.270 Winchester Ballistic SilverTip Opinions

What's yalls opinions on Winchesters Ballistic Silver tips? I have been using them for a while now and in the last couple years started having issues with deer running and not finding any blood, and causing me to loose a nice 8 point and a doe.

Have you checked your POI? Maybe it's you or the gun not the WBSTs. I get DRTs with them.

Did you find any sign of a hit? If you found no blood ,how do you know you made a hit?

Yes everything is good. I just recently started questioning the ammo due to hearing numerous people state they would never shoot silver tips or any nosler loaded ammo due to no pass through. 90% of the time I find blood or the deer drops. But that 10% could cost you a nice deer!!

Yes. I would see that I hit the deer. And find the deer but not a spot of blood. Then on other occasions find a spot or two of blood then never see blood again

I haven't used that ammo. I prefer a bonded or mono bullet for complete pass through. With a pass through you will at least have a good blood trail.

I would recommend these bullets.
Accubonds
Fusions
Partitions
Lightest Barnes TTSX your gun shoots well.

I've been using the silvertips for years now, and I've only lost two deer that I remember. But I have killed numerous deer where I don't find blood or only a small amount of blood then the blood stops and it would take me a while to find the deer. But it does worry me when it come to a nice deer and the chance of not finding blood or any deer really. It would just really suck to know I just shot a really nice buck and can't find it, thats numerous nights of no sleep and questioning your self.

Some one told me about the Hornady GMX all copper. Just don't know any one that has used it.

I don't like ballistic tips. Use a mushrooming bullet that will penetrate hard and leave an exit hole. The exit hole is your best friend when tracking.

No need for that. You are questioning for a good reason. It will eventually happen. Any of the bullets I listed above in your 270 will give you complete pass through and most even full length pass through. Just pick up some and go with whatever your gun shoots best.

I can say this, without a shadow of a doubt the Nosler brand is an awesome hunting bullet. I have loaded and hunted with BT, SBT and Partitions all of my hunting life. I have loaded .270, .308, 30-06, 7mm Mag and .300 Win Mag and been extremely happy with results. But that being said things do go wrong sometimes, and that happens with any load.

I will say I like the Partition best in a .270 for hunting purposes.

I don't know about them. They are a copy of the Barnes TTSX and TTX. The Barnes has been around longer and proven longer. Shoot light for caliber bullets in the Barnes TTSX and it will be devastating with pass through.

yup; i tried these exact bullets in my .308 & just didn't care for them too much ... went back to a mushrooming bullet & haven't looked back ...

For store bought ammo, I shoot Barnes TTSX. Best of both worlds with all copper for weight retention and polymer tip. I will load some next to compare to the Nosler Partition.

You couldn't give me a box of those ballistic tips. Get rid of them and get some Hornady 140 grain BTSP.

I use them in 243 and 270. No plans to change. I will agree you don't get a pass through if you are trying to exit through a shoulder but most are DRT.

Thanks for all the suggestions.

I use them in my .270, have been very happy over the years. That said, last year I did not have a single deer drop. I don't know that they are made as well as they once were, but overall I have had very good success with them.

In my experiences with Winchester rifle ammo I would find something else.

Not sure you got good information there.

The idea behind ballistic tips or silver tips is that the bullet will fragment into pieces upon impact and become more like buckshot as it passes through the deer. The problem with that is the fragments do not have nearly as much penetrating ability as what one solid bullet would have. If you hit the deer in the shoulder then there’s a chance that the bullet with explode on impact and then the meat of the shoulder will absorb most of that penetrating punch from the fragments. Even if you don’t catch a lot of meat the fragments may still not pass all the way through the deer.

I used silver tips in my 30-30 for a while back when I used to shoot a lot more deer than I do now. I always shot deer behind the shoulder and the silver tips would make mush out of the inside of the body cavity….but I would often times find the fragments embedded in the off side rib cage and not get a pass through. That made for several tough tracks where there little to no blood and I quit using them.

I've been super impressed by the fusions. I've shot a bunch of deer with them in a 3030 & 270. My son shot his first with a 7mm08 yesterday.the deer that did run left amazing blood trails. I've yet to have one that didn't exit even on a deer facing straight away with the 3030. I know the Barnes would work well but at twice the cost

I shot a small buck in the throat patch with a 7 mag at maybe 10 yards and the silvertip exploded and didn't exit. It nearly took his head off but that was an eye opener for me. A big buck that close and the same bullet in the shoulder might end up with a superficial wound

Don't like them. My son used to shoot them in a 7mm mag and although he killed the deer, they didn't bleed well.

