.30 165 gr. Sierra HPBT Gameking for Deer?

For hunting use ,in some States , the Matchking is not a legal bullet to use . What caliber are you shooting (308 ;'06 ;300 WM) ? The next question is what twist is your barrel ? All these things will make a difference when selecting a bullet in any weight . A friend came to me with a Savage 99 lever gun in .308 . Wanted some hand loads for deer & elk .I knew his rifle shot 3" groups with 150 gr and 4.5 " with 180's . The barrel was not marked with a twist rate so in went the cleaning rod w/ jag & patch. Turns out to be a 1/12 twist .He wont get much velocity with the 180 so I sug. 165's . We cleaned up the bore & loaded Hornady SPBT ,Nosler Ballastic tips , and Nosler Partitions , all in 165 gr over Varget powder . We shot 5 round groups to see how well they would group . Hornady suprised us at .400" . Nosler Ballistics were at 1.25" & Partitions at 1.11 " ! Well the Hornady's dropped a deer right now at 230 yds . But even more impressive was the 935 lb. bull elk that he dropped with 1 round thru the heart ! It was dead befor it hit the ground . That shot was I think 125 yds. There is a photo of it on TED NUGENT'S sight photo #183 . Hope this is of a small help.
 
I'd second the Hornady thumbs up. Never yet used 'em in the heavier bullets - always at .243, but experience with those show excellent results.

To get an exact point of aim/impact relative to that Sierra 168 MatchKing, I'd suggest some time at the bench. Only way to be sure is to actually go through the motions & arrive at a loading that doea duplicate that MatchKing.

In the meantime, a quick bit of playing with some ballistic software & relaoding manuals, I see that the 168 MatchKing has a BC of .475 - our starting point & of course, that varies depending on velocities, etc.

Sierra's 165 SPBT is .474 & their HPBT is at .375 (a real surprise to me, but that what's listed). Obviously, their SPBT is much closer.

Speer has a 165 SPBT at .477, Hornady's 165 at .459 & the Nosler BallisticTip right at that "magic" .475 number.

Again, the Nosler 165 BT has been my most accurate bullet - bar none (I did a .640" 3X group at 200 yards with a wildcat TC - 14" bbl'd handgun with that bullet) & the onliest deer shot with it (poor thing) took many hits to die. It wasn't the fault of the bullet. Every one (4 shots from 200 - 50 yards) performed flawlessly, "mushroomed" & ended up at the farside hide - that deer just did not want to die is my only explanation. This at starting velocities of 2400 fps. Since I was "proving" out an elk bullet at these lower velocities, I wanted much better penetration & went to the Barnes XBTs. The accuracy isn't there (but the pentration most certainly is) - doubtful that what's you're looking for as a MatchKing substitute ... anyway, I digress.

Depending on the muzzle velocity - that's what you'll get for BCs & the like & your 168 approximation. Looks like that Sierra SBPT GameKing's right on the money.
 
I have been using 165 gr Nosler BT's for over a dozen years, and have yet to recover a single bullet or piece of jacket in my VS 308. One dime sized hole in and one silver dollar sized hole out. Cheated one year with a silver box of 150 grain soft nosed Winchester and it bounced off the shoulder-cranked in a handloaded 165 (reloader 15) and broke that same shoulder, and bullet exited after breaking a rib on the off side-100 yard shot. Found out the Hornady 150 and 165 is just as accurate as the Nosler at half the price. Will try them this year to see if they work, but you know there is going to be a 165 grain BT as the second round in the mag.
 
David, my father used only the 150-grain Hornady in his '06 from WW II to 1974, when he pretty much "hung it up" from hunting. TLOK how many deer he killed...

:), Art
 
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