[Ole]

I want to use my Marlin 1895 in .450 Marlin. The good news is I have some time to practice a bunch this summer! :biggrin:

Looking to use the 350gr RD bullet. I have a load I tried last weekend and it shoot good (30gr of SR4759) and the speed is right (1700fps). It's plenty accurate. I put 5 inside of 1.5" at 50 yards off a horrible rest (shooting off a padded ammo can on a table). The area where I hunt rarely presents a shot over 100 yards, as fairly heavily wooded areas dominate my hunting unit. 1700fps makes this gun a 150-175 yard elk gun and I don't want to beat myself up with the recoil of full power loads (AKA: flinching).

:questionmark: My question is: Would you guys bother with casting up a soft nose bullet or just shoot with normal (harder) alloy that runs around 16-18 BHN?

Has anyone shot a cow elk with something close to this bullet/combo and can you report as to what I should expect?

 

[Ole]

What state do you hunt in?

Hi Dan the Man thanks for the response.

I hunt near Happy Jack, AZ. It's about halfway in between Flagstaff and Strawberry. Unit 5B south. I've been fortunate enough to take 5 elk out of that unit. It's the only unit I'll put in for elk because I know a few good spots.

In AZ, elk tags are hard to come by (about every 4-8 years is the norm for getting drawn for good units).

 

[Ole]

OK so I went in a different direction.

Today I made up 17 rounds with various hollow points. The alloy is 20:1, so these should work nicely but only testing will tell:



The two on the left have a very shallow 1/4" std drill bit hole. The 3 in the second row have a fairly substantial hole with that same bit. The ones on the right use a countersink bit that I've had luck with in the past.

Here's a close up to show hollow point details from the different bits:



Now I need to talk my friend with the ballistics gel into molding up some big blocks to catch these big honkers.