Help Support Long Range Hunting Forum
While I am not a big fan of hammer bullets. there is nothing wrong with them with the exception that you need to tune your loads to the bullet. not tune the load to the rifle. They are also inordinately expensive and you can get similar (maybe not exactly the same) performance from many other bullet designs that cost less and kill the game just as dead, providing you hit somewhere in the sweet spot. I've never had a deer complain that it was killed by a Sierra or Nosler bullet and not a Hammer. The deer don't care so why go specializing your rifle for Hammer bullets and make it impossible to accurately shoot others.
When you have enough post count to send me a PM, message me. I have 178s for you to try for a 1:10" barrel twist on my dime.
Curious if you've tried them. I find they are so easy to find a load for and not very picky about seating depth. And, do a great job making "Hammer pudding".
Actually I did a few years ago out of curiosity. Bought a box of 30 caliber and 270 bullets. The 30 caliber 165 gr Power Hammers did OK, accuracy wise but no better than the Noslers or Sierras that I normally use. In the 270 tried 124gr Hammer Hunters. In this case in my Tikka T3x with a 1/10 twist did not shoot as well as 130 or 140 gr Nosler Partitions. With the Hammer 124 gr Groups opened up from 0.60 MOA with the Noslers to 1.2 to 1.3 MOA. Price wise about the same as the Noslers.
Got what you're saying. Good luck
I don't know about what 30-06 you are selling, but suggest that perhaps you try different weights and powders. The attachment was shot with a Ruger 77, tang safety, 26 inch, 1:10 twist Lilja barrel. Note that the notation on the target is incorrect, the bullets are not 199gr Sledge Hammers they are the 199 grain Stone Hammer bullets. There is a difference in POI because of a scope adjustment. That load was getting around 2500fps+. Despite what some readers will say, I have found Hammers to be finicky for one reason or another. In my son's AR (.450 Bushmaster) we had an issue with pressure and had to decrease the load. We also had an issue with his AR with the bullets moving forward when cycling. So he reduced the buffer spring and we put a heavier crimp on the bullet. I have loaded the 223gr Stone Hammers in my 35 Whelen, only to find that I have to seat the bullets deeper, than the recommended COAL, to get them to chamber into my rifle. This was an unfortunate error on my part because I changed bullets just before a black bear hunt without any range time. I ordered them "last minute", the folks at Hammer did a great job getting the bullets shipped and out to me, my screw up there. Presently I have been "trying" to get their .452, 221gr Stone Hammer Bushmaster bullets to feed in my Ruger Hawkeye rifle. This rifle will feed anything that I put it in, but......this bullet. I believe that the ogive is a little blunter thus giving me the feeding issue. I am "not" selling the rifle, I "am" working on the rifle to get it to feed. Seating depth and polishing the feed ramp and removing all of the receiver burrs are on the the bench right not. This .452 bullet with a weight of 221grains in the .450 Bushmaster is the perfect weight that turns the Bushmaster into a formidable black bear cartridge. For me it is the perfect weight/velocity bullet for the cartridge at 2500fps out of the Hawkeye. The second attachment is a 50 yard target that was recently fired with the Hawkeye. The top three shots are Barnes 250gr TTSX bullets, the bottom six are a combination of Hornady black 250 grain bullets (3 rounds) and of the Hammer 221gr Stone Hammer bullets (3 rounds). I was glad to find that the Hornady Black 250gr bullets shot same POI as the 221gr Hammer bullets. I cannot explain the horizontal stringing, probably the loose nut behind the trigger??
So what is your point? I don't refuse to try anything, but when what I am trying does not work up to expectations, I don't continue to throw money away trying to make things work. I deal strictly out of the box firearms, not custom built expensive firearms.
This was from an out of the box Tikka T3x in 30-06. It's only 5 shots, one of which I pulled but the 165 gr Nosler Partitions seem to shoot OK. The Tikka T1x in .22 LR does ok at 100 yards too.
