Nosler Ballistic Tip vs. Hornady SST

Nosler Ballistic Tip vs Hornady SST

  • Total voters
    58
I'm with Clark, in that I trust the BT's. I've shot over 200 whitetail deer with BT's. Most in the 270 and in the last couple of years in the 260. If the bullet didn't work to my satisfaction, I'd be using something else. When possible, I put it behind the shoulder and shut down the lungs. When used like that, it's rare that I don't get an exit. As to how far away the deer were, that varied from 30 yards to about 400 yards. Worked every time.

I do try to avoid quartering shots, since an exit doesn't always happen.

And one thing to mention. In my 260, I've been shooting a 100 gr BT for a couple of years. They do fine on coyotes, pigs, and deer, but the 120 grainer does a better job. I shot a big hog about a month ago. About 250 pounds or a bit less. The 100 grainer did him in, but I had to plug him one more time before he could make it to the briar patch. Got an exit on the first bullet. I put it behind the shoulder and it had to travel through a very thick boar hog. Range was about 80 yards. MV is about 3100 fps.
 
I never voted, when I posted my original reply.
But, given that I currently have fewer than 100 Nosler BTs in my stash (.308" CT BTs), but there are over 600 Hornady SSTs on hand (6mm, .277", .308") and another 1,000 coming from Midsouth (6mm); I figured that I should at least cast my vote that way for the poll. ;)
 
It's been asked already but I will reiterate... why would you EVER target any ungulate on the shoulder? What is the fatal area here?
As far as a non "ideal" shot, why is it then ok?

I believe that it's a bad habit to get into and if you happen to expand your hunting to include elk & moose... you will be wounding game.
 
You dont want either of those bullets as they are made for expansion. If your going to shoot them in the shoulder you want a more solid bullet. ANY normal solid bullet will do. Ballistic tips of ALL kinds are nothing more than a hollow point plain and simple.

I shoot SST's. Shot many, many deer with 243 and 30-06 SST's with no problems whatsoever from 20yds to 600yds. But then again I dont waste the shoulder meat. I shoot them in the neck unless they're out past 350yds or so. Then its in the chest.

The one time I did shoot the shoulder with 243 SST was not pretty. It could have been WAY worse, but it was enough that I dont do that anymore. Besides, there something about a neck shot that is SUPER addictive.:cool:
 
reloader28
You dont want either of those bullets as they are made for expansion. If your going to shoot them in the shoulder you want a more solid bullet. ANY normal solid bullet will do. Ballistic tips of ALL kinds are nothing more than a hollow point plain and simple.
Click to expand...

The guys I hunt deer with use partition bullets and I use Ballistic tips.
They give me a bad time, and compare me to other hunters they know that use BTs, with poor personal hygiene.
I would tell them off but good, except I need them to help me drag my deer to the truck.
 
Thanks for the replies.

Thanks for the replies. I've decided I'm going pick up a couple of boxes(yes, I'm one of those lowly malcontents who doesn't handload;)). BTW I don't intend to shoot deer in the shoulder, but if there's a shot that requires me to shoot through the shoulder I would like my bullet to hold together enough to get the job done.
 
"always" and "never" are difficult to justify when referring to bullet performance.
Like I said, I've shot several deer with 165 BT from my old 30/06. At this point, I've not found reason to complain about penetration at any distance from 40-400 yards even on shoulder shots. There WILL be significant meat damage in my experience.
On the subject of shoulder shots: this is a viable option unless you're using a pip-squeak round. Some places I hunt I need the deer down right there. Sometimes a big buck doesn't offer the picture book broadside presentation. Either of these plus numerous other scenarios justify the loss of some shoulder meat to ensure killing the animal quickly and/or assuring simpler/easier retrieval.
 
I can't take this poll....

I have yet to shoot a deer with the Hornady SST in 30-06.

I can speak from personal experience though.

Shooting the Federal Premium with the 165gr. Nosler ballistic tip in 30-06, I have never had to track a deer. They were always laying right where I shot them.
One deer, I didn't realize that he was slightly quartering away. When bullet hit, picked him up, and threw him down, literally. I watched it through the scope.

