.257 115 berger coming apart

[buckfever]

My 2506 had a 115 Berger come apart midflight. I've herd of a rough bore causing this or maybe a dirty bore the rifle in guestion is Remington 700 build date is 1970 and I bought it used any ideas.
The load
54 gr H4831sc
CCI 200
Remington case

 

[Gunner46]

Use Noslers.

 

[salmonchaser]

Not to familiar with the 25-06 but becoming more familiar with Berger. I'd never use them for hunting based on my limited experience. I've used hornady, Speer, Barnes but have settled on Nosler. Hard to beat.
Good luck


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[joelkdouglas]

Hmmm. I've shot several 115 Bergers through a 25-06 without any issues. I wonder if you got a faulty bullet. I doubt a 25-06 can push that bullet enough to be on the edge of failure every shot.

That's the same load I have used without any issues, except I was using standard H4831 instead of H4831SC. Doubt it makes any difference.


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[Guy Miner]

Huh. Interesting. I've shot a couple of hundred 115 gr Bergers through my .25-06 with higher velocity loads, and no problem. In fact, I found them to produce excellent results on deer size game.

According to Berger, max load of H4831sc is 54.3 grains, slightly above your load, producing 3022 fps. Did you get a muzzle velocity for your load?

I was running it over a max charge of Retumbo, and averaging nearly 3190 fps. Excellent accuracy, very flat trajectory, and never had a problem.

Dunno. Bad bullet?

I did switch back to Noslers, also in 115 gr, the Ballistic Tip. Very lethal. Very accurate. Probably a tougher bullet with that thick base.

Regards, Guy

 

[buckfever]

I did shoot one more with no problem. The velocity was around 3075. I used this load last year for antelope and wanted to use them for deer this year I'll switch back to Noslers next year. Thanks for the help.

 

[Wis65x55]

I am at a loss. How can it be determined that the bullet disintegrated in midflight?
Keith

 

[Guy Miner]

Oh - it's not all that uncommon. Can be seen readily by the shooter or at least by other people on the firing line. Often there's kind of a "puff" of gray-blue where the bullet comes apart, often 25 - 50 yards from the rifle.

Was quite a big deal 15 years or so ago when so many target shooters started using faster twist rifling and pushing high velocity for their long range target ammo.

That's actually what led Berger to build thicker jacketed target bullets. Note - their "hunting" VLD's are the original, thinner jacketed versions that have proven so effective as hunting bullets.

Years ago I had a Nosler .30 cal, 168 grain target bullet come apart in flight, fired from my .308 Win. That bullet though, had an obvious defect in the jacket. I loaded and fired it out of curiosity to see if it would self-destruct. It did.

Guy

 

[Kodiak]

I have not had this happen, even when rather frail bullets have been driven at 4000 fps or faster from .22 cal. wildcats.

If the paper target has more than one impact or hole I would guess that bullet failed in flight to the target.

 

[Guy Miner]

Normally it doesn't happen - but try standard standard varmint bullets in a real fast twist barrel, at max velocity, and it's quite possible. For fun, and out of interest, Dad loaded some .25 cal bullets in his .257 Weatherby, I think they were intended for the old .25/35 or something like that... They never made it to the target! At really close range, it looked almost like a birdshot pattern. Was pretty amusing.

The fast twist is often part of the problem, but not the whole problem. It's largely been addressed by bullet makers.

Guy