5. Too Light for Big Game?
After digesting the preceding table, the following data will be more significant by comparison. Many people advocate the use of the very smallest small bores for big game, the .22 centerfires (and even rimfires!). Around August-September 2000, there was an article on this very subject in nearly every gun magazine published in America and all the articles were guardedly in favor. Why this is a bad idea is readily seen in the table below. The wound track created by even the most robust of custom bullets is barely acceptable as a minimally effective lethal wound. On anything larger than a 120 lb doe, their use is questionable and even in this regard the utmost of precision accuracy is required. These are varmint cartridges. A 64 grain bullet does not suddenly transform a .220 Swift into a big game cartridge. Thats a sectional density of only .182; even the puny 85 grain .243 caliber bullet is more medicine. But mass is not the greatest problem. Only the X-Bullet, Trophy Bonded Bear Claw, Nosler Partition and Winchester Power Point (favored by SWAT) are strongly constructed and behave at all like big game bullets. The long Speer 70 gr semi-spitzer is apparently no better a performer than a typical 55 to 62 gr soft point.
The Smallest Bores: .224 and .243 Rifle Bullets
| Caliber / Cartridge |
Bullet Type / Mass |
Impact Velocity |
Expanded Diameter |
Depth of Penetration |
Retained Weight |
Ref |
| .223 Remington |
55 gr Winchester Soft Point |
3043 fps |
0.340 in |
7.7 in |
17 grs / 31 % |
1 |
|
55 gr Hansen Soft Point |
2977 fps |
0.301 in |
5.7 in |
23 grs / 43 % |
2 |
|
55 gr Hansen Soft Point |
2977 fps |
0.295 in |
7.7 in |
26 grs / 47 % |
2 |
|
60 gr Hornady Soft Point |
3077 fps |
0.440 in |
7.9 in |
26 grs / 43 % |
1 |
|
60 gr Trophy-Bonded Bear Claw |
3074 fps |
0.510 in |
10.5 in |
53 grs / 88 % |
1 |
|
64 gr Winchester Power Point |
2780 fps |
0.490 in |
10.0 in |
44 grs / 69 % |
1 |
|
70 gr Speer Soft Point |
2923 fps |
0.340 in |
8.5 in |
21 grs / 30 % |
1 |
| .243 Winchester |
80 gr Berger FB HP Match |
3300 fps |
0.443 in |
5.5 in |
23 grs / 29 % |
2 |
|
87 gr Hornady V-Max |
3200 fps |
0.389 in |
6.8 in |
25 grs / 29 % |
2 |
|
100 gr Nosler Partition |
3000 fps |
0.387 in |
13.0 in |
64 grs / 64 % |
2 |
-
1 -- Finn Aagaard, ".223 Rem - A True Deerslayer?", American Rifleman, National Rifle Association, November, 1992, pp. 40 - 41, 70 - 71.
2 -- Independent testing by the author
When selecting a .22 centerfire for hunting big game the question I must ask is: Why? What are you trying to prove? It isn't that kinetic energy kills game like lightning because they all have less kinetic energy than even the mildest appropriate weapons. It isn't that retained velocity or flat trajectory is better because .224 bullets invariably have miserable ballistic coefficients (comparable to round nosed bullets or even pistol bullets) and lose velocity like mad beyond 100 yds. It isn't dependable, predictable terminal effect because nearly all .224 bullets are highly frangible and in consequence are highly unpredictable (note the two illustrations of the Hansen 55 grain softpoint). The only possible argument is familiarity and confidence with a particular rifle and that, friends, is laziness. Use the right tool. It is unethical to play a game in which a failure in precision bullet placement results in a badly wounded animal. On a clear broadside shot they probably kill deer faster than anything you've ever beheld. But those bullets are too close to the margin of failure for any but the most disciplined of marksmen to employ.
If you insist on hunting big game with a .224 caliber rifle, the only bullets worth consideration are the 55 to 60 grain Trophy Bonded Bear Claw, the 50 to 53 grain Barnes X-Bullet, the new 60 grain Nosler Partition, the 60 grain Hornady soft point (considered by one authority that I trust to be the best of all), and maybe the 64 grain Winchester Power Point. Keep the impact velocity above 3000 fps. In the August-September 2001 issue of Handloader magazine, Ross Seyfried describes a load for a .224 wildcat that uses one of Nosler's new 60 grain Partitions at a scorching 4100 fps and which penetrates over 19 inches in wet paper making holes that looked "like small nuclear explosions" ("Smallbore Extremes", pp. 30 - 35). The jackets on these bullets are much thicker than on the .308 caliber Partitions! Using one of Warren Jensen's J36 bullets (78 grains) at 3700 fps, a penetration depth exceeding 20 inches was achieved. There is some merit to the idea of extremely robust ultra-smallbore bullets with stratospheric impact velocities, but even at this they aren't any better than a .25-06 or similar.
