Gday
I better nip this in the butt before it gets out of hand & hope this puts a bit into perspective on how anal I am
I'm not disputing bergers ability to kill as I've killed a lot with them & just wasn't happy with the erratic opening / results some openings delayed as much as 10 in but a lot @6 plus on chital ( axis to you guys I think you call them ) now this is not the norm i get that but it's enough it's noticeable when your shooting side by side with other pills & results are better from that pill by a fair bit ( I think berger was one category down on my data sheets than my favourite frangible yet still killed quite respectable )
I tried cleaning hp cleaned meplat up & had trouble getting a consistent opening even on fairly similar resistance the tahr in NZ are not overly a big critter ( chamois smaller ) but the terrain they inhabit can be extremely treacherous & I lost the most amount of tahr with bergers yes they died but I couldn't get to them as they walked stumbled off the cliff faces once hit I switched back to amax & the % lost was reduced if I did my part & probably why I had my moment of finally someone gets it yep probably should've shut up but I don't like editing as if I've said it I'll own it & apologise if needed
We mainly use to hunt in mid July & crampons we're a must to try & stay on the cliff faces i liked to hunt , my mates not so much ( I was nicknamed a mountain goat for some reason lol )
I'm not disputing the bergers will kill & are far better @ longrange that up close especially once hp cleaned ( looks like they have a different approach now
) & it's a bit of my own problem I get that as if a pill one minute opens say @2 in then 8 in how can you have consistent results not in my world & just ask Steve how painful I am when I evaluate a pill yep I want more than that , yep I push to find the holy grail but it won't be possible that I'm sure but man the pills I'm seeing on the market today are very impressive compared to yesterday's on the whole
I can see on the bigger critters & I've got no right to comment on there ability to kill elk as I've not done that but our samba ( elk size roughly) the Berger were used a lot myself included & a huge amount have been killed with them but over time & failures the Berger popularity has shrunk ( before supply issues ) & I've still got mates that use them & we go head to head all the time lol so I'm used to it but I also say its potentially the hide & mud on our samba that causes issues I don't know but it dosent fit with chital & fallow but rusa are somewhat similar so I'm not sold on that's effecting the Berger so I just stay away from them now
Now I'm not a longrange shooter anymore apart from these darn prototypes as I'm stretching the barrel back out again on my rum to try & get data for Steve & settle my curiosity more than anything on pill design for terminal results as how low these pills will work to not open & while the pill may work the velocity may just be to low to create enough trauma
So before this prototype came down under I thought no mono had a chance of competing with a good frangible & most monos ( mushroom variety ) are poor below 2100 but 2400 I liked to keep them
1800 on the hammer is a good number but the good frangible will consistently open @ 1600 but Berger is not it imo & by open I mean work /kill not just open a little or nose over & tumble
It's just what I've found over my years nothing scientific just measure the impact to tip & do autopsies to see what's opening where , the type of bubble the pill producers & then smack another & see how it compares again & again
I hope that is clear on my position if your having good results with Berger I say it's only time
Na shoot what anyone wants it's all cool but I'll go into bat for a consistent pill design over erratic even if the erratic is a small % yep I find weaknesses in a pill then exploit that weakness in critters to see how it actually does preform
Man in some other thread I was even defending c&c yep I'm for using the best you can but if your within brand x pills very good results I will leave alone as it will kill well across so many resistances
Hope that helps on where I come from & I've had some great conversations with some incredible minds over the years & I've eaten crow a lot of times over it so I'm not always right either but I've learnt a heap , I think these conversations are going to be hard here but we will see it seems to have calmed a little lately
No offence intended to anyone
Cheers