.223 Barnes 70 Grain TSX Performance

[Ironman8]

The ONLY reliable shot I have found with the heavy OTMs has been a double lung shot or neck shot, forget hitting the shoulder or the head as these bullets completely and totally fragment and do NOT penetrate worth a damn.

They do work extremely well if you can slip one in right behind the front elbow low and bust a rib and take out both lungs, they never make it more than 50 feet before they are completely exsanguinated. This makes for a very nice butcher job too as all the blood is above the diaphragm and virtually zero meat damage.

A neck shot is lethal too as that normally breaks the spinal column and/or slices out the blood flow to their brain.

None of the heavy OTMs are "penetrating" rounds, but they do fragment very well. You can forget taking a heart shot with any OTM, with the Barnes 70 grain you can though.

Thanks for the response SP, and it's about what I expected. I like shooting at the base of the skull/just behind the ear most of the time, or the neck.

The only surprising thing is the bolded part above. You've had these not penetrate the skull??

[SkyPup]

To tell the truth, I have not personally made any skull shots using the OTMs, so I cannot state one way or the other.

But I am sure they would penetrate the skull on one side at least.....the Barnes 70 grain TSX, however, totally and completely smashes both sides though....

[Ironman8]

To tell the truth, I have not personally made any skull shots using the OTMs, so I cannot state one way or the other.

But I am sure they would penetrate the skull on one side at least.....the Barnes 70 grain TSX, however, totally and completely smashes both sides though....

Gotcha. Yeah the TSX is no doubt devastating.

I'll get to try some 77gr OTMs here in the next month on some hogs...with the TSX as backup

[rocsteady]

Now that you've had the 7.62 for a while, how do you rate it compared to the 5.56 with the 70 g TSX? What do you like better, what was more to your liking with the 5.56?

[SkyPup]

Now that you've had the 7.62 for a while, how do you rate it compared to the 5.56 with the 70 g TSX? What do you like better, what was more to your liking with the 5.56?

The best thing about the 7.62 handloaded Barnes 130 grain I have been using is that you do not have to wait for the perfect shot to make a kill. A bad shot often, but NOT always, will anchor them and/or kill them. Even so, I do not suggest taking running away "ass" shots as it is not humane even if you do manage to put them down that way.

I am also concerned about bullet travel too as we are often not far from domestic suburban landscapes and have to be careful in which direction we are firing at night so as not to endanger anyone. The .308 is going to carry further than the 5.56mm if it penetrates completely through some hog, although using the Barnes copper bullets this may be worse than using a more frangible bullet.

I also like the increased range of the 7.62mm, I limit my 5.56mm shots to a max of 200-225 yards day or night, the 7.62mm essentially doubles that range day or night out to at least 400 yards. So if we are in a large clearing I can take advantage of the longer killing range. The 7.62mm seems to be inherently accurate. Plus it just sounds real good when a .308 hits them in the shoulder, there is a resounding "THUNK" that you can audibly hear to know that you definitely nailed another one.

The 7.62 with a 20 round mag is another 3-4 pounds to be carrying around, and we hike miles at a time often in extreme heat and humidity, the 5.56mm allows me to carry more stuff with me including GPS, camera, Night Vision gear, FLIR Thermal scanners, water, etc. , it is all a trade off.

I really like my 5.56 and I really like my 7.62, I have full confidence in both of them when I decide to take the shot they will both make it, I just may be able to make more shots with the 7.62 that I would defer with the 5.56....

[rocsteady]

Exactly what I was looking for...thanks for the detailed response.

Seems that one of the advantages of the 5.56 would be follow-up shots but more often than not, I think you are precise and careful enough that you don't need 'em.

I don't recall seeing any pics of your hogs with multiple bullet wounds...

[SkyPup]

I don't recall seeing any pics of your hogs with multiple bullet wounds...

Eggsactly!!! I do not take a shot unless I am confident that I will make it lethal on the spot.

[.46caliber]

I think the 62 grain reloads were up around 3,000fps and the 70 grain are more like 2,700fps, but I do not have a chrono to actually check them out.

Would you mind sharing these two recipes? Feel free to PM if you don't want to post them. These are what we're thinking of for small whitetail and our trips to Houston for hogs.


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[SkyPup]

Would you mind sharing these two recipes? Feel free to PM if you don't want to post them. These are what we're thinking of for small whitetail and our trips to Houston for hogs.


Sent from my PG86100 using Tapatalk 2

It is nothing special:

62 grain Barnes TSX -> 25.5 grains of Hodgdon BLC-2
70 grain Barnes TSX -> 25.0 grains of Hodgdon BLC-2

Lake City Brass

CCI #450 Small Magnum Rifle Primers

Both loads are a couple of tenths below max and work very well in a short barrel gas semi-auto gun nnd are 1 MOA rounds from my rifles. There are plenty of different powders to use, but since I have 48 pounds of BLC-2 for my 5.56mm and 7.62mm, I don't use anything else. Again, it works great for me, someone else could certainly improve on it.....

[zacii]

Have you had any problems with excessive copper fouling using Barnes bullets as much as you do?

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