Badlands Precision Bulldozer - performance on game?

[Copper Guy]

That is great, I am on the page. I will look for the video. They seem to work good up close from what my one cousin that lives in california has seen, I'm more interested to see how they perform at extended ranges! The last several years between me, my wife and my cousin that lives here in Wyoming, elk ranges have been 713, 600, 703, 710, 814, 845, 865 and 910. I'll be ising the 270 SBD out of my .338 Norma, muzzle velocity of 2840, to see how they perform with lower velocity impacts.

If you place the bullet properly the bullet will do its job. We have changed the hollwpoint to a 5 pointed star cut that expands down to 1700 fps impact velocity. You probably have the torx hollow point. Sounds like your elevation will be quite high so your bullet with the high BC it has will impact at well over 1900 fps, more than enough to get full expansion.

 

[codyadams]

If you place the bullet properly the bullet will do its job. We have changed the hollwpoint to a 5 pointed star cut that expands down to 1700 fps impact velocity. You probably have the torx hollow point. Sounds like your elevation will be quite high so your bullet with the high BC it has will impact at well over 1900 fps, more than enough to get full expansion.

At the elevation I hunt pronghorn, 1150 yards give or take is where I hit 1900 fps. Where I hunt mule deer and elk, the thinner air gives me about 100-150 yards more range for the same velocity. We haven't taken a pronghorn over 1000 as of yet, but we have taken a fairly high quantity in the 800-high 900 range. There have been a few mule deer or elk that we have seen at 1100-1300 range that we possibly could have taken, but either weren't the quality of animals we were looking for, the wind conditions were too unpredictable to take a shot, or getting closer was relatively easy. While I haven't needed a range of over 1000 yards yet, it would be nice to have the extra, 1700 fps minimum would add around 300 yards to max range, and a nice cushion. I practice out to 1500-a mile relatively often.

 

[seekoutside]

any kills this fall?

 

[codyadams]

any kills this fall?

We got some good info on this thread with a few contributors, including the designer of the bullet himself -

Badlands Precision Bullets thread - From BC to terminal ballistics

There seems to have been rising interest in these bullets, but information is spread out and somewhat limited, so hopefully this thread will help consolidate information. I would like to keep this thread somewhat organized, accurate, and to the point. If you have first hand experience please...

www.longrangehunting.com

 

[dave_halsey]

How sensitive are these bullets to the seating depth? Im going to be loading up the 175 bulldozer 2 in a 30-06 ackley improved and my goal is to hit 2900 fps with it shooting sub moa. This thread really sealed the deal to go with badlands for the new sheep, deer and antelope slayer!

 

[codyadams]

How sensitive are these bullets to the seating depth? Im going to be loading up the 175 bulldozer 2 in a 30-06 ackley improved and my goal is to hit 2900 fps with it shooting sub moa. This thread really sealed the deal to go with badlands for the new sheep, deer and antelope slayer!

In my testing, I didn't find them very sensitive. I would start anywhere from .020" to .040" off, if that doesn't work then tweak it some. If you check out this other thread too, there are some other guys that have loaded them as well, and more on game performance too.

Badlands Precision Bullets thread - From BC to terminal ballistics

There seems to have been rising interest in these bullets, but information is spread out and somewhat limited, so hopefully this thread will help consolidate information. I would like to keep this thread somewhat organized, accurate, and to the point. If you have first hand experience please...

www.longrangehunting.com

 

[JTH]

Following

 

[30378wbymag]

In my testing, I didn't find them very sensitive. I would start anywhere from .020" to .040" off, if that doesn't work then tweak it some. If you check out this other thread too, there are some other guys that have loaded them as well, and more on game performance too.

Badlands Precision Bullets thread - From BC to terminal ballistics

There seems to have been rising interest in these bullets, but information is spread out and somewhat limited, so hopefully this thread will help consolidate information. I would like to keep this thread somewhat organized, accurate, and to the point. If you have first hand experience please...

www.longrangehunting.com

Cody,
Thanks for all the informative replies, just one quick question; was that broadhead in your cousins bull embedded in the scapula with tissue growing over it or was that from this year? Elk certainly are one of our toughest game animals...

 

[codyadams]

Cody,
Thanks for all the informative replies, just one quick question; was that broadhead in your cousins bull embedded in the scapula with tissue growing over it or was that from this year? Elk certainly are one of our toughest game animals...

