Shot a nice doe this afternoon at about 80yds with the 270 win loaded with 130gr ttsx, I was very surprised at the damage that was caused by this load. I am not used to seeing these perform this way. I have only used them in 7mag with 140 ttsx, and there is no comparison between these. The 140gr made a nice quarter sized hole all the way through. This deer was broadside at a slight angle facing me. This may have contributed to the extensive damage displayed in the pics below. What do some of you think?

Left side entry

So much for eating up to the hole........ Plenty of fat on that doe, she was eating good!

My thoughts too.

I think you got a cup and core mixed in with your TTSXs. Out of about 80 deer, I have yet to see one anywhere near that. And, that includes deer shot at pretty short range.

I shot four through the shoulders this year using a 50 cal ML rifle with T-EZs at 1700 FPS and all four were dead when they hit the ground and never moved. Nothing even approaching a mess, much less like that.

I had something similar with TTSX 85 grn out of a .243 last year. Mine was only a sample size of 2 but on both the shoulder was shredded! Shot distance was about the same as yours.

My wife shot a mule deer buck with a 100 TTSX from a .257 Roberts this year. She's very careful about avoiding shooting shoulders, if they can be avoided, so placed the bullet behind the shoulder on the broadside buck, yet several pounds of meat was lost.

We have generally found TSX's and similar monolithics like the Nosler E-Tip and Hornady GMX do shoot up less meat than bullets losing some weight, but velocity has a lot to do with it, and all expanding bullets will sometimes damage considerable meat. The MV of Eileen's load is around 3150 fps and the range was a little under 100 yards.

are you sure it wasn't an old Nosler ballistic tip?....that's what it looks like anyway...

I have seen pretty messy results with the 120 TTSX out of my .260 at closer ranges. As previously stated velocity has a lot to do with damaged meat.

I killed deer with 110 TTSX's from a 270 and 80 gr TTSX from a 243 this season and got nowhere close to that kind of carnage. The 120 gr Fusions from the 7-08 seem to be harder on meat.

Not a 270, but I used a 100 gr TTSX in a 257 Weatherby on a 5-point white tail a month ago and it completely destroyed the front end - you'd have needed to eat it with a straw. 177 yards on the laser afterwards. It was a perfect heart shot, cut a notch out of the top of the heart and took out all of the big blood vessels coming out of the top. It still ran 71 paces. Every 10 feet or so it looked like someone had sprayed a gallon of red paint on the snow. The only bone hit going in and out were ribs. Both sides were layered bloodshot from the brisket to the withers and part way up the neck.

I've been using X's of one kind or another since they first came out 25+ years ago, and have never seen damage like this. This was the first Tipped X that I have shot an animal with, and the first blood for my 257 Wby, although a grand total sum of one doesn't prove anything. The load was a 100 gr TTSX over 76 grains of Magnum and a Fed 215 in Weatherby cases, and according to the Chrony is going just shy of 3600 fps corrected 15' from the muzzle. I have no idea how fast it would have been travelling at 177 yards, but WOW, I'm a little leary to use it again.

I am sure this was a TTSX 130gr load, thats the only thing I shoot through 270. Besides ballistic tips are yellow in the 270. This was about the worst I've seen with a TTSX ever. Nothing even close with 7mm 140gr's. But clipping the back edge of the shoulder blade caused the bullet to come apart I would assume.

No, the bullet didn't come apart, not on a shoulder blade. But fragments from the shoulder blade probably added to the meat damage.

Wow! I have never seen a TTSX do anything like that. Did it hit something before hitting the deer? I had a GMX from a 7mag hit a twig last year, then strike the deer in the neck and come out on the shoulder. The entry was way larger than I expected and theoff shoulder was a mess.

I have some 130 grain TTSXs and am getting ready to work up a do it all load for my Dad. I haven't shot any out of a .270, but have had such good performance in other cartridges, we are going to give them a try.

I'm sure if the bullet collided with the shoulder joint in the exact right spot, it'd explode the bone sending bone fragments into the meat causing exactly what you had happen. You can eat right up the hole when it's in the flat part of the scapula, but hit that joint and bone tends to go everywhere.

The shoulder blade was shredded and framented into tiny pieces so that very well could be where a lot came from, there was nothing in between me and the deer it was a straight clean shot, only slightly on an angle.

I've put a few 270 bullets through deer shoulders. I have put a few through deer shoulder blades. I made a fist size hole through the onside blade with a .270 TTSX. I have run a bunch more Barnes in other calibers through deer shoulders and I have never seen anything even remotely approaching this one.

In my experience, deer scapula usually break down into what would be described as gravel and not shards like leg bones.

I've put really high speed Barnes through deer at inside ten yards and never seen this.

I don't get the expectation that killing critters shouldn't get a little bloody now and then. Chit happens. And I had the same thing happen on a cow elk this year with a 180 ttsx.

It beats me, thats what I was shooting the TTSX for was to stay together, but oh well on that one. Shot quite a few with 7mm 140gr TTSX and results were minimal damage but DRT results. It sure made a nice conversation anyway. Thanks for all the inputs, comments. I will try again and compare results with this one.

