Is being Dead on at 25 Yards good for deep timber hunting with a 150 Gr. 30-06 SPCL?

W

Will Beararms

New member
I have always sighted in dead on at 25 with a Remington 30-06 Soft Point Core-lokt hunting in thick pine fields and hardwood stands in South Arkansas at max ranges of 100 yards. Is this a good rule of thumb? Should I consider the 180 Grain for timber hunting? If so, is the 25 yard sight-in still a good number?

The reason I ask is that I have never lost a deer with the 150 Grain but I have had some run at ranges of 60-100 yards like they never got hit. Would the 180 Grain give me more umph?

I have noticed that the 30-30 150 grainer drops em' dead in the tracks but not so with the '06 in my experience. When you hunt deep timber, you need a load that will knock em' down before they get into a thicket----------------especially if it's an evening hunt. I have lost the 30-30 and gone back to the '06 so that I will have a gun that can be used to take any game in North America.

Thanks
 
This is only my opinion mind you, but it's very possible you're making such a clean hole at that short of a range, that the 30-06 is proving impractical. Even an SP might have trouble at 25-100yds. I've picked up 45ACP bullets off the ground that were shot into a tree at 25yds that weren't mushroomed at all.

At 25-100yds, you might want to try handloads. Seems to me if you load a slower velocity with the heavier 180gr, you might get short-range kills more frequently. Going with the extremely soft ballistic tip Nosler might help too. Try to mimmc the 30-30 cartridge.

I'm not much of a 30-06 user, so somebody else will have to help you out there.

If you were getting kills with the 30-30, why not just keep using the 30-30?
 
Id' agree with the above. Strictly a guess, but...the .30-30 has a flat-point bullet that perhaps transfers energy faster. The deer you're after are probably fairly small. Maybe the .30-06 bullet is all the way thru or mostly thru before opening. Try something that opens faster. You may have 2000# of energy going out the off-side.
 
If you're using iron sights, dead on at 25 yards is okay for your sort of hunting. If you're using a scope, it is common that dead on at 25 yards is two or three inches high at 100 yards, and again near dead on at 200.

For short range effectiveness in an '06 with a 150-grain bullet, the Sierra boat-tails open up rather quickly. (Same for the 165-grain, for that matter.) Another good bullet that seems to work well at all ranges is the Remington Bronze Point. I've had large exit wounds all the way out to 350 yards.

I don't know if Remington still has factory loadings in the Bronze Point, but Federal loads the Sierra bullets in some of their stuff. The Federal Premium High Energy has been chronographed at 3,150 ft/sec with a 165-grain Sierra HPBT from a 26" barrel. Good stuff! :)

Hope this helps,

Art
 
Usa a slug, really

Grab your 12 gauge shotgun and use a slug. At 25 yards, a shot through the shoulders with a standard, or Fosters, slug will knock down a deer. Try Federal Classic rifled slugs in 2 3/4. They are cheap enough to allow lots of practice. Mount a fiber-optic turkey sight and zero it at 50 yards.

I have switched over to a Hastings rifled barrel and scope on my 870 Wingmaster with Federal Barnes Expanders. These give more range and plent of oomph as well.

Seriously, if you want to put down a deer in the evening, use a slug through both front shoulders. The front legs won't work and you'll get massive bleed-out. For close-in hunting, why mess with a rifle when slugs are devastating close-in.

Sometimes "The Art of the Rifle" loses to the utility of the shotgun.

Later
 
150gr.30-06

You might want to try reloading some blunt nose bullets that are intended for 30-30 in your 06 or try a round nose bullet with a lot of lead exposed on the nose.. They should open up faster and dump the energy faster than a spire point or more pointed bullet does.
 
I have had problems with 308win bullets not opening. I was using 180grain Remington Corelocks. I switched to Winchester 180gr. Slivertips and they have never failed to open for me.

I have a Winchester Mod. 1895 leveraction in 30-06 that I am going to use this year. My choice of bullets is the Remington 220grain roundnose. They have a lot of lead exposed so I expect them to work well but time will tell.

The best deer dropper I have ever used is the 350 Rem. Mag. with 200grain roundnoses loaded to about 2700fps.
 
Thanks to all. I lost the lever since I prefer a bolt action and I do have shots over 150 yards walking to and from the pine fields and hardwood bottoms where the stands are located. I creep versus walking to a stand and as such I have often had shots on the way in to the stand. For this reason, I need a little more range than the 30-30 will deliver. I actually enjoy creeping in, stopping periodically and factor it in to the amount of time I want to spend actually up in the stand for evening hunts.

I will probably move up to the 180 grain this year for more oomph. I will be sure to post if I get a deer this year.

Thanks again.
 
For the '06, "Oomph" as such is far less importance than bullet performance. My two way-out-there deer were one-shot kills, at 350 and 450 yards. The first was a 150-grain Bronze Point; the longer shot was a Sierra 150-grain SPBT.

For shots in the general vicinity of 100 to 150 yards, the spitzer bullets don't seem as likely to blow up, compared to the boat-tails. The boat-tails will possibly expand better out around 300 or so yards, but not blow up out at that distance.

For more generalizing, the 180s are more useful if deeper penetration on heavier animals such as elk is the need. For deer, they're sort of gilding the lily.

FWIW, Art
 
As a fellow "short range woods" Ark'ie, I have found that the Federal Classic in either 180gr or 220gr RN are perfect for the close shots (especially the 220 at 2410 vel, it has over a ton of energy out past 100 yards).
Either one will do the close range work very nicely, I would just pick the one that grouped best for my rifle at 100 yards & never look back.

BTW: both also fly more than flat enough for a "point blank" shot out to 150 yards. k
 
For a factory load, I like the 168 grain winchester supreme silver ballistic tips. They may be the perfect whitail load for both close and long range. Good shooting, Weagle
 
Actually, I think I'd go for a 125-130 grain bullet.

You don't need a "brush-buster" & a decent shot in the boiler room ought to put 'em down right there & now. Shouldn't give up a single thing for a longer shot neither.
 
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