Hornady Interbond? Thoughts and Experiences

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Just wondering what everyone thinks of the Hornady interbonds, accuracy and performance in any caliber. Please share reloading tips, mostly want to know how far off the lands they like to be for accuracy and how fast they like to go. They look like should work good.

Read a bit and seems like it would be tougher than an accubond, and bit more than swift s2 and almost perform like a tsx/ttsx with the high weight retention and bullet must be fairly "hard".

I bought a box of 25cal 110gr to try as 110 accubonds are scarce, I do have a couple boxes of 100ttsx too, but wondering if I should grab some more interbonds. Gonna cook up some 257 bob loads this spring/summer. Been grabbing some sst's in a couple cals to play with as most hornady bullets seem to be priced decent. Thx!
 
Had to do a lot of fiddling to get them to shoot well in my most accurate [with other bullets] 30-06.

I actually found Hornady's GMX easier to get to shoot.

Never shot any game with them, so am unable to comment.

However, I use and like the Swift Scirocco II, and believe it is one of the best bonded bullets out there right now.
I have recovered a couple, and they are one tough bullet, but expand well.

Regards, Dave.
 
Been horsing around with them and a couple of others looking for a "stout" bullet for my 7.08 to use on Moose.

The Hornady Interbonds are the least expensive of the three bonded bullets I have been playing with - the other two being the Nosler Accubond and the Swift Scirocco.

Here is a pic of the terminal performance of the three bullets I'm trying. It's not "my tests", but I used these results to narrow down my "long list" of potential bullets (at least the bonded ones).

The test was with 30 cal, 180 grain bullets shot into 10% ballistic gel (ya, I know, no bones blah blah, but shows how they each perform under the "same" conditions - so at least a baseline).

They were shot at two distances (IIRC) 50 yards and 200 yards - so an uber-close and a "typical" shot for the average hunter

The pic shows the bullet, the bullet in cross section, what it looked like @ 200 yard impact, what it looked like @ 50 yard impact - also included the impact velocities, the weight retention, % of "mushroom" and the penetration depth.

The one nice thing about the Nosler is that you can shoot the same weight BT's (cheaper) and your point of aim shouldn't change compared with the Accu-bond (the boat tail is a hair different, but they fly the same for the most part) - ditto the Hornady SST/Interbond - although the cost difference is less dramatic.

The Scirocco, according to many tests, is the "toughest" of the three, but being uber-long may not fly well from all twists.

terminal%20performance%20-%20bonded%20rounds_zpsw8can1mb.jpg


I don't shoot with enough velocity to get the mono's to reliably expand to their potential so I won't consider shooting them (at least until no-tox is the law).

While I could get all of the three (Interbond, Accubond and Scirocco) to hit sub-moa with my 7.08 I still went with option 4 (140 grain Swift A-Frame) - it is the most expensive option but I absolutely trust the bullet for Bullwinkle.

Unless I was hunting Elk sized game or larger I wouldn't even consider a bonded bullet, much less a partition style or a mono. Deer are pretty easy to kill and SST's or Ballistic Tips are "cheap", fly well and "kill deer dead".
 
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I've tried Interbonds in various 7mms and .30 cals. So far I've haven't got them shooting well enough that they ever got to go hunting in anything. Too bad, I wanted them to shoot. Cheap and usually available and all that. Ironically, I have no problem picking up the cheapest Hornady Interlocks and plastering just about anything up to moose sized with it.
 
Dogleg said:
I've tried Interbonds in various 7mms and .30 cals. So far I've haven't got them shooting well enough that they ever got to go hunting in anything. Too bad, I wanted them to shoot. Cheap and usually available and all that. Ironically, I have no problem picking up the cheapest Hornady Interlocks and plastering just about anything up to moose sized with it.
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The "poor man's partition" aka interlock is very under rated... I absolutely love em in my 7-08 and am looking forward to trying the 165's in my RFB this fall for deer and elk.
 
Dogleg said:
I've tried Interbonds in various 7mms and .30 cals. So far I've haven't got them shooting well enough that they ever got to go hunting in anything. Too bad, I wanted them to shoot. Cheap and usually available and all that. Ironically, I have no problem picking up the cheapest Hornady Interlocks and plastering just about anything up to moose sized with it.
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I stopped hunting years ago but when I did hunt I used the same Hornady Interlock as Dogleg did above. I came to this decision after recovering the different bullets I was shooting out of the dirt bank behind the targets. The only bullets that totally held together were the Hornady interlocks and Nosler partitions and name brands like Sierra broke up and went to pieces.

So all I can say is Dogleg must be as smart, good looking and modest as I am. :evil:
 
It may have been an abnormality, but I swore off the Interlocks when a 140 grain 270 completely disintegrated on the rib of a Whitetail buck.
Virtually none penetrated into the cavity on the 80 yard, broadside shot.

