Favorite.17 cal bullet
- Thread starter Wolfdog91
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spotstalkshoot
Well-known member
There isn't a great supply/choice of 17 cal bullets, mostly because of market demand and bullet jacket supply. What is your intended use? Is the barrel a 1/9 twist? If so the Hornady 25 vmax will get you started but it isn't a good coyote bullet, more of a raccoon size and smaller critter getter.
For various reasons, good .17 coyote bullets have become hard to come by. J4 stopped making jackets long enough for 30's a long time ago. But for a .17-223, 25's would be more appropriate anyway. Pretty much any 25 you can find that isn't a Vmax or MEF should be "pretty good". The discontinued Hornady HP, Midway has had a run of them made off and on since they were discontinued and sells them at a very reasonable price when they do. Whether they will again or not, or when, though, who knows. Last time they had them I stocked up at $10 per hundred. And, it's not even a bullet I use (I'm still using up J4 30's). Just figured, get them while the getting was good.
- DAA
- DAA
Look forward to hearing him a this works out for ya.
Can’t add anything much. Don’t get attached to a discontinued bullet unless you can buy them right and in a good number. Hornady is my main stay but Blackhole has some I would like to try, probably be another barrel or a new build. May be a while for me as I am another that bought a pile from midway, before I ran across a fellow from California selling all his brass and bullets from his loading business, he quit when they went green.
Coyotejunki
Well-known member
I have a supply of both Hornady HP and Berger match 25gr bullets, I like the Bergers best but Hornady HP are a close second
rivervalley
Member
Why won't the vmax work for anything larger than a crow or woodchuck?
Coyotejunki
Well-known member
Not speaking for Borkon only myself, 17 cal Vmax's can and have killed larger prey such as coyotes, it is just I believe the majority opinion they are not as reliable to do so.
OTOH an old (LOL) Arizona trapper and ADC guy I am very good friends with told me the Factory 17 Hornady Hornet bullet has killed bobcats and coyotes out to 200 for him. Though it isn't his main rifle, honestly I think the old 22LR rimfire from his pistol kills more trapped coyotes yearly than most of us do calling. I believe he does trap and shoot a few hundred coyotes yearly. Sorry went off topic.
Back on point, what I believe is best and what sometimes works are two worlds apart.
Chance Doane
Well-known member
My Favorite Coyote bullet out of my 17 TAC is Todd Kinders Woodchuck Den Gold 30 gr Boattail Hollowpoint at 3950 FPS. Lays Called Coyotes out quick as Mike Tysons Punch!
My next choice is the Berger 25 gr Match target bullet at 4225 fps.
Both of these bullets are sadly discontinued
My next choice is the Berger 25 gr Match target bullet at 4225 fps.
Both of these bullets are sadly discontinued
Dultimatpredator
Well-known member
If I remember back when I bought a 17 Remington from a member here, the 25 burger was the holy Grail coyote. I remember loading it up and going out and shooting a few ladder test and it didn’t impress me so I sold the gun off gave it a chance. I think I’m just a 22 caliber or 243 caliber kind of guy.
alf
Well-known member
The old Coyote Gods website was of the mind if you weren't shooting the 25 Berger you were a 2nd class citizen.
I was into the 17's pretty heavy back when we had fox around here & no coyotes. First gun was a custom 17-222 and performance with the 25 Hornady or 25 Remingtons were about equal in accuracy & fur, and about the only 2 viable options out there at the time. When Berger came out with the 30's, I tried them due to my barrel having a pretty long throat. They worked fine, but when Hornady came out with the 20 Vmax, I felt that was the holy grail for a fox bullet at 4200 or so.
Once the coyotes took over, I sold all the 17 guns & stuff, & moved up in calibers, as I prefer bigger bullets for coyotes.
Those were the two. There were some other good ones, long gone too, like the Genco's and more recently the Nagel's. Couple others, long, long gone.