First time I ever heard of a TSX doing that? I don;t use them sso I don't really know but the theory about the bullet exploding the shoulder joint sound's like it might be right. Only deer I've ever seen messed up that bad was a mule deer I shot in the shoulder with a 225gr bullet from a 338 win mag. Nothing was salvageable in the front of that deer.

I popped a whitetail this year with a 80 grain TTSX at 3900 fps MV out of a .257 Weatherby. Since the range was only 68 yards it had most of it left. Anyway, I caught the back of the shoulder, blew a fist sized entrance hole and a bullet sized exit just behind the far shoulder. It still ran maybe 40-50 yards with a blood trail 8 feet wide. I don't know about you, but I'm getting sick of my stories with Barnes bullets ending with "And then it ran away and we looked for it". This one was a science project to see if hyper speed was going to drop animals better; I think its safe to say I'm going to go back to bullets with lead in them and leave the TSXs and TTSXs for buffalo and such.

Good to hear how many people have never seen this sort of damage with a TSX, so know it can't happen. I've put hundreds of thousands of rounds through various Remington 700's and never had a bolt handle come off, but I know it can happen.

I've seen extensive TSX meat damage now and then. One other time was also when my wife shot a mule deer buck with the same .257 Roberts and load--except this was back before the Tipped TSX appeared, so the bullet was the hollow-point version of the 100-grain.

The buck was standing broadside in tall sagebrush 50 yards away, so only the top half of the body was visible. The bullet landed at the bottom edge of the shoulder blade, behind the joint, and went through the top of both lungs. We lost most of that shoulder--despite the bullet only going through the shoulder blade and not the joint.

I think I am going back with the 130gr SP Hornady Interlocks, never had a failure with any caliber, and half the cost. I'm using 117 BTSP in 25-06, and working on 180gr 300 win mag. Can't go wrong with the Hornady line for deer sized game in my opinion.

Coincidentally, I shot a mule deer buck a day after my wife did--and with a 130-grain Hornady SP Interlock from a .270 Winchester. Less meat was damaged with the Hornady, but my buck was at least twice as far away, and muzzle velocity was around 100 fps slower.

I've also had excellent luck on deer with Interlock Spire Points, using bullets from the 100-grain .25 to the 200-grain .338.

I shot 3 deer over the weekend with 139 grn Interlocks from a 7mm-08. Every bullet fragmented into very small fragments and left me chasing them through the meat and even throwing away a bit because it likely contained fragments. I dug out several very small fragments. I didn't find anything larger than 1/10 of those bullets. All shots were from 20 - 80 yards though.

Sometimes things happen like that... I have seen the humble ol' 30-30 blood-shoot up most of the "backstrap" from a high hit to the spine.

The shot was angled a little toward the rear of the deer, entry was top of shoulder and exited mid back, but most of the meat was toast clean to the rump. A single factory 150 gr core-lokt was the culprit, Average size whitetail range 50'ish yards... Wound looked similar to the one in your deer Hammer2506, just a different path in the deer.

Damage not as drastic as that in the op's pics but, was surprised at the amount of bloodshot meat on a deer a few geeks ago....slightly quartering away at approx. 60 yds., 130 gr. Partition out of a 270 entered just behind the left shoulder and messed up the opposite shoulder even though it did not exit directly through it....hydrostatic shock at 3100+fps will sometimes mess things up.

Did you catch the "elbow" by chance?

80 gr. TTSX at 3,600 fps out of a .240, 130 # doe at 85 yds. I dug double hands full of clot out of the cavity. Fair amount of damage inside the chest, she ran 100 yds. Had to find her at night in the woods.

DF

R H Clark,

You might want to contact Hornady about that. I've shot quite a few animals with the 139 Interlock, both flat-base and boattail, from the 7x57 and .280 Remington, on game up to cow elk sized. They've mostly exited, and the few I did find were mushroomed back to the Interlock ring.

Any company can put out a bad batch of bullets. I was talking to Hornady official this spring and he said once in a while they get somebody on the line who tries to hurry things up. The result can be shallower Interlock rings, higher inside the jacket.

I used to use them in the 7mm STW and got 90% exits with spectacular kills. One thing though, I used the flat-base version, the boat-tail likes to come apart.

been using the same as you just used, for 3-4 years now, and have never seen damage like that.

But from a few years of hunting, every now and then something happens you don't expect.

Will say though, we stay off shoulders and always have done so.

Couldn't be.

Yeah, that's what I thought too!

The most consistent way I've found to minimize meat loss even with monometal bullets is to keep muzzle velocity moderate--and keep the bullet in the ribs.

Damm funkiller that MD is.......

Yeah, reality overdose, for sure...

DF

Going in one side, out the other and destroying everything in between is what TSX's do best, and the reason I use them.

High velocity bullet impacts destroy meat. You'd be disappointed if they didn't.

7mm 120g TTSX @ 2900

Entrance


Same hole under the hide.

Damage on the ribs shouldn't bother anyone.