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I use Winchester 130 gr Ballistic Silvertips in my 270. I shot an 8 pointer with them right behind the front shoulder. The lungs and heart were like jelly, but I lost very little meat. The bullet did not hit any bones, and the buck ran about 100 yards and collapsed. He was about 100 yards away when I hit him.
IMO, they worked fine, and I'll continue using them. These are the newer generation BTs, and I like them.

I use 150 gr Winchester ballistic silver tips in my 300WSM and have been very pleased with close and long range shots on whitetails whether neck shot or elswhere. Both these deer were neck shot. One at 40 yards and one at 150 yards. One is on the wall. both dropped in their tracks.
 

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I had an issue with one not performing last season early on, but it was a fluke, I shot high and back a little, the bullet went between two ribs and came out between two others, never expanded.

Later I shot a big hog in the boiler room and dropped him where he stood. 5 minutes later I killed two smaller hogs with one shot. All of them were 165grn BTS from my 30.06.

Last day of the season I shot a small deer that was acting weird. He moved as I shot and I hit him high in the back requiring a follow-up shot. The follow-up was in the left eye, the entire right side of the skull and all of the contents inside of it were gone. Sprayed all over the place. That was from a 7mm08 with a 150grn BT.

They work but cause some devastation if you encounter bone.
 
Nozler Ballistic Tip Bullets

You should get better results with the Rem. Cor-Lock bullets, they wont deestroy meat like the NBT, if you don't handload also try the Fed. 165 Noz. sollid base loads. The solid base is a better bullet than BT.
 
You should get better results with the Rem. Cor-Lock bullets, they wont deestroy meat like the NBT, if you don't handload also try the Fed. 165 Noz. sollid base loads. The solid base is a better bullet than BT.
I read that the newer nosler BT's (according to nosler) are supposed to replace the solid base' It hasn't been around for years. It was a great bullet that I used to take several deer and elk with. It should never been dropped from production IMHO.:( Haven't killed anything but paper with the BT. Shot a few deer with the old style BT about 10 years ago or so and really made a mess outa them!
 
I shot my first bull elk in Colorado with my 30-06 and 165 gr Nosler Ballistic Tip. I only got 1 shot into the bull at 200 yards while he was quartering away from me. He dropped as if he slipped on a banana or something. Stood up and walked away into the trees. I watched and waited about 30 minutes before going in to find him. There he was. The bullet puntured his lungs and he bled internally. Good thing I waited a bit before going in after him. He'd a ran off if I'd trotted in after him right away. I've also shot several mule deer using my 30-06 & Nosler BT's. I've shot my biggest mule deer with a 130 gr Nosler BT in my 270. At first I thought I missed him. I went and found a blood trail and located him just 50 yards from where he was shot. I think the BT's will do ok for deer. They're accurate enough. You just gotta make sure you make a well placed shot on the animal.
 
I've used many different cal. BTips and decided that for bigger game i would use tougher bullets. I will say that everyone I've shot has been awesome in the accuracy dept. I like how the Accubonds perform. The only gun I'm using BT's in is my 22-250. The BT's I've used or seen used on big game would have been better off with reduced loads even in the .30 cal. There's much to be had from a bigger slower moving bullet when it comes to game you want to eat.
 
Just reviewed this thread, from start to finish, and I notice that the posters with the worst experiences with the Ballistic Tip bullets were using magnum rifles. The folks that were using 'standard' or non magnum rifles, seemed to give the bullet a better review.
There might be a lesson there, in regard to the best application of Ballistic Tips bullets.
 
No thanks, there are to many other high quality bullets out there that perform more consistently on deer sized game.
I love to punch paper with them though, they are very accurate. Then I will sometimes go with the Accubonds, because they hold together much better.
 
Accuracy can be amazing with NBT's due to the bullet design. The tightest groups I have shot were out of the .270win using 130gr NBT's at max data loads (R22). Deadly medicine for whitetails. Have yet to see this bullet fail to bring down a deer. Hits like a lightning bolt. I love 'em.
 
I've killed about 20 deer with 165 BTs out of my .30-06 and never lost one. This includes a couple front quartering shoulder shots on nice animals. I have mostly loaded them down to fairly mild .308 levels though simply because I found a particular sweet spot with one load accuracy wise. I think this fact has improved terminal performance over what full blown 2800+ fps loads would yield. I would not use this bullet with any flavor of .300 Mag! Go with the Accubonds in that case.
 
Very accurate in every caliber I've shot them in. Very fragile in every caliber I've shot them in. 243 Win. 257 Roberts and 300 Win mag. light or heavy for weight, way to violent expansion and to destructive for big game or any edible game. I switched to the Hornady SST or flex tip when I want a plastic tipped spritzer, I never looked back, good dependable expansion and penetration without worrying about massive destruction of unnecessary meat loss and fragmentation! EXCELLENT ACCURACY!!
 
I loaded up some 130 Grain BT's in my 270 Weatherby Magnum, 3 shots under a nickle, however I am scared to use them on Whitetails. They are flying a little under 3300 feet per second. I loaded up some 140 Grain Accubonds for deer season. They are having similar performance at the range.
 
