A year or so ago I had gotten off on a tangent with plated 180gr HP bullets. I wa able to drive them hard and accuracy over bags was as good as 1" @ 30 yds. This year one or two shots with a Glock 6" barrel will put 1, 2 , or 3 shots out of ten in a tight cluster and the other shots are hard to keep on the barn? Pull downs and etc look pristine, this with a mild taper crimp. Using Berry and Ranier.
Results wit a new Sig are similar with more shots touching and a few deviants. Last group with Xtreme HP put 3 into less than an inch and the forth cut off a fiberglass fence post 2' off to the left. Stopped at that point.
Im guessing thst the plating is blowing in flight and steering the bullet to wherever they want to go. Bullet holes appear clean but one or two may have been "keyed". The most curious shot was one with, I think a Berry, was with a heavy load in the Sig. This was at a quart plastic jar filled with water at about 25yds. got the range so to speak with the first 2 and with a bit of windage the 3rd exploded the jar. BUT on examination the entrance "wound" on the jar was a perfect print of the bullets base. I dont think it hit the ground before the jar but cant be sure.
Dropping the loads with the Xtreme bullets to about 1100 in the Sig groups are quite good. In the G20 not too great-8-10" @ 25-30yds. But ususally one or 2 dead center.
Is this as I suppose just the plating breaking up for some reason or other. Puzzled also by the change in performance from last fall to this winter. ???
I've pretty much eliminated any plated bullets. While I've had great accuracy from them at plinker velocities, I don't need to have a plinker load in the gun anymore. It's just my own laziness I guess. At one time I would have maybe 10 different loads for the same gun. Trying to keep up with that got pretty heavy especially since I load for me and the family. I'm getting down to the basics again with one or 2 loads and have cut the number of different powders as well. I usually have more components on hand than most local gunshops. That's pretty much gone away as well. So my recommendation is to find a relatively inexpensive bullet that wears many hats. For me, the Everglades brand bullets are the ticket as of now. I've probably loaded over 4000 in the last few months and bullet performance has been good. They shoot accurately and open up like you would expect a HP bullet to do. While probably not the absolute best bullet on the market, they don't cost what the best bullet on the market does either. For me, they are great compromise of a hunting bullet and a plinker. Works for me.....so far.
I only now use the Xtreme heavy plated bullets... tried a few others but overall the xtremes were the best.
No issues with above 1200, retrieved quite a few and find the plating is solid with just land & groove markings
I have shot quite a few plated with the same erratic performance. Had some very nice 1 1/4" groups at 25 yards to keep me encouraged but.....back when I had a G29 its like the barrel was too short to stabilize the bullet and they were keyholing going all over the place. I recently acquired thousands of Montana Gold's that will be my first attempt at full copper jacketed. I think it will be a major upgrade!
Have had same bad experiences with plated bullets across multiple calibers, just don't trust them anymore.
For cheap range ammo, I load HiTech coated from SNS Casting or jacketed from Zero Bullets.
Both are high quality at very good prices.
www.snscasting.com
www.rozedist.com
Yeah finally convinced myself that plated is questionable in 10mm. One group at 30 yds was 3 touching in a cloverleaf and one cutting off a fiberglass fencepost 2 feet off line of sight. I shot a plastic bottle at 30 yds and the entrance hole was made by the base of the bullet. I think they tear the plating and tumble.