Not all ballistic tips are created equal.

Ran across this https://www.ballisticstudies.com/Knowledgebase.html
Lot of reading but interesting to me. Not all factory ammo and not all test on deer but looks well done

I have used them for as long as I can remember. Won't use anything else in my 270 they do the job!

They catch a lot of flack, but I have had great luck with Winchester's Deer Season XP's. I've killed six deer with them and have not had one run yet. They're also more affordable than Winchester Ballistic SilverTips.

130 grain.

I shoot a .300 mag with win ballistic silver tips. They are wicked

No doubt! Shooting a little ole deer with a 300 Win mag,you could probably kill him with a rubber bullet.

I have shot 5-6 deer with them complete pass through on every one and lots of damage all the way through. I would guess you would not get a pass through if you shot directly in the shoulder. But I don't shoot there so they work for me. I like them and my gun likes them.

I shoot the Winchester ballistic silver tips and I really like them and the damage they do.
They’re all I will shoot.


Entry

No reason an entry hole should ever look like that

I believe I have always gotten a pass through with silver tips out of my .270. I am a fan and haven't found any reason to leave them.

I've had great luck for several decades with handloaders Ballistic Tips in my .308. At 2920, you get giant holes and at least part of the bullet will pass through. It really doesn't matter, because they are always DRT or make it only a few yards.

But I would not use them in anything smaller than a .30 caliber. I've seen too many run off with no exit that others used. I hunted for years with a guy who insisted on using them in a .243 and it's a terrible bullet for that round. No telling how many deer I helped him track, and we never found a lot of them. Troy has said they gave mixed results in his .270. And I think even the .30 caliber can fail at velocities above .308/30.06 levels. My uncle lost one on a shoulder shot using a .300 Magnum. I tried to tell him the bullet wasn't designed to go that fast, but he had to find out for himself.

I didn't have a large sample size, but the 30 caliber also was very impressive in a 30/30 Ackley Improved at 2560. I think they would be a good choice in a 30/30 but you would have to handload them.

If I shoot a deer with my .308 it's gonna be a buck and I want him DRT, and I haven't found anything as likely to produce that as a BT. If I am using any other gun, I wanna drill a hole all the way through the deer and plan on probably having to track him. I am gonna try again to kill one with my Colt .45 revolver, and I'll be using a cast bullet that will hopefully pass through. Match the bullet to the gun is my philosophy. Good luck!

Exit wound on a deer shot at 8 yards with a 150g .308 BT:



Entry wound on a deer shot at about 45 yards with same setup:



Exit wound on the same deer:



These pics are nothing unusual and are what I expect from my setup. If a deer ever runs off after I've shot him then I am gonna be sure that I missed. A deer doesn't get away after this kind of damage.

I don’t know what brand bullet he was using but I tracked a big buck for a guy last year that had been shot in the point of the shoulder with a ballistic tip out of 300 mag. He said the deer dropped down on his front side leg nearly to the ground and then spun around and took off. It apparently just exploded on its shoulder and didn’t penetrate well. We tracked it 14 hrs after the shot and jumped it up still alive about 300 yards from the hit site.

Ive shot em since they came out and I high shoulder or neck shoot every deer...and I just drive up to where they dropped in their tracks. Just threaded a needle on a nice buck in the thicket. 8 inch window,..nothing but head and neck. He smelled me snorted,.ran a few steps...gave me that neck and dropped like a turkey.

I like them. Aim at the shoulder and not the lungs. Especially on a mature buck as they will take some lead, especially if theyve been shot before and survived.

HEY! Now you watch that talk!

I love shooting my Winchester Silvertips.

Never had an issue with nosler ballistic tips.

Here's a good rule of thumb

Muzzle Velocity above 3300fps = Mono Bullets

Muzzle Velocity between 3000-3299fps = Bonded Bullets

Muzzle Velocity below 3000fps = any big game bullet


Of course this is MY rule of thumb and based on MY research and real world testing. But...there is a lot of truth to the above. The faster the bullet the more violent the entry. At 3300+ the Ballistic Tips have a higher probability of coming apart too quickly. At .308 speeds, or equivalent they can be absolutely devastating. Choose your bullets based on speeds in which you are pushing them.

