bullets for close in shots. However, using mono's come with their own suite of issues that you need to be aware of. My 2c.
 
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