.30 caliber

Below is a Canadian Grizzly Bear shot with a .300 WSM.  Hazel used the 180 grain A-Fame loaded to 2950fps.  Range was 60 yards, the boar was just dissapearing into the Alders on dark, quartering away. Hazel picked her angle perfectly (see bleeding around the entry wound), taking the snap shot from a kneeling position.

The A-frame performed flawlessly, the bear was anchored where it was shot, the bullet destroyed the vitals, coming to rest against the front of the offside shoulder.  Bullet weight retention was 176 grains.  Weight of bear approximately 190kg (420lb). Length of animal 6 foot.



Below, note the larger than caliber entry wound.  The A-frame wiill often do this at close range / high impact velocity. This also occurs with the Swift Scirocco from time to time.  Large entry wounds show that the projectile is expanding quickly and dumping vast amounts of energy.  This can of course also occur in cases of surface bullet blow up, however, this certainly is not the case with the A-Frame which delivers deep trauma for fast killing.



Below, the recovered A-Frame.




Hazel, so far our .30 cal champion provides us with more to view.  Below is the result of the 178gr A-Max at an impact velocity of approximately 2770fps, used on a boar.  The boar had a very bad day, the bullet entry wound is shown between the finger tips.  A deep stab wound is evident behind the shoulder.  This is the result of a fight this boar had earlier in the day with another boar in the area. Also pictured is the remains of the cup and  core of the Amax which bounced off the offside hide and went back into the chest cavity.  Rebounding is common on very tough boar when using light to medium bullet weights of all bullet designs (apart from Barnes) at close ranges. 

The 178 grain A-Max in this instance, was being utilized as a long range load in Hazel's .300WSM.  The boar pictured was encountered at close range.  Here we get to see how the both the 168 and 178gr A-Max bullets perform when pushed to extremes, note the large entry wound into the chest cavity followed by a small exit wound through the offside ribs, but without full exit.

It is worth noting, this boar did not collapse instantly (hydrostatic shock) though the bullet weight and construction combined with the game weight (50kg / 120lb) were well matched.  I have only been able draw two possible conclusions.  This boar was very heavy and dense for his size / mass and may have presented too much resistance (imagine a secretary trying to KO a heavy weight boxer) or just as likely, the boar's body chemistry had been altered due to the previous fight with the boar, altering his shock reaction temporarily.  Regardless, at the shot, the boar broke into a run but died within 15 yards, such was the internal trauma.



Entry wound, tusk wound and recovered remainder of cup and core.



Fully fragmentary lung wounding.  The liver was also completely destroyed.





Exit through ribs prior to bounce back.



Below is the result of a 208 grain Hornady A-Max at an impact velocity of approximately 2100fps on a feral goat. After full fragmentation, the remaining fragments have penetrated the rumen pictured, note the even pattern, twelve main fragments in total, similar to a 12 gauge shotgun loaded with buck shot used at point blank. Fragmentary wounding is a key factor in fast, clean killing at long ranges in the absence of high velocity.  Or explained another way;in the absence of disproportionate to caliber wounding / hydraulic shock.  The Heavy A-Max bullets excel in this role.