I would quit rifle hunting if that's all I could shoot. Terrible bullet in a 25-06.

Shot them in my short mag. Shot and killed one deer at 20 yards. Perfect shot and no blood. Found the buck about 75 yards just walking down a trail I thought he ran down. There was no devastating exit hole but there was an exit hole. Looked jus like the entry hole. I shoot partitions now. Ain’t bet looked back.

Stopped using them 15 or so years ago because of the same issue y'all have already discussed. Shot a nice buck in the shoulder about 125 yds. Bullet exploded inside deer on opposite shoulder. Only had a 27 caliber entry wound and no blood. Deer ran about 200 yds in a thicket. Just happened to walk up on him. Been buying the green and yellow box ever since, no more problems. (The silvertips did group better than any other bulletproof out of that gun)

I agree completely with your conclusions, though all of my experience with bullets faster than 2920 is based on what other people were using. I don't own any rifles faster than a .308 or 30/06. I have never hunted game bigger than deer and I don't hunt where I can see over 400 yards, so I have no use for anything bigger. My uncle had his 300 Magnum for a caribou hunt, and I think he developed a flinch from shooting the thing and has never been a good shot since.

The first deer I shot with a NBT was sometime in the early 90s. I saw a buck walking across a cutover at 180 yards and had to take a quick shot before he got across. He went out of sight at the shot and I didn't know if I had even hit him until I got there. I caught him high in the shoulder and had a fist sized entry with a small exit. I wish I had made a pic; it was the most devastating wound I've ever seen from any gun. A deer has no chance of surviving a hit like that.

So I then loaded some 120g NBT to shoot out of my 7x30 Contender at 2400 fps. I killed several deer with it, and then lost one of the biggest bucks I've ever seen on our place. He was directly facing me when I shot him, and I tracked blood the rest of the day and never recovered him. I switched to a 130g bonded bullet after that and never lost another one. If I'd been using that to start with I have no doubt the deer would have dropped on the spot.

An NBT is a great deer bullet in 30 caliber below 3000, but it's a bad choice in dinky calibers or at higher speeds.

The deer you lost wasn't because you shot a BT. You likely got off center and just clipped part of a lung or maybe just got shoulder. Yes,a better penetrating bonded or mono bullet might have helped if you were at an angle to reach other vitals after more penetration. That BT however acted just like about any cup and core bullet would have with that shot. A core lokt or inter lock may have done the exact same.

It also depends on which one you are shooting. A 120 grain 7mm Nosler BT is a very tough bullet. It was toughened to knock over silhouette targets for those guys when they complained about it.

In general however I do agree with the speed assessment.

I miss the old original silvertips! Left exit holes like soft balls!

Me too!!!
I refuse to use a Ballistic Tip.
Well, maybe an Accubond.

You may be right, but keep in mind this was early 90s and the NBT back then supposedly fragmented worse than they do now. I was on a Contender forum back then and a lot of other hunters had bad experiences with that 120g bullet. The buck was chasing a doe, and the first thing I noticed was the size of his nose. I've never seen a deer that looked like him before or since. He was for sure over 200 lbs and going by body shape he was 7 or 8 and one tough hombre. It was a 75 degree morning the day after Thanksgiving and I was just hunting a doe. I heard him grunting as soon as I got in the stand and immediately wished I had brought the .308.

He grunted and chased her in the thicket for an hour or so, and finally she came out and made a circle by me. I had a rest, but I needed him stopped to try the shot. He stopped at 40 yards facing directly at me, and I put the cross hairs on the center of his chest and shot. His knees buckled, but it didn't even knock him down. Then he ran off hard and came right by me; had thick antlers about 20" wide but looked like just 6 points.

It is certainly possible that I was off center with the shot and only got one lung, but also very possible that tough rib cage deflected the bullet to one side, or even slowed penetration enough that it didn't get a vital at all. I sat in the tree for an hour, confident he would be dead within 100 yds. There wasn't a drop of blood or any sign of a hit. Obviously wasn't an exit, but any bullet would not likely have exited from that angle.

I spent an hour looking through a thicket and finally found blood a quarter mile away where he crossed a road. He had to have been bleeding from the entry, and there wasn't a whole lot. When I found that, I went back to camp and waited a couple of hours. I would have waited longer, and should have, but it was so hot I figured he would spoil if I didn't get him soon. I had other hunters coming that afternoon, but I was still alone at that point.

