Working on a better mouse trap
I’m always looking for the next better mouse trap. I have been trying to go to all lead free bullets for a while. I had mixed performance on game from Barnes, poor Performance from Lehigh as they slowed down…..and now I’m trying Cutting edge.
Here is some of my testing so far:
Working with the 44 mag BFR and 200 grain Cutting Edge Bullets. First round of load testing.
Shooting 75 yards which is the highest point of my bullet path for the zero I prefer to run. Plus at 75 yards the 4x leupold cuts the diamonds about perfect on the target.
All shots taken in the prone with a Holland rear bag. No front support.
All of the groups are within my margin of wobble in the supported prone. You cant just look at the lil gun group and think it’s got to be the best.
All groups are 5 shots except the 11fs.
Now onto velocity testing. These should all be between 1400-1500.
Later after checking velocities over a chrono I found all of them to actually be pretty slow…around 1200 fps. So I went back to the drawing board. The Cutting Edge bullets have minimal bore resistance so I decided to try the fastest powder that would fill the case to the base of the bullet….and perfect! 1780 fps with AA7 and a ragged hole!
I then took that newly gained knowledge and applied it to the 500 JRH BFR with the 340 Cutting Edge. AA7 got me to 1500 fps with that.
5 shots with the 500 JRH
AA7 also reduced my velocity spread to within 5fps in both guns.
I have been working on drop data with both and both are staying on 6-8” steel plates just fine to 200 yards. With the higher velocities the point blank range has been extended a great deal. Drop data for the 44 bellow.
We know fracturing bullet designs work and are proven in rifle calibers….we shall see shortly for the handguns. The accuracy is there and I have a pile of western big game tags in my pocket….
More to come as the season opens….Sept 15.
I know this thread is old but a question for you Chris. You stated above that you saw poor performance in the Lehigh Defense bullets as they slowed down. I am just wonder if that performance reduction was their groups falling apart or their performance on game? I've shot a bunch of deer with Lehigh's controlled fracturing bullets moving at subsonic velocity and have been really impressed with their terminal performance (accuracy isn't too shabby either) so reading your results piqued my interest.