Same thing can be said for hunting with a black powder rifle chucking a large lump of lead quite slowly, the big leaky hole theory pretty much works every time.
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Well you've got winter coming and those short dark wet cold days, so good chance to read up on the different killing mechanisms.
Huge amount written on the various terms thrown around on forums - hydrostatic shock, cavitation, etc etc. It's well worth doing as its very informative and helps weed out forum bullshit and marketing hype.
There are some cool videos on how different bullets kill - fragmenting, controlled expansion, etc. Broad head arrows are different again. I think there's a lot of ignorance out there about broadhead arrows.
The biggest problem with the topic is that for every statement of "fact", someone will come along and try and disprove it with a tale and a couple of photos. Neither of the wound experts I'm thinking of will readily accept the use of 6mm on red deer sized game, so years of NZFS cullers were obviously all doing something wrong with their puny and unethical 5.56mm!
At the end of the day, there is no substitute for a knowledge of anatomy, and shot placement. Especially the role of the autonomic part of the central nervous system - what it does, where it is, and what happens when you put a bullet through the main autonomic nerves in the thoracic cavity. Put a .223 bullet of the correct construction and velocity in amongst the autonomic CNS, the animal is dead in short order. End of story.
Where this falls down in the use of the lighter varmint bullets, which is why this thread has been good to review the importance of (a) twist, (b) weight, (c) construction, (d) terminal velocity.
Greetings All,
At one point NZFS adopted .270 Win as their standard animal control cartridge, mid 1970's I think. CAC made head stamped ammo for them. This was all written up in the hunting mags at the time. I found two discarded NZFS head stamped cases on the range, both expanded by egregious over loads. Whether these were factory or hand loads I don't know. Either is possible knowing CAC's later problems.
Regards Grandpamac.
Hmmm.. @grandpamac.’’CAC problems’?
When did they occur and what were they?
I used to religiously use CAC 180 hollow-points in my Finnwolf with no issues ever.
Greetings Finnwolf,
I was referring to the High Flyer shotgun cartridges that were blamed for the destruction of a number of shotguns. I believe that CAC paid out to replace a number of these. Like you I used CAC cartridges, and later cases, without complaint. Still do for cases. I think their quality tapered of a bit towards the end.
Regards Grandpamac.
Gidday there Grandpamac, Yeah the .270 was supplied along with .308 at that time but .222 was used rather than the bigger calibers although one of my bosses grabbed a .270 that was on offer at the time and he was not culling,rather an office type.
The Forest Service offered the Thar hunters in my area brand new CF2,s in .270. Those things were far too heavy and bloody noisey plus the weight of ammo, hence the .222's being far more popular. When I worked in the Marlborough district They offered new Sako vixens in .222. Cullers moved around a lot from one district to another and at the end of the day the .222 was still very popular regardless of animal size.
cheers
My apologies NewbieZAR for getting side tracked :) on certain subjects I find my bleating can sort of keep on keeping on eh.
47gr of nicely mushroomed 80gr ELDM recovered from under the offside skin of a red after penetrating shoulder, spine, lungs and opposite ribs at 250 V0 2800fps.
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you bleat away old chap...youve done the hard yards and shot more animals than most of us will ever get sights on....the years of REAL experience can not be discounted....you KNOW and us younger folk just think we know.
you will have forgotton more than a lot of us will ever learn.
.223 neck shot couple of nights ago (graphic).
85 yards. 77 grn Sierra @ 2900 fps.
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Mmmm... Questiond, if these guys you talking about using a 223 and head shooting everything with the exception of the roar why cant they head shoot stags in the roar with the 223??
Clearly the range is even closer so if they have no problem head shooting deer grnerally then surely they could do it in the roar up close....just saying
I can't comment on the high powered CAC ammo but when I started on the Pest Destruction Board in the late 70's the old Rabbit Board 12 g shotgun ammo was alright.
The 22 ammo both sub and super was shocking. Subs would quite often go off like a super which was bad news especially when we were on der farms and needed to be as quite as possible so as not to Spook the animals. Super sonic ammo sometimes went off like a 22 mag or other times like a sub. One night me mate had one that barely made a noise and on inspection found the bullet stuck in the barrel, luckly he checked before firing the next round. Back then we used to get the CAC in a plain white box for subs and supers were marked SR5, interesting times. Sorry got a bit side tracked From 223 on deer thread.
Can't speak for anyone else but personally have used a 223 for years during spring summer months and off a machine. Always go a bigger cal in the rut because head or neck shooting with a 223 doesn't help if you want to keep the capes.
Still shot a fair few stags in the rut, meat hunting non trophy areas with 223 no problem at all. Use an even smaller cal now for filling the freezer but never in a rush to do that and rarely shoot much over 50 yrds.
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also...if the stag of a lifetime is departing and the only shot on offer is fair up his arse...well the 308 or mighty poohseventy will anchor him for finishing but .223 as good as it is will struggle.
larger margin for error with a rushed shot.....the .224 centrefires ARENT for rushed shots....