Fortunately, it stunned the deer, and he took a couple of jumps and stopped for a few seconds, allowing me to send another his way.
That one went between the onside ribs and did the job.

I still shoot the Hornady interlock, but I no longer hunt game with them.
I'm sure a lot of game has been successfully taken with them, however.

Regards, Dave
 
Eagleye said:
It may have been an abnormality, but I swore off the Interlocks when a 140 grain 270 completely disintegrated on the rib of a Whitetail buck.
Virtually none penetrated into the cavity on the 80 yard, broadside shot.

Fortunately, it stunned the deer, and he took a couple of jumps and stopped for a few seconds, allowing me to send another his way.
That one went between the onside ribs and did the job.

I still shoot the Hornady interlock, but I no longer hunt game with them.
I'm sure a lot of game has been successfully taken with them, however.

Regards, Dave
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Interesting... I've seen .270 bullets vaporize before with shallow penetration but never the interlock most often it's a cheap federal bullet... How long ago did this happen? Any idea on the velocity?

I've been concerned with pushing the 139gr .284 too far in my 7-08 but I nailed a WT last fall at just over 300M and had good expansion and a clean pass thru with a DRT deer... I wonder how slow it can go but the bullet will still expand? I've been loading Nosler ballistic hunting bullets in .308 reduced loads for my missus but they are expensive buggers... Might need to do some testing.
 
Mystic Precision said:
Hrn has pretty much discontinued the entire Interbond line so that is now moot.

Jerry
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Hornady has not discontinued the Interbond, they have suspended production on the line and many other products to concentrate on their big sellers during the current "boom" run on components and "anything firearm related" in the USA... in all likelihood, the line will be in production again.

I have taken to shooting paper with SST's and hunting with the sister IB's... POI is nearly identical in most cases (I check every single time anyway)... it is cheaper to shoot the SST's and hunt with IB's... I have had no problem getting IB's to shoot with good accuracy.
 
Thx galamb for the little write up, in the same class as the others for sure, I like the swift s2 as well and have some 130 6.5 cal that I hope to have a load for come fall.
I'm shooting the 129 interlock 6.5 at targets right now and not complaints so far, but only 40 left and none locally.
Jerry, the hornady website said production suspended and I was under the understanding because of the "ammo shortage" that everyone talks about :), concentrating on filling the more popular cals and weights. if they resume time will tell.
So not a lot of positive so far - maybe I'll grab a couple more 100ttsx, just don't want the 117-120 in the bob so thought a 110 would be a good compromise for weight and velocity. Some bobs don't shoot the heavys good as well I've read, probably the twist rate.
 
I've been concerned with pushing the 139gr .284 too far in my 7-08 but I nailed a WT last fall at just over 300M and had good expansion and a clean pass thru with a DRT deer
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I used to crank those up to 3500 fps in an STW, and kill deer like a direct nuclear hit. About 9 out of ten would exit.
 
Hotwheels81 said:
Interesting... I've seen .270 bullets vaporize before with shallow penetration but never the interlock most often it's a cheap federal bullet... How long ago did this happen? Any idea on the velocity?
Click to expand...

This occurred about 10 years ago. I was quite close, 80 yards, and the muzzle velocity of that load was just shy of 3000 fps.
Impact velocity would still have been up there.

I am a big Partition fan, but the 140 IL shot so well in that 270, that I thought I'd give it a try.

Fortunately, the deer was not able to escape, but the results could have been bad.
There was a substantial surface wound on the chest area of the deer, and a lot of fragments just under the hide around it, but nothing actually got to the lungs.

Regards, Dave
 
The 180s shoot absolutely lights out in my .308. I haven't tried them in any other gun but it didn't take much work to find a load for hunting that will absolutely shoot better than I can. 5 shots into less than 3/4 of an inch is pretty good for a hunting load.
 
The 8mm 200 grainers would not shoot in any of my 8 x 57's, but in my 8 x 64, an entirely different story. Accuracy at 100m hovers around 1" 3 shots. I've shot a number of whitetail with this bullet, the closest at 40 yards and did not experience any blowup or lack of penetration. Penetration in all cases was complete. I liked them so much I bought another 3 boxes!
 
I've had a lot better experience with the interlocks in 257. My 25/06 loves them. Shoots the inter bonds almost as well but there isn't much the inter bond can do that the interlock can't. The interlock may shed more weight but the results on game are dramatic with enough weight left to exit or at least hit the hide on the far side and they're about 1/2 the price
Partitions are a great bullet to. A 100 gr partition would suit a 257 Roberts nicely
 
Tried a handful of Interbonds out of my 2 416 rigbys...I got a pattern out of them at 100 yards. Switched back to Interlocks and been happy ever since. Waste of money me thinks.
 
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