For those who are shooting Barnes bullets, the Expanders and the XPB’s are essentially the same bullet. I use the XPBs in my Accura and my Optima pistol, both .50 cals and 250 grain, .451 and 225 grain, .429 respectively. I buy these without sabots as the ones that come with the Expanders I do not like. Again, respectively, I use black and green Harvester sabots with the XPB bullets.
I’ve never recovered a bullet from the Accura, driven by 110 grains [v] BH209 powder. I have recovered two from the Optima pistol which pushes the bullets at right around 1500 fps, and both of those bullets went from in front of a shoulder diagonally thru the deer and were under the hide at the opposite hindquarter.
I mentioned the 225 grain, .40 cal Fury bullet earlier here, but I have yet to hunt it. Maybe during the muzzy season or next year. I ordered a couple hundred of them to shoot, both in a .45 Kodiak with Blackhorn powder at about 2000 fps or the Patriot rifle using smokeless at around 2500 fps, both using sabots.
Fishthumper commented to me that anything .45 cal is tough to locate in stores. I’m certain that Don Meier can relate to this: back in the dark ages when muzzleloaders were first being brought to the market as hunting tools, they were primarily .45 cal. or .54 cal. .45 caliber was the everyday caliber back then. When the .50s began to show up they took the market by storm and eventually the .45 got far less attention, especially in new gun sales and the components began to disappear from the stores’ shelves. In more recent years and with the advent of more interest in the .45, both as black powder/sub and smokeless guns, the .45 cal bullet market has blossomed, primarily with on-line sales and the bullets selection is growing every year. Many of the bullets being sold today have a focus on long range accuracy . Many of those bullets, when used for hunting can have devastating terminal results on a deer at smokeless speeds so one has to be careful in bullet selection. Bonded bullets or the monolithic bullets seem to do the best with the .45s in the field today. The newer bullets can cost upwards of $2.00 each so someone wanting them is probably a pretty serious long-range shooter. Used on deer, they can get ugly. Today the XTP pistol bullets and a couple of the .458 rifle bullets are perhaps more common in the deer woods and they do an excellent job on deer out to three hundred yards. I think the most common XTP bullet weight in the woods is .300 grain either in the .451 or the .429 sizes. Personally, I left the XTP market as a hunting bullet and went to solid copper to help get lead out of the field, but this Fury bullet came along and being bonded I like it a lot and will at least give it a try on deer as it’s hard to get them to come apart inside the deer.
There is a vast market for those with .45 cal rifles if one look on-line. Dop some reading in some of the muzzleloading forums and you’ll find them. And for any that question whether a .40 cal bullet can get the job done effectively and cleanly, the first deer I shot with a Barnes Expander was on a slight sidehill eating its way straight to me in the stand. The deer’s head was down nose to the dirt and the bullet hit about six inches behind the ears when I shot and the bullet exited just ahead of the diaphram thru the sternum. The deer mule kicked at impact so hard that it broke both of its hind lower legs. Exit hole about 2″
Here’s an example of what a newer, high tech, .45 cal bullet, shot bullet to bore, no sabot at smokeless speeds. The bullet was a 300 grain, .45 Arrowhead. Appropriate for paper punching, maybe not so much for deer hunting.
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this is third season with it. Love the gun just need to shoot something with it!