Many of the staunchest advocates of the .224 hot-rods freely admit to taking head, neck and spine shots (a practice I deplore) when touting the lethality of their beloved caliber. That proves nothing, since any bullet that destroys the brain or spine is instantly fatal. Some will argue that the supposed greater accuracy of .224s permits such precision, but this is arrant nonsense. Field accuracy is less a function of inherent rifle accuracy and more a matter of animal behavior, wind and a steady (or unsteady rest). Heads and necks move a lot more than the thorax of an animal. I suppose that I am on a rant about this, but it is a disturbing trend, like the current obsession with "ultra-magnums". What comes next? If .224 caliber premium bullets will work, why not .17 caliber? Do we draw the line at abysmal failure?
After my 2000 season experience using the .243 Winchester I don't feel terribly confident in this caliber for big game either. My brother killed a 140 lb doe and a 200+ lb buck with one shot each diagonally through both lungs using Winchester 100 grain Power Points. The doe sat down but didn't die for a full minute. The buck ran 85 yards. Neither bullet exited and the entrance holes couldn't be found until the animals were skinned. Both bullets seemed to perform reasonably well. He was hunting in alfalfa fields in Montana and neither animal escaped. I shot two does on separate days not long after that in Alabama and lost both of them as they ran into an overgrown clearcut full of shoulder high young pines and briar thickets. Neither left any discernible blood trail and I searched in a fan extending well over 100 yards through the maze of brush without finding the carcasses. The drizzling rain and countless other recent tracks didn't help. I was using the 100 grain Nosler Partition load shown in the Figure (compare it to the lightest 7 mm bullet). Obviously, the .243 calibers are "enough", but only just barely so. In open country this caliber is fine on lighter species of big game, but I won't choose it again for heavy cover. I suspect that the varmint loads illustrated would have proven instantly fatal. They might also have blown apart on the scapula or even a rib. It would be interesting to know the risk and probability tradeoff between the chance of a bullet failure and the likelihood of losing a mortally wounded deer. Regardless, I'll stick with my 7 mm.
The following data for standard service sidearm automatic and magnum revolver handgun ammunition further illustrates the relative (im)potency of the .22 centerfires as weapons for hunting big game. Recall also that heavy, large caliber, flat-nosed handgun bullets can be expected to penetrate 30 to 50 inches while creating a 3/4 to 1 inch diameter wound channel.
Test Data for Automatic & Magnum Revolver Handgun Bullets
| Caliber / Cartridge |
Bullet Type / Mass |
Impact Velocity |
Expanded Diameter |
Depth of Penetration |
Retained Weight |
Ref |
| 9 x 19 mm |
115 gr Winchester Silvertip HP |
|
0.621 in |
6.62 in |
116.1 grs / 100 % |
1 |
|
124 gr Starfire HP |
|
0.652 in |
5.75 in |
122.7 grs / 99 % |
1 |
|
147 gr Winchester Black Talon HP |
|
0.651 in |
7.38 in |
147.3 grs / 100 % |
1 |
| .40 Smith & Wesson |
180 gr FMJ-FP |
950 fps |
0.400 in |
18.3 in |
174.4 grs / 97 % |
2 |
|
180 gr Winchester Black Talon HP |
950 fps |
0.616 in |
6.10 in |
171.4 grs / 95 % |
2 |
| 10 mm Auto |
175 gr Winchester Silvertip HP |
|
0.687 in |
7.75 in |
169.3 grs / 97 % |
1 |
|
180 gr Starfire HP |
|
0.653 in |
6.38 in |
180.2 grs / 100 % |
1 |
|
200 gr Winchester Black Talon HP |
|
0.691 in |
6.5 in |
199.7 grs / 100 % |
1 |
| .41 Remington Magnum |
170 gr Sierra Power Jacket JHC |
1450 fps |
0.644 in |
8.1 in |
151 grs / 89 % |
2 |
|
210 gr Hornady JHP |
1300 fps |
0.548 in |
9.9 in |
183 grs / 87 % |
2 |
|
210 gr Hornady XTP-HP |
1300 fps |
0.643 in |
8.3 in |
206 grs / 98 % |
2 |
-
- 1 -- Martin P. Olsen, "9mm v. 10mm High Performance Ammunition Tests", Rec.Guns FAQ, IV. Comparative Firearm Information, G. Calibre Issues, http://www.recguns.com.
- 2 -- Independent testing by the author
The figure below depicts the wound tracks created in testing with saturated phonebooks by the .243 / 6 mm bullets described above alongside the wound tracks produced by a standard service sidearm (.40 S&W), a magnum revolver firing standard weight (170 and 210 grain) hollowpoint bullets (.41 Magnum), and a conventional softpoint from a .22 centerfire cartridge (.223 Remington). Clearly the .22 centerfire using this class of bullet is marginally suitable only for the smallest game animals. If premium grade bullets in .224 caliber perform as suggested by the data in the foregoing table, then the suitability of these cartridges for big game is less questionable, possibly comparable to the magnum handgun, but I have also read that the only reliable performance occurs (even using premium bullets) with impact velocities exceeding about 2900 to 3000 fps.