Nice entry hole. No shoulder on opposite side. Blew it apart.
 
ballistic tips

I've no experience with SST's, and have only handloaded ballistic tips (no factory ammo).

Based on that, I can tell you that the B-tip 130/270, and 180/.30 (in a .308) has been an extremely accurate slug for me in a Rem 700 (.270) and a Savage hog rifle and Savage Scout in .308. They have been good killers, but are a "soft" bullet, so to speak, and will shed a good percentage of weight if recovered from an animal. Somebody will write in and tell us how much soon I bet. At least one scribe has called the b-tip the "ideal" deer bullet.

The early 180/.30 B-tips were a bit soft,and supposedly Nosler toughened them up a bit for those folks who might take on an elk. I have little doubt that a contemporary 180/.30 b-tip would punch through an average deer at the shoulders. I actually like the early, soft 180's for whitetails, but the old solid base, 100 pack slugs are near impossible to find these days. I have not shot any 150 or 165 b-tips at deer.

The 130/.270's behaved very sedately for me, I think one reason being that the impact velocities were low due to longer range and broadside lung shots with no real bone encountered. With the 22" tube on my rifle, I could not break 3000 fps at the muzzle (2875 +/-) with my best accuracy load, and at 200 yds or so, the bullets did not expand dramatically at all. But they did result in very dead deer. I did recover one of these longish .270's, a quartering away shot. The slug was just so much chewing gum ahead of the off shoulder, with an entrance at the onside diaphragm. Another very dead deer.

There's a lot of internet chatter about the b-tip being too soft and resulting in lost game. Got a buddy that slams them regularly. But much of that I think is bad shooting.
 
I'm with bamaranger. I shot the old Nosler Solid Base Boattail 130 grainers in my 270 until Nosler quit selling them. Because they were so accurate, I transitioned to the original Ballistic Tips, which were even more accurate. They were, I think, messier on the receiving end than the old SBBT was, but they killed the deer at least as well. I sure didn't call Nosler to ask that they toughen up the bullet, but I didn't mind that they did. The tougher one works just as well on deer, and it really is an extremely accurate bullet. I've killed hundreds of deer with BT's. If it didn't work as advertised, I would quit using it.

I think that I just might have 20 or so old Nosler 130 gr SBBT's in an original box. I quit using them when I couldn't buy more, so I never used up all I had.
 
I've read a lot of reviews at bulletreviews.com , midwayusa, cabela's etc., and generally the consensus is that the Nosler ballistic tip is very explosive / non-penetrative, like most ballistic tips, while the SST seems to be "tougher than the average ballistic tip" - a bit more penetrative and a good balance of penetration and expansion (though by no means as penetrative as a true premium bullet).

However, NEITHER are what I would dub "premium" - To me, "premium" means a bonded or partitioned bullet that penetrates extremely well. Cheap soft points and ballistic tips alike are lumped together as "non-premiums", since they perform roughly the same on an terminal ballistic basis (albeit with the BTs slightly better externally).

If you want premium, go with an Interbond, Accubond, Accubond LR, Partition, TBBC, etc. The Interbond from Hornady is a neat concept because it has the same BC as the equiv. SST - just costs more due to the bonding / performance.
 
There's no way I can say this without sounding like a snot. But... you've read a lot of reviews and based your opinion of Ballistic Tips on what you've read. I've shot a lot of deer with them and based my opinion on what happened. Yes, they are destructive, though I wouldn't call them explosive. I shoot deer in the lungs (95% of the time) and the deer die rather quickly. I most always get a through-and-through and a good blood trail if they go more than 40 yards. As for whether or not they are a premium bullet, I don't really consider them so. I consider the Gameking and the Ballistic Tip to be similar. And I'd put the CoreLokt in that same group. Way back when, I used the CoreLokt quite a bit before I started reloading.