I used a 1/8 twist 223 on deer pretty regularly for 9 years, generally with controlled expansion monolithics. I had a couple of heavier calibers at the time but I normally chose the 223, as I’m a meat hunter more than anything. I purchased it as a bit of an all rounder for varminting and meat hunting (fallow and smaller reds at shorter ranges). It filled that role pretty well but I don’t think the 223 is a great choice as a stand alone deer rifle. If a nice fat red spiker wanders out onto a clearing 250yd away, right on dusk and there’s no opportunity to get closer, I want a caliber that will reliably flatten that animal with a shoulder shot. So that means a 6mm minimum. Do yourself a favour and get a 243 instead
I agree, slightly, If I only could have one rifle it would be a 6.5mm Fact is you can run 100gr pills easy as which will do everything a .243 will do but you can run 147s to shoot shit wayyyy out there. Plus how many people do you know that want to run heavy .243 rounds????
IMO the 6.5 (.260) is what the .243 should have been.
With these neck shots and the .223 the margin for error can be pretty slim.
This was the other night too. You can see it was hit a bit high at 100 yards. Sighted in for 200 and I didn't allow for the plus 1.5". Could have been a miss - as it was it wasn't an instant kill. I still rate the .223 though.
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Are you going away from the coppers Bruce, for a while you said they were the bees knees?
@nor-west Im just a bullet slut :) I'm not using the Barnes at the moment because I need a duel load for wallaby and deer from the same rifle without too much mucking about. Barnes are too spendy for wallaby.
60 grain partition, 63 grain Speer, 64 grain Winchester, can you give these a run please, will work in a slower twist barrel at 22/250 speeds which is similar to your 223 speeds. :)
i use 64g winchester soft points and have never had a problem
Agree 100%. 6.5 is the sweet spot for great ballistics, low recoil, and moderate barrel wear. A 6.5x55, 260, Creedmoor, or 6.5x47 would all be very high on my list if I had to own just one rifle.
In regard to the 223 debate, many of us begin our hunting careers with reasonably hard hitting cartridges like a 7mm08, 308, 270 etc. And we soon come to realise that they are a bit overkill for shooting yearlings or spikers at shorter ranges. We start thinking about another rifle to add to the safe for our meat hunting endeavours; something that’s accurate, fun to shoot, with no recoil and a flat trajectory. So low and behold, a 223 finds it’s way into the safe. But I believe this is a mistake and most of us would be better served by a 243 for that role. Well that’s been my experience anyway
Love my 22.250 as it falls somewhere between the .223 and .243 and shoots flat too
I would not be using a Vmax on deer or goats. I have shot thousands of rabbits with them and a few goats...they explode. I have shot a plenty of goats and deer with a 55gr Sierra gamekings.
Last night. .223...363 yards
77 grn Sierra TMK. Exit pic.
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Better penetration and trauma with the 77 grn, but the 69 grn is pretty good too.
You will need a 1:8 twist for the 77grn. 1:9 is ok for the 69. Both will kill well with careful shoulder shots but the 77grn certainly penetrates a bit better. The beauty of the 77TMK is that they are designed for short AR15 type magazines so shoot very well at 2.3" from a Tika mag, whereas the 75 and 80 grn ELDM gobble up a lot of powder space. @gimp uses the .223 ELDM and knows a bit about them on deer.
I would have been quite happy shooting last night's hind in the shoulder - but had to be a smarty pants :)
Has anyone tried Hornady GMX projectiles in .223 or .243 on deer?
1:8, with modified mags that allow a longer OAL (Something like 65mm)
Here we have they key issue with .223.
Ive seen seventenths shoot on paper and he is a phenomenal shot.
“Competent” and “good” dont even start to describe it.
It sounds as if he can also shoot enough animals that he can let them walk any time.
The later posts here are mostly from older forum members and past masters.
This is not a calibre for the beginner or youth.
65gr SGK ,Fallow @247m ,hillar shot, broke both onside and offside legs took out both lungs and top of heart.
Expected to find it under the skin as couldn't find an exit on the hill but on skinning a few days later found it had just managed to exit.
Bit messy but it didn't argue the point at all.
It did well to exit after breaking both leg bones.
In
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Out
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Thats after I trimmed most the blood out so it didn't go off in the chiller!
Its not as bad as the 60grvmax tho I was surprised at the damage considering the range.
I think the fact it collected solid leg bone on impact contributed a lot vs a clean crease shot. Shot was to put it down on the spot and it did that.
Something like a 243win would be perfect for fallow and handle reds at sensible ranges too. One of the best in between cals for those animals I reckon. But realistically what ever you hit it with (hilar shot) at least one shoulder is usually fucked for meat anyway.
+1. The 223 is pretty effective when used sensibly, especially on fallow. But as soon as you run into a big red hind or spiker that’s spent most of its life gorging itself on good farm tucker, and it’s 250yd away and looking decidedly nervous, you’ll be feeling justifiably under gunned. Not so with a 243
The cullers in the NW Ruas or some of them preferred the 243 and had to trade ammo because the powers that be did not like the venerable 243 yet was a fantastic calibre for slip shooting in the river catchments. Yes some idiots [aged 18] hauled around the BSA CF2 270. A railway track would have been lighter but with a 130gr pill it certainly hammered deer. Some used them as a replacement for the 303 spinner. Gary Sutton shot 7 deer above the Ironbark hut on the tops next to Mokai Station in spring 1976 using a 222 which was quite a feat considering he normally used a 270 which was bigger than himself.This hill was adjacent to the clip on the Redstag timber dude and Alipate? were shooting in the saddle during Covid period.