NM Cow Elk Hunt

slimjim · Posted: Wed Nov 30, 2016 2:35 am Post subject: NM Cow Elk Hunt

I was fortunate to harvest a 500-lbs cow elk this past weekend in Western New Mexico. It was a broadside double-lung shot at 196 yards with a new bullet I have been helping a start-up company develop for the 6.8mm SPC, the 105 MKZ Cavity Back Bullet (CBB). The elk went 20 feet and dropped. The bullet was a complete pass through. There was a large pooling of blood around both the exit wound and mouth. I could follow the blood trail back to the point of impact. The picture below of the elk with the 6.8 was taken back at camp not where the elk went down so it doesn’t show the blood loss.

slimjim · Posted: Wed Nov 30, 2016 2:39 am Post subject: Re: NM Cow Elk Hunt

Here is a recoverd 105 MKZ from a hog so I've included this pictures to show how the bullet expands. Its an all-copper bullet and even hitting bone retained its pedals.

slimjim · Posted: Wed Nov 30, 2016 2:40 am Post subject: MKZ Wound Channel

After fielding dressing, you could see the bullet was fully expanded before entering the chest cavity by the 2.5-inch entry wound between two ribs. The exit wound was the same size and broke a rib going out. The lungs clearly showed the wound channel with the off-side wound looking like a 3-pointed star – maybe a result of the 3 pedals of the expanded MKZ. There were no indications that the bullet lost any of its pedals thus retained 100% of its weight during the terminal phase.

slimjim · Posted: Wed Nov 30, 2016 2:41 am Post subject: Re: NM Cow Elk Hunt

My hunting partner had stopped his cow elk with a shot from a 300 WM 165 GMX that hit the spine while the cow was on the move. But he had left his box of ammo at the cabin so only had the one round in his pocket to start with. Thus we used the 6.8 to put the elk down with a shot to the neck (118 yards). We ended up throwing his neck meat away because the 105 MKZ’s expansion and resultant wound channel with bone fragments didn’t make it worth the effort to butcher.

I was pleased and impressed with the 105 MKZ’s performance. I’ve shot cow elk with my .270 Win using 130 GMX and 129 LRX bullets at 275, 325, 350 and 400 yards. Yes, this was a closer 200-yard shot and only a sample of one, however, the entry and exit wounds from the 105 MKZ matched or bettered my prior harvests with a more powerful cartridge plus this elk was down as quick or quicker with more blood loss.

stovepipe · Posted: Wed Nov 30, 2016 12:05 pm Post subject: Re: NM Cow Elk Hunt

Jeebus! The Straps!!!

Elvis · Posted: Wed Nov 30, 2016 6:28 pm Post subject: Re: NM Cow Elk Hunt

them look like good projectiles slim........ thankyou again for all the hard work you put into trying to get the projectile companies to be honest, there sure is a lot of hype and huha out there and its nice to see real results.

Gil Martin · Posted: Wed Nov 30, 2016 10:39 pm Post subject: Re: NM Cow Elk Hunt

Very nice pictures. Thanks for sharing. I like a story with a happy ending. All the best...
Gil

Vince · Posted: Thu Dec 01, 2016 12:10 am Post subject: Re: NM Cow Elk Hunt

Congratulations on your elk...that 6.8 105 MKZ Cavity Back Bullet sure did it's job...and did it well. I would imagine from the results you are getting we can expect to see a 'new kid on the block' in the not too distant future as far as all copper bullets are concerned.

As Elvis said Slim...thanks for all your hard work and for passing on your findings mate.

slimjim · Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2017 5:03 am Post subject: Re: NM Cow Elk Hunt

I finally got around to doing some terminal performance testing with the new MKZ bullets from CBB (CavityBackBullets). These are .277 bullets and they out expand every .308 monolithic bullet I've tested including from the 300 WM.