- DAA
Dultimatpredator
Well-known member
After the first couple of range sessions with my gun, less than stellar accuracy, versus my other predator rifles, along with super small holes in the target, I just didn’t get excited about the caliber. Just never gave it a chance. It was a limited run 700 with an HS precision stock, stainless. Nobody wanted to buy it here because the bolt was silver and the barrel had black coating over it. Think I paid 450 bucks for it through the classified here and I’ve been sitting there for months. It shot about three-quarter inch groups if I remember right when I load tested it at best. I sent it in To have the coding bead blasted off the barrel and the bolt spiral fluted. Costed me under 150 bucks. They are in back by the time everything was done. i needed up selling it for $1650 bucks a year or two later and bought a new 14.5” POF P415 with the proceeds on sale at Cabela’s for $1849 at the time. Used my points I had saved up along with the profit from the 17 rem. that gun made me a lot of money. It was a good investment because the POF .2 inch to .3 inch at 200 yards with hand loaded 60 grain vmax along with 25 grains of benchmark. The only bad part of that gun is it blows your eardrums out. A lot of coyotes with it and it’s been sitting since the new shoes have worn off with that one too but it’s not going anywhere for how accurate is.
spotstalkshoot
Well-known member
You can still get the best Red fox/raccoon bullet, Berger 25 gr match VARMINT (mef). I have a good supply of Hornady 25 HP, Berger 25/30 varmint/target and Woodchuck den 25/29. And a fellow from WY made a bunch of custom 29 gr hp(when he still had jackets) for me, the metplat on those are between the Berger varmint and target in size. I wanted to be able to wear out a couple barrels. I like 2-5 inches penetration on coyote, 1-3" penetration on red fox. Saves a lot of time not having to sew hides.
Does the 25gr Berger perform much different then the 25gr Hornady HP? That 25gr Hornady HP that was discontinued a couple years ago was kind of a tough little bullet. I don't think I've ever shot any of the 17 cal 25gr Berger's so I'm curious how they compare to the Hornady's.
I haven't actually used the 25 Hornady. I have a bunch of them, but haven't ever needed to try them.
When you say "25 Berger", things get fuzzy. The 25 Berger that we are talking about was the old, old, old 25 "Match". Berger applied the same name to a different bullet later, then mixed things up again with the "Varmint Match" and so on and so on until the meaning of "25 Berger" has gotten hard to keep straight.
The old 25 Match had a teeny, tiny, super tight meplat. Which was it's secret sauce for "controlled expansion". At MV's in the 3800-4000 fps and ranges under 200 yards it was "just right" for coyote. And had just enough penetration to allow for a direct shoulder hit without pure splash.
Back when Clint Starke was making bullets, I did a lot of prototype testing for him. And I could never talk him into making a 25 (or 30 for that matter) with that tiny meplat. His reason, which made perfect sense, is that you'll occasionally get a punch stuck in that tiny HP and have to stop and replace the punch. And from a one man elbow powered operation, that just didn't make financial sense.
When Clint got out of the bullet business, Chan Nagel bought his dies. And bless Chan's heart! First time I talked to him, before he had even started to sell any, he was onboard with the tiny meplat and while he was operational, we had a really good coyote bullet. And more than that, when J4 stopped making long .17 jackets, he endeavored to make his own jackets which were every bit as good as J4 and he provided a really good 30 gr. too.
But, long winded way of saying, I haven't actually used the Hornady so can't actually answer your question!
- DAA
When you say "25 Berger", things get fuzzy. The 25 Berger that we are talking about was the old, old, old 25 "Match". Berger applied the same name to a different bullet later, then mixed things up again with the "Varmint Match" and so on and so on until the meaning of "25 Berger" has gotten hard to keep straight.
The old 25 Match had a teeny, tiny, super tight meplat. Which was it's secret sauce for "controlled expansion". At MV's in the 3800-4000 fps and ranges under 200 yards it was "just right" for coyote. And had just enough penetration to allow for a direct shoulder hit without pure splash.
Back when Clint Starke was making bullets, I did a lot of prototype testing for him. And I could never talk him into making a 25 (or 30 for that matter) with that tiny meplat. His reason, which made perfect sense, is that you'll occasionally get a punch stuck in that tiny HP and have to stop and replace the punch. And from a one man elbow powered operation, that just didn't make financial sense.
When Clint got out of the bullet business, Chan Nagel bought his dies. And bless Chan's heart! First time I talked to him, before he had even started to sell any, he was onboard with the tiny meplat and while he was operational, we had a really good coyote bullet. And more than that, when J4 stopped making long .17 jackets, he endeavored to make his own jackets which were every bit as good as J4 and he provided a really good 30 gr. too.
But, long winded way of saying, I haven't actually used the Hornady so can't actually answer your question!
- DAA