I have often shot trophy class fallow deer in Australia with 130 grain Ballistic Tips from a 270 Winchester. I shot the biggest fallow buck I have heard about this year 2011 with a 130 grain Nosler ballistic tip. For a side on shot in the heart lung area they are spectacular killers on fallow, chital and rusa. If you might need to shoot through much tissue as in a going away angle shot I would not trust them. For general use on trophy deer including red deer I prefer 150 grain Hornady Interlok. You do not need Interbonds or similar except for Elk and the very tough sambar. I prefer to use a 338 Winchester magnum on those bigger deer. All of the above deer are available in Australia as well as the little hog deer. All deer in Australia have been introduced. I have shot the grand slam (all record class) of Australian deer three times over 40 years of hunting them. I have never shot white tail. There has been an explosion in the deer population of Australian deer in the last four years. we need keen Americans down here to help us shoot them. See my article on momentum on this web site. I write a weekly column for: <HUNTANDSHOOT.COM.AU>
 
The only NBT's I have used are the 55gr. .224's from my .223 Sav M12 LRPV at the range. Most accurate bullet I've ever used. Even more accurate than the 52 gr. Sierra Matchking HPBT. But, I haven't hunted with them before. I'll give them a try on 'yotes this winter. It is true the partitions are less accurate, but for a hunting bullet, they are hard to beat.
 
I loaded up some 130 Grain BT's in my 270 Weatherby Magnum, 3 shots under a nickle, however I am scared to use them on Whitetails. They are flying a little under 3300 feet per second. I loaded up some 140 Grain Accubonds for deer season. They are having similar performance at the range.
Been there, done that (with a standard 270Win.) and you are making the right choice. For anything you plan to eat, and particularly if you prefer a good exit wound every time, the Accubond is a much better choice than the BT's. As the velocity comes down the BT's perform better, IME.
 
Nosler ballistic tips

Used them in a couple of different calibers (an .06 was one) for deer and antelope. Plus a friend of mine used them also on the same hunts. Too much expansion, too much disingration, wastes too much meat. Even shot in the heart, lung area, the shoulder, backstrap was bloodshot. They are very accurate though. The best hunting bullet on the market is the barnes tsx as far as performance goes. They out penetrate any bullet (possibley the exception would be a "solid") and they do not cause a lot of bloodshot area because they do not disinigrate. They were the first to manufacture the totally copper bullets. You can spend more money on other bullets, but you can not buy a better hunting bullet.
 
I read that the newer nosler BT's (according to nosler) are supposed to replace the solid base' It hasn't been around for years. It was a great bullet that I used to take several deer and elk with. It should never been dropped from production IMHO.:( Haven't killed anything but paper with the BT. Shot a few deer with the old style BT about 10 years ago or so and really made a mess outa them!
The original ballistic tip was just the solid base with the plastic tip added. That tip caused them to expand quicker and more violently (which is why you still hear repeated horror stories of them blowing up). Nosler went back and thickened the jacket on them and on some very much more so to the point up to 60% of the weight is in jacket. I see solid bases on sale from time to time, one of these day's I'll buy some and give a try.

Just reviewed this thread, from start to finish, and I notice that the posters with the worst experiences with the Ballistic Tip bullets were using magnum rifles. The folks that were using 'standard' or non magnum rifles, seemed to give the bullet a better review.
There might be a lesson there, in regard to the best application of Ballistic Tips bullets.
Spot on. Way to many hunters aren't choosing the right bullet for their cartridge then reporting failures. You can't expect a BT (which is a cup and core bullet) to peform admirably when it's being pushed outside it's design parameters.
 
Spot on. Way to many hunters aren't choosing the right bullet for their cartridge then reporting failures. You can't expect a BT (which is a cup and core bullet) to peform admirably when it's being pushed outside it's design parameters.
I have to agree totally. I have had good performance with them. I did have penetration issues in a 25-06 when shooting deer at 50 yards or less. When shot at longer ranges the bullet performed flawlessly and I did not have a ton of meat damage. I handload now for the 25-06 and have slowed the bullet down some. I am shooting Hornady Interlock. They had the same problem when pushing them at or over max loading. I feel sure the 25 caliber ballistic tip would perform fine at shorter ranges if I slowed them down some.

If your shooting a magnum caliber you should be shooting a more heavily constructed bullet. I doubt Nosler would recommend a ballistic tip in a 300 Wim mag if shooting Moose or big bear. It is common sense.


Darin
 
I I doubt Nosler would recommend a ballistic tip in a 300 Wim mag if shooting Moose or big bear. It is common sense.


Darin
Nosler just wants to sell bullets. They used to say the Ballistic tip took over for the old cup and core Nosler boat tail. It doesn't. It's a great varmint bullet in my book, the Accubond is a much better game bullet.

RJ
 
I think the Nosler BT is a great bullet. It is fairly economical to shoot, and usually gives me nice small groups. Nosler is putting out some consistent bullets in their BT manufacturing process. Mostly, that in the 165 gr weight in 30-06. But when I'm done shooting paper, partitions - or some other more-stout bullet - gets loaded up, or bought, and sighting in is again done when I'm after big game.

Beefing up the BT for certain calibers was the right step; it lessens the failure on big game. It is still a 'hollowpoint' when that tip is removed, however. Pull a tip off and take a look. Great bullet for certain uses. Compared to the partition or many others for big game, no hard choice for me.
 
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