Looked like it was from that season, early in archery season, healed up essentially

 

[nralifer]

Ok so I talked to them a bit more. It was a very hard up hill shot, steeper than 45°. The bull got up around 65 yards and sterted walking away and turned and looked back, at a pretty hard quarter. The shot entered center shoulder, went through just a small section of the front of the chest cavity, then center punched the spine in the neck/shoulder junction area, and continued to punch through meat until it was under the hide center neck on the off side, penetrating through around 2+ feet of elk. The blood shot wasn't that bad, and the elk dropped and didn't move at all. If it would have it would have rolled down the hill. As far as petals, they didn't find any, but even just grazing into the chest cavity, the lungs were mostly jello.

They said the bullet looked like a roller bearing, with the completely flat frontal area that they look for with these specific mono bullet designs.

After reading, according to some high tech ballistic studies, a smaller but flat frontal area traveling at higher speed creates a larger permanent wound channel than a larger traditional rounded mushroom bullet. What it says is that it takes more energy to mushroom a lead core bullet than for a mono to shed its petals, thus slowing the bullet down more, creating less of the hydrostatic shock and wound channel due to lower velocity, and also the rounded front causes less damage traveling through the animal than a flat one. The monos with this design shed their front petals rapidly and do not use as much energy doing so, and the flat fronted shank going at a high velocity creates a shock wave in the internal tissues, thus leaving a large permenant wound channel and generally getting deeper penetration.

This is how I understand it so far, and it seems to make sense.

That is a pretty accurate description, but at impact velocities of around 2400-2500 the petals stay on and expansion is more reliable in bullets made out of C110 copper because it's ductility is better than other alloys and machines well. The harder the alloy of copper the more likely petal shedding will occur or at low impact velocities the probability of opening decreases.

 

[338 dude]

Just got a recovered bullet from an elk. Same load and bullet as from my previous post. Large 5x6 bull, about 80 yards hard quartering away shot. Bullet entered square in the shoulder, went through shoulder and spine and was under the hide on the off side neck. elk dropped in tracks and didn't flinch, though it was a spine/neck shot. here is the remainder of the bullet vs an entire bullet. Also on a different note, a broadhead that was found in the scapula of this bull elk. Reinforces how heavily constructed these critters are!!View attachment 154216 View attachment 154217 View attachment 154218

A G5 Broadhead I believe

 

[nralifer]

Ok so I talked to them a bit more. It was a very hard up hill shot, steeper than 45°. The bull got up around 65 yards and sterted walking away and turned and looked back, at a pretty hard quarter. The shot entered center shoulder, went through just a small section of the front of the chest cavity, then center punched the spine in the neck/shoulder junction area, and continued to punch through meat until it was under the hide center neck on the off side, penetrating through around 2+ feet of elk. The blood shot wasn't that bad, and the elk dropped and didn't move at all. If it would have it would have rolled down the hill. As far as petals, they didn't find any, but even just grazing into the chest cavity, the lungs were mostly jello.

They said the bullet looked like a roller bearing, with the completely flat frontal area that they look for with these specific mono bullet designs.

After reading, according to some high tech ballistic studies, a smaller but flat frontal area traveling at higher speed creates a larger permanent wound channel than a larger traditional rounded mushroom bullet. What it says is that it takes more energy to mushroom a lead core bullet than for a mono to shed its petals, thus slowing the bullet down more, creating less of the hydrostatic shock and wound channel due to lower velocity, and also the rounded front causes less damage traveling through the animal than a flat one. The monos with this design shed their front petals rapidly and do not use as much energy doing so, and the flat fronted shank going at a high velocity creates a shock wave in the internal tissues, thus leaving a large permenant wound channel and generally getting deeper penetration.

This is how I understand it so far, and it seems to make sense.

I know it's a bit late to respond to your post, but your comment that it takes more energy to mushroom lead than it does to petal copper is spot on. The big mushroom really limits penatration, making quartering shots a poor choice for lead core bullets. In my personal experience with the Bulldozers, quartering shots at any distance are highly lethal because the Bulldozer penetrates so well. A Bulldozer entering the rear chest on the right quartering will go diagonally through both lungs, likely severing the vena cava, aorta and pulmonary artery besides creating a large temporary wound channel in the lungs themselves. Slow motion gel test video show that the Bulldozer will start to form the expansion cavity of the wound within 1-2" of penetration. Bullet travel through the lungs is less stressful to the petals because the lungs are the least dense tissue in the body. Muscle is more like ballistic gel, and bone is quite variable in toughness. Shoulder blade is thin, humerus is very tough and frontal skull is the hardest. Not at all surprising that petals shed after hitting bone, but the hard shank will continue through. The high BC of the Bulldozer assures the highest impact velocity at any given distance.