So yes, I'm a fan of the Ballistic Tip. I can't compare it to the SST since I don't have any real-world experience with them. I have some loaded up for the grandson's 308 but he'll grab my 260 and scamper into the woods with it. The only thing I can say about Ballistic Tips in the 260 is that the 120 grainers are better at putting big pigs and deer down than the 100 grainers are. The 130 grainer in the 270 puts them down even faster than the 120's in the 260.

I have found that the Ballistic Tip varmint bullets are nowhere near as tough as the hunting versions. Anything less than about 100 grains is going to be a varmint version of that bullet. I had to quit shooting big pigs with the 55 gr BT's, because they got into the briar patch before they died. Not good. But...I can surely tell ya that if you want to knock a coyote flat, use that 40 gr BT in your 223 or your 22-250 or 220. It's like a laser beam.
 
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I've used both on game, they both work well and perform almost identical. My vote goes SST because they're cheaper and shoot very well.
 
Gents,
How does ballistic tip (180 gr / 308) will perform on hogs / boars? 200 pounds or more?

For shoulder shots, can an exit wound and blood trail be expected?
 
Jolly1, probably not. The Acubond however would be more realistic for pass-through shots on a hog....and then there is the Partition which would have a better chance than all three...
 
If you want pass thru, then hooligan's suggestions are good. Many years ago I shot a hog of around 400 pounds. Used a 270 and a 130 gr Nosler Ballistic tip (the pre-toughened version). It was a medium power load with 4064. Killed the hog on the spot, but the bullet ended up in that slab of gristle or cartilage on the far side of the hog. Just recently I shot a 250ish pound boar with my 260, using a 100 gr Nosler Ballistic Tip. Had to shoot him twice to keep him from reaching the briar patch, and only one bullet exited the hog. The first bullet was well placed and would have killed him, but he'd have died in a thorny place I did not want to enter. So if you want superb accuracy, go with the Accubond. If you want superb penetration, go with the Partition. I shot through a medium sized sow with a 60 gr Partition in my 223, and it went, for lack of a better term, long-ways.
 
I don't think it matters much . If buying factory ammo use the one that's more accurate. I have trigger time with both . Still use NBT in a 308 and sst in my 7mm. Had to many quick kills with both. never had a deer move any more than 2 or 3 steps almost all heart lung shots and a fee neck shots. never shoot for the shoulder. Almost never have a pass thru. Shots from 20 feet to 410 yards. Had some frag fairly well with both but mostly heavily expanded with 75% weight retained. The 308 are both 125gr loaded down and 150gr nbt at 2800fps for both , 7mm 139gr sst at 3210fps. For hogs I would use a accubond in a heavier for caliber bullet. 165 in 30 cal and 150gr in 7mm.
 
You may have different results with the heavier bullet. However, I've killed 2 deer while using 95gr SSTs in my .243. The first was a 25 yard broadside shot with perfect placement behind front leg. Entry hole .243". Exit hole .5-.75". Watched it bleed out as it ran about 25 yards and crashed. This was a small 110lb cull buck (Oklahoma deer).

The 2nd was a large (for NE Ok) buck which dressed at about 140lb. He was 176 yards out quartering toward me and was down hill a bit. The shot entered just above and inside the shoulder between shoulder and neck. He dropped instantly then got up and moved about 10 yards where he crashed. No exit wound.

On the first one, I didn't find the heart when I field dressed him. On the second, one lung had a 1 1/2" hole shredded through it. I did not find the bullet on the second deer. We also did not find any bullet fragments while processing. That sucker just dissentegrated.

In my experience, the SSTs open VERY rapidly. If you're shooting through the rib cage or soft tissue, I would say go for it. But, if you hit solid bone like shoulder blades of hogs, vertebrae of any animal, etc, I think you'll blow out a large surface wound and the animal will get away. I'm going to Remington CoreLokt after these SSTs are shot up. I may go ahead and by CoreLokt for deer and keep my SSTs for yotes.
 
I shot this doe with 165 grain Nosler BT out of a 30-06 from about 60 yards. The entry hole was behind the shoulder on the other side. The exit hole in the shoulder you can see in the pic.

 
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