Thanks for sharing more of the details of your experience, Ron. Everybody SHOULD change their mind if so indicated by actual results - personal or related by reliable sources. Your willingness to change - for sound reasons and especially after publicly endorsing the HGPs - are an important mark of a person with true integrity and strength of character. Knowing your reasons for first endorsing the HGPs and then for the change, along with the level of experience (yours and others) behind the change, is especially helpful to others who are looking for good elk bullets, and that's why I asked. Thanks for providing good answers!
Here's where I'm coming from in asking the questions: After leaving active duty I was a member of the Army Science Board for several years, and every year we reviewed the Army's efforts to assess the lethalities and vulnerabilities of US weapons, as well as the lethalities and vulnerabilities of foreign weapons. Despite annual budgets running to many tens of $millions and the best efforts of many brilliant scientists and engineers who devote their lives to thousands of carefully designed experiments and extensive computer modeling, the best answers were never more than educated guesses. Why? Because there are way too many variables to explore no matter how much time and effort is spent. BUT - the educated guesses are much better if the research is carefully thought out and as comprehensive as possible within the time and money available, and if all possible field experience is carefully collected and considered too. And that's why the Science Board reviewed the research every year.
When it comes to big game bullet performance, some of the variables are: What were the impact velocity, shot angle, point of impact, path through the body, and bullet expansion along the wound channel? Was the animal calm, alert, panicked, tired, rested? To what extent do we really know most of these variables, let alone control them in any way? Bullet (and arrow) results on game can be really surprising: Last spring black bears were raiding our Montana mountain home on almost a daily basis, and I finally had to shoot a 125 lb yearling in our back yard, at about 20 yards, with a .308 loaded with 165 grain Nosler "Big Game Ballistic Tip" bullets. It ran about 20 yards and flopped down, but because there are neighbors fairly close by and the bear was still twitching, I shot it again. NEITHER BULLET made it through the little bear's chest, even though no major bones were hit! Probably a case of bullets that blew up because the impact velocity was too high, but??? One adult cow elk that I hit from 25 yards with a smallish two-blade broadhead shot from a 50 lb recurve ran 25 yards and collapsed stone dead. That little broadhead went through both sets of shoulder muscles, both lungs, and exited on the far side, but the wound channel was small and clean. My biggest bull was quartering slightly towards me when I shot it with a big 3-blade broadhead fired from a 62 lb compound at 12 yards. The big broadhead made a huge wound channel through one lung, the diaphram, the liver, the paunch, and all but the last inch of hip on the far side - and the bull still ran 800 yards with the arrow in its body! I found it the next day after a long grid search. On the other hand, I killed two other bulls and a cow with the same compound setup, and they died almost as quickly as the cow I killed with a recurve. Why the differences? With my .257 Roberts I've had complete penetration bang-flop kills on deer at ranges of over 300 yards with 117 grain Sierra "Game King" bullets (my dad's favorite through many years of Montana deer and elk hunting)... and I've had the same bullet blow up on a spike at 100 yards, for no apparent reason. I killed my first ML deer, a big doe, at 70 yards with a pure-lead round ball: Complete penetration and she died as quickly as any deer I've killed with a centerfire.
So... I'm interested in hearing EVERYBODY's experience with muzzle-loader bullets for elk - particularly with full-bore all-lead bullets like the HGP that are legal during MT's new Heritage ML season - and will consider everybody's experience when making my choice. The more experiences that everybody shares, the better our "educated guesses" will be.
the cheap eBay parts gun 45 cal…(CVA Optima on Cooper box)
the dead elk shot once at 83yds…with….
the bullet…a 240 gr Precision Bullets “Dead Center“ pure lead bullet in a sabot atop 110grs of T7 2f ….double lung damage, recovered the bullet just under the hide of the off side…the bull walked 50yds and tipped over.