So I went back and picked up the trail where he crossed the road. Deer had been shot for 4 hours by then. I followed the trail about 200 yds and jumped him. I should have backed away again, but I checked out the bed to see how much blood was there, and it wasn't much. I felt sure at that point the bullet was in his chest cavity and hadn't just blown up on a shoulder. I walked a few yards to where he crossed a ditch to see if there was blood there and jumped him again. He had only gone about 100 yds. I backed off then and waited several hours before going back. I found one more drop of blood and never saw another sign of him. I looked for him until dark and then most of the next day. It was the worst deer hunting story of my life.

I can never know for sure exactly what happened, but I always thought the bullet got inside him and fragmented so much that it wasn't able to kill him. Whatever it was, I still get a sick feeling thinking about that deer. He would have been a great deer to take with a handgun. As I said, I switched to the bonded core bullet after that and never lost another deer with the gun. I will forever believe I would have killed that deer if I'd been using the bonded bullet that morning. I could be wrong.

Several years later I shot a 185 lb buck with the .308 and a BT from that same angle. It completely destroyed everything in his chest and it was like a mass of jello when I field dressed him. Not all NBT bullets are the same.

PCP, just a quick note and totally unrelated but bullet speed and recoil don't always go hand in hand. Usually when I'm talking about high velocity bullets then I'm talking about 6mm 7mm and .257 bullets which can be shot extremely fast but without a bunch of recoil. My 25-06 handloads are pushing 3400fps but have the recoil of your.308.

I certainly understand that, and not quite sure what I said to make you think I didn't? Maybe me saying I had no need for anything bigger than a 308 or 30/06? I was thinking more along the lines of my uncle's 300 Magnum, and the fact that it's too fast for a NBT. Only reason I can see to use that in AL would be at longer ranges than I can see anywhere I hunt.

I've always thought felt recoil had more to do with the weight of the projectile than the velocity. At any rate, I don't think we are disagreeing on anything here.

My main point in getting involved in the thread is that for deer I think there is a pretty narrow range of bullet weight, diameter, and velocity for which the NBT is a great choice. But get very far from that ideal and it becomes a really bad choice.

We are both on the same page

You may very well have center punched him at only 40 yards. Such a shot is the reason I prefer an Accubond over a ballistic tip. I think the Bt's excel at broadside lung shots,but you might not always get that shot.

The last shot I took like that was with a 150 grain factory 270 Fusion. It went full length,exited low in the gut and went back in a hind leg breaking it and lodging against the bone. He didn't go far.

I've got a wall full thay died to the BST ammo I'm mostly 30.06. Dropped a 275lb Nebraska buck Tuesday with them.

Shoot what you like. Any ammo will kill if you shoot them in the heart or lungs.

275lb!! I would like to see a pic of that mule!

The Winchester xp is the most accurate ammo my model 70 will shoot, but I have had mixed results on deer and swapped to fusions. After reading this thread I might go back to it and try to stay away from the big bones. Need to find a bonded bullet with the same accuracy

Nosler Accubonds always shoot well for me.

I load my own cartridges and used .270 Nosler BT's for exactly 1 season. They are "trash" for hunting IMO! Switched over to Nosler Accubonds and they are great. Been shooting them for probably 15 years (maybe longer). Used them in 7mag with superior results - almost every one is a pass-through. If you like Nosler bullets - the Accubond is a great bullet. Nosler partitions are also excellent - but they are on the expensive side and overkill for deer.

BTW, the deer I shot Saturday was of course shot with 308 NBT. I got serious back trouble and can't drag one at all, so I have to pick stands where I can drive to the deer and shoot him in the shoulder with a BT to make sure he is DRT.

But the deer was about 75 yards from a road and walking towards it when I spotted him. Since he was going towards the road I let him get to the last opening before bleating at him to stop him. He was still about 40 yds from the road, so instead of shooting him in the shoulder I shot just behind it, figuring he might make the road before expiring. It worked out perfectly and he was in the ditch just across the road.

I backed the cart right up to him and started winching him into the bed as I always do, but he was so heavy that the cable that holds the winch bumper down snapped and I couldn't get him on. He was far enough into the bed that I was able to just drag him back to the house.

Just further evidence of the superiority of the NBT.