Question for .45-70 shooters

[dr walker]

Have any of you tried Barnes Original .458 300gr FN bullet? What animals have you shot? penetration? bullet performance?
I am new at shooting a .45-70.
So, far I have only loaded up a few and accuracy was excellent. The load I currently have for it is 1800-1850 FPS.
I am a little concerned of its use as a hunting bullet due to its light for caliber weight.
I am wondering about how this bullet holds up in medium and heavy game animals.
I know there are many other bullets available, but I already have many boxes of these bullets and am not in the position to buy any other bullets right now.

[TDF]

I'm not familiar with Barnes 300 gr bullet but if it holds together well you will have trouble keeping one inside a deer, at least. I've shot 4 deer with the 45/70 and a nosler partition 300 gr at 1800 fps or so and have yet to recover a bullet. In fact I've shot two bucks with 44 mag rifles and a 300 gr Hornady XTP at 1500 fps and only one of those stayed in the deer and that was an angling shot that took out the front shoulder a couple of ribs the lung the liver stomach guts etc. then smashed the offiside rear leg bone and was found just underneath the skin fully expanded. Can't comment on anything larger than Nebraska deer though as that's all I've hunted.

TDF

[Lastmohecken]

I have killed several deer with factory 300gr softpoints, and complete pass through on lung shots (broadside), one fairly heavy bodied buck, dropped in it's tracks with a frontal chest shot. That bullet probably ended up in the stomach, I think. It was getting dark and I field dressed it but didn't have time to dig around to find out, before it got dark.

Wild dogs and coyotes usually fell DRT with about any decent body hit, or at the very least got anchored, well enough for a finisher. These were often running shots.

I like the 300gr, even as a factory load it does pretty good at resonable ranges, on whitetails and smaller stuff.

[Stan in SC]

I load 300 grain .458 Remington jacketed hollow points in my 45-70's with great results.
I also load 300 grain .430 cast bullets in a .44 magnum single shot rifle and am very pleased with the accuracy.

Stan in SC

[Bear 45/70]

Why use expensive jacketed bullets when it isn't necessary with a .458" diameter bullet. The .458 is already as big in diameter as as most expanded 30 caliber bullets. Because of this I went to lead bullets and have had only one runner and he went a whole 30 feet.

[dr walker]

Bear 45/70- I agree completely with not buying expensive jacketed bullets, but I did not buy these and I have a bunch of them. I am just trying to save money by not buying any other bullets. I was hoping someone had some hunting experience with these bullets, just so I would have some idea what to expect. I will try to get out and shoot a few pigs before it gets too hot and the mosquitos carry me away.

[otteray]

Same thing that I want to know, here in lead free condor country.
Barnes' website has 300 gr loads for the Ruger No.1 with IMR 4227 ( a powder that I have) that I simply want to know if that data can be used with the Marlin Guide Gun, with the staring load backed off a bit.
The powders they do show for the Marlin 1895 Guide are not available around here.

[Swampman]

I don't think you can beat the Remington 405 grain bullet. It's awesome!

[Bear 45/70]

Same thing that I want to know, here in lead free condor country.
Barnes' website has 300 gr loads for the Ruger No.1 with IMR 4227 ( a powder that I have) that I simply want to know if that data can be used with the Marlin Guide Gun, with the staring load backed off a bit.
The powders they do show for the Marlin 1895 Guide are not available around here.

The max Ruger loads are a complete NO-NO in any Marlin as the top Ruger pressure is 50,000 CUP and Marlin's max pressure is 40,000 CUP. I would suspect that most any copper jacketed bullets loads in the same weight should be close.

[otteray]

Same thing that I want to know, here in lead free condor country.
Barnes' website has 300 gr loads for the Ruger No.1 with IMR 4227 ( a powder that I have) that I simply want to know if that data can be used with the Marlin Guide Gun, with the staring load backed off a bit.
The powders they do show for the Marlin 1895 Guide are not available around here.

The max Ruger loads are a complete NO-NO in any Marlin as the top Ruger pressure is 50,000 CUP and Marlin's max pressure is 40,000 CUP. I would suspect that most any copper jacketed bullets loads in the same weight should be close.

I emailed Barnes and got some load data from Preston using powders that I have:
SR 4759, XMP 5744 and IMR 4227

[Mike D.]

I use the Barnes 300 TSX down in Condor Country and it performs just as you would expect. Blacktails are no match for this bullet, nor are they for .308 TSXs in my 1895 .30-06. I haven't poked any pigs with 'em but expect to soon. Those so-called Ruger No1 loads work OK in my 1886s, too. You must be prepared for some serious sight adjustment, though, due to the copper bullets striking considerably higher.