Wichester X not impressed

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luftmech

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So I managed to take a doe yesterday with my new to me 7WSM, nice sunny day, no wind, fresh 2" of snow, doe metered at 320 yards. Put the cross hairs on and blammo, she didn't run, just turned slowly and I knew that she was hit.

I walked up to where she was last seen, no blood, no flopping around signs in the snow and no deer hmmmm I say. Well there she was about 15 yards away hiding in the tall grass on her way to the bright light in the sky so I completed the hunt. When I skinned her out the bullet went in the right side just behind the shoulder with a 3" entrance hole. Due to the angle the bullet travelled through one lung, the paunch and into the left ham.

The odd thing with the bullet, that was recovered, was there was no expansion/mushroom effect. the front third of the bullet was gone leaving the 7mm shank. The bullet worked for its intended use but I was expecting it to mushroom out better. It was the Winchester 150 grain Super X Softpoint.
 
luftmech said:
So I managed to take a doe yesterday with my new to me 7WSM, nice sunny day, no wind, fresh 2" of snow, doe metered at 320 yards. Put the cross hairs on and blammo, she didn't run, just turned slowly and I knew that she was hit.

I walked up to where she was last seen, no blood, no flopping around signs in the snow and no deer hmmmm I say. Well there she was about 15 yards away hiding in the tall grass on her way to the bright light in the sky so I completed the hunt. When I skinned her out the bullet went in the right side just behind the shoulder with a 3" entrance hole. Due to the angle the bullet travelled through one lung, the paunch and into the left ham.

The odd thing with the bullet, that was recovered, was there was no expansion/mushroom effect. the front third of the bullet was gone leaving the 7mm shank. The bullet worked for its intended use but I was expecting it to mushroom out better. It was the Winchester 150 grain Super X Softpoint.
Click to expand...

I'm not a big hunter by any means, but when I got my 30.06 a few years ago I picked up a box of Winchester X to sight it in.

A guy at the club told me they are a 'shoot and track' bullet, meaning they weren't efficient at dropping an animal.

Anyway, I never used them for hunting. The Remington Core Lokt, 180 grain, PSP I've used for Moose drops 'em fine.
 
luftmech said:
The odd thing with the bullet, that was recovered, was there was no expansion/mushroom effect. the front third of the bullet was gone leaving the 7mm shank. The bullet worked for its intended use but I was expecting it to mushroom out better. It was the Winchester 150 grain Super X Softpoint.
Click to expand...

What did the remaining piece weigh? Sounds like it did mushroom and the petals broke off, leaving the tail end intact.


Mark
 
I'm not a 7 WSM expert but know 270 WSM very well and a 270 WSM 150gr load is meant for moose not deer!
You might have taken a too heavy, too tough bullet for the game you intended to hunt.

Alex
 
buddy of mine shot a little white tail buck with his 300 WM with 150 grain Winchester X at about 80 yards. Quartering, it turned the lungs, heart and liver into soup, nicked the guts, and came to rest inside the hide on the far side, with a typical mushroom shape. It was all soft squishy stuff - no bone - for about 20-30" of penetration. The deer didn't make it far, but I'd think twice about using this bullet on anything bigger, and I have doubts as to its effectiveness if it had stuck bone.
 
What did you expect? Its a cheap, bottom of the line bullet. Buy higher end if you want better performance. I recommend the 160 gr. Nosler Accubond. Federal Premium loads it. I have shot many deer with it. Great performance. Also, cant go wrong with a Partition.
 
The remaining bullet was 98 grains, like I had said the bullet did work as it dropped the deer with deep penetration. I was just not impressed that the bullet had come apart in the way that it did with no mushrooming. I believe that it musroomed " momentarily " and then vaporized.

It could be that this is my first magnum and I am used to finding .308 rounds that are nicely peeled back.
 
Your 7mm 150gr was probably going at around 2300 fps at 300 yards which is the limit of reliable expansion with non-premium bullets.
The best all-round load is the 140 Trophy Bonded Tip at 3200 fps which still runs at 2600fps at 300 yards and will expand very well even under 2000fps.

It will cost you 60$ a box of 20 rounds but the Trophy Bonded Tip bullet is better than the excellent Accubond and Barnes TSX.

Alex
 
Wierd, my family only shoots Winchester Super-X .30-06 180 gr. and 7 rem mag. 175 gr. The .06 drops moose with authority and the 7 mows deer over like a train. Using big magnums may be pushing traditonal bullets faster than they can handle, causing fragmentation and rapid energy transfer that destroys the bullet. Thats where premium bullets really shine, try some of the mentioned premium loads and I'm sure you'll see better results.
 
Have to remember that no one bullets performance on any target can be 100% predictable.

It may work well on your next kill or repeat the same performance, there is no way to tell.

Some variables can be enhanced but in the end we do not know for sure what that projectile will do upon impact.
 
I once picked up a box of winchesters each for my .308 and my 6.5x55 and can't say how the winchesters perform on game as I have never used them. My .308 groups federal blue box 150's and rem core lokt 180's around 1"-1.5" at 100 yds. I tried 180 gr. win. silver tips and got a sweet 8"-10" group. I then picked up my open sighted 6.5x55 and put 5 core lokts into about 3", the 140gr. winchesters were not even on the paper. My buddy was shooting winchesters in his 6.5 beside me and we both noticed a difference in noise (loudness) and recoil from one shell to the next from the same box. I know all kinds of people who would not shoot winchester ammo if it was free.
 
I don't think many more expensive bullets would make a diff., pure copper bullets tend to shed their small petals and Nozzzler partitions tend to loose the front portion on contact.
 
AlexF said:
I'm not a 7 WSM expert but know 270 WSM very well and a 270 WSM 150gr load is meant for moose not deer!
You might have taken a too heavy, too tough bullet for the game you intended to hunt.

Alex
Click to expand...

Not that heavy a bullet for caliber, and if it was a tough bullet it would not have separated. Especially on a long range shot.
 
It is totally normal with regular cup and core bullets to have the mushroom break off. They usually break off at the canalure near the end of the primary wound tract. The remaining shank can go a bit further, sometimes quite a bit due to the small frontal area. This is very similar to what a Nosler Partition does and it is a good thing.

Another thing that can happen is if the bullet tumbles the front section of the bullet can break away under the high RPM. All it takes is one little piece of grass or twig to cause a bullet to tumble.
 
A stabilized bullet will not tumble from hitting a small branch; it may deflect but not tumble. It would take something to seriously deform it and slow it down before it's rotational inertia could be overcome. Even then, what is more common with a barely stabilized round (twist too slow), or destabilized (key holing), is turning 180 degrees on impact to penetrate backwards.

Whatever the case, I would not get too attached to a bullet (for big or medium game) that had a propensity to only retain 65% bullet weight on a soft target. Especially at over 3 football fields away. Too many good bullets that would easily out perform this. Even in the cheap isle.
 
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