Jayzesake wrote: »

I've read that Nosler BT 95gr are good, but not sure if they're available in Ireland.

I used Federal 95 gr, because they have Nosler BT bullets. A devastating round, super accurate, but not cheap. Around €45 per 20. However a fantastic round.

Hornady SST Superperformance are also supposed to work well.

I'm a well documented critic of Superformance.

No matter what caliber i've fired them in they have always disappointed. For the first shot they were decent. Hitting where i wanted. However any follow up shot would shift, even slightly, and the more you fire the more it climbs.

Recently a lad on the range arrived with his brand new rifle in .243, new Zeiss Victory FL Diavari 4-16x50, best rings/mounts, etc. He could not get a group. I tried and i might get two close or even touching, but nothing more.

He was using Superformance. Now if he was to fire the first shot, and possibly a second he would do for a stalking set up only. If he was shooting more, and this can happen when dealing with goats, he would have problems after shot one or two.

He gave up, went away, came back a few weeks later with a few boxes of the Federal and she clover leafed every 5 shot group without fail.


Others are a fan of the Superformance, just not me. They also (and i chrono'd them) go faster than stated speeds on the box, and i also had numerous stiff bolt lifts.

Jayzesake wrote: »

The link you posted is for Federal Vital-Shok, I see Federal also do a 95 gr. 'Nosler Ballistic Tip' (Patrick Carley has these for €39/ box). Is there a difference between these?

Same bullet. Scroll down a little on the link above, and you'll see this:

And I'm a bit confused about 'Nosler', it seems to be both a brand and a type of ammo sold by other manufacturers?

Like most manufacturers they do their own brand of ammo but also sell the components (such as bullets) to other manufacturers and in boxes of 100 to reloaders.

Also, you seem to feel that Superperfomance being faster than their stated speed is a bad thing, why is that?

Most speed on ammo boxes are top end speeds. IOW the manufacturer says it'll do speed "X". When you chrono them you mind find they are a little or a lot less. Example:

Lapua Scenar in 6.5x55 has a stated speed of approx 2,800fps (might be wrong on the exact numbers but it's been a bit). When i chronod them i got speeds of 2608 down to 2436 fps. The box stated 2640 or so fps. So other than not hitting the stated speed some were nearly 200 fps slower.

In .308 i used to use Hornady 150 SST. Stated speeds are 2820. This is from testing in a 24" barreled rifle. I was getting (from my 24" barreled rifle) top speed of 2828 and then as low as 2741. The variance was less than the Lapua, and overall not a huge drop, but in terms of shooting over distances it can cause an unexpected drop in point of impact.

Now the Superformance. I tested the .308 stuff a lot because it was what i shot the most. I test fired 20 rounds, in four, five shot, batches. The stated speeds were 3,000 fps on the box. When i chrond the speeds i got were between 3,100 to 3,208. From a 24" barreled rifle. To put that into perspective my FTR rifle, using handloaded, match grade ammo, in a 32" custom barrel could only get to 3,157 fps.

So the Superformance was running hotter and faster out of a shorter barreled rifle than i could get from handloading. this means that whatever propellant they use to load the Superformance is "hot". It burns hot and fast creating huge pressures and sending the bullet out at almost unbelievable speeds.If i were to use the Hornady Superformance in FTR i'd be disqualified as the top speed allowed is 3,200fps.

And what is stiff bolt lift (pretty obvious, I suppose, but I've never heard of the problem), and what causes it?

As above if a round is loaded with a propellant that is too hot or too much the pressures created are huge. So is the heat when fired. The case of the round expands so hard that it presses against the side of the chamber. So when you go to unload the empty case the bolt has to turn the "stuck" case. This is what causes the bolt to be stiff. It's a sign of high pressure and most reloaders would reach this point in their ammo testing and then back of on the load used to ensure they did not have an accident by overcharging.

Worse case scenario would be catastrophic failure of the rifle, or the "best" worse case is case head separation. This is when the "rim" of the case becomes separated from the body of the case due to excessive pressures and heat. IOW bad loading.

(Loads of questions, I know. Still loads to learn.)

We all have to ask at some point. I know i did.

I had a look on Patrick's website and this is his full list of .243 ammo:



The top one i'd imagine are the 95 gr Vital shok or V-shok. They only do two 95gr rounds in .243 (Federal that is). They are:


Vital Shok (sometimes called V-Shok) ............................................. and ..................................... Fusion

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You want the Vital Shok. If unsure it'll say Nosler on the side. The Fusion use Federal's own Fusion bullet.

It's some sort of Remington or AR platform rifle. However it's not surpressed, it's the camera doing that. To drown out the noise of the rotar blades they would "dull" the sound which means everything, including the rifle being fired, would be dulled out. At least that is what it seems to me.