Thread: 308 subsonic. I'm a bit late to the party.

308 subsonic...
I'm a bit late to the party.

Ok here goes.....

Request some ideas.

I have a 308 16" rifle. And*have had success with this over the years bush hunting.

With a variety of projectiles. It*has a 11 twist factory barrel.

A mate has a new dog and has expressed interest in shooting subsonic loads over his dog. In*the Southland bush.

My interest is in the reloading side of this exercise rather than the dog side of the exercise.

Previous reloading of Sunsonic*

I have tried some 208grain pills with trailboss a few years ago. And*these work well in terms of grouping out to 50m (about 1").

But in terms of hunting I'm concerned about the lethaly of these.

With only having shot a small fallow(in the neck), and a number of rabbit type creatures.

Current reloading efforts Subsonic**

I have just tried the new Nosler 220 sub sonic pills.

But these must almost be coming out of the barrel sideways! See*image of tumbling at 25m!

I knew that this was probable outcome of this being the case because of the twist rate.

Some options-

A. Option to use these or the Lehigh projectiles is to rebarrel to a faster twist.

Unlikely to do this immediately.

B. Option to go to a cast projectile. I*believe someone makes cast projectiles on the forum.

Questions ...

Who is using the cast option?

What effect does the cast projectile have on my barrel in terms of being able to switch between subsonic load and a supersonic*Berger load?

Lead coating in barrel?

i.e. I want to have the option of shooting subsonic in bush and still be able to shoot supers on a scree slip on same day.

Whoa. That is a lot of txt!

Cheers for any ideas.

I use 151gn cast with 7.8 of trailboss behind them and they group around an inch at 100 yards. Not being very fussy about my barrel cleaning, apart from a boresnake every few shots, my rifle will happily shoot full noise hornady etc and retain accuracy.
Rifle has 16.5 inch barrel and one in ten twist.

Have shot a number of goats using the subs, over my dog. Max distance around 80 yards, They dont get up

Thanks Pengy.

Where are you getting your 151's from?

Pm sent

I shot a few deer using the same 151gr cast hollow points a couple of weeks ago. Shot placement is critically key. Shoot them in the head and hit the side, jaw snout many supersonic rounds will kill the animal, subbies won't. Neck shooting skim the vertebrae or miss the main neck bone and you will never see it again.
I generally lung shoot them as there is slightly more margin of error but once again you can't really afford to hit the main shoulder bone. Some deer go 20 yards some go 120 so if you are in the bush without a dog that's good at tracking then you might have a hard time.

shootersNZ....he makes them,sells them for stuff all on trademe. 151grn HP from Tokoroa....job done.
and take note of what the wise chap has said in above post......

I would rather use a supersonic load to poke decent hole in deer if shot wasnt 100% rested/calm animal etc and by all means use subs for a finisher etc...they are fun.

So those sideways projectiles im guessing you could end up with a blown to bits suppresor? They must be crazy unstable to do that at only 25 yards I could throw one like a dart straighter

I fired 15 of the cast 151gr projectiles on Sunday, muzzle velocity ranging from 1130 to 1300 fps, 1:12 twist 308, all made nice round holes at 50m.

a suggestion...try pushing them flying bricks at say 1700fps......dont throw them away,plenty of folk been really keen to try them out....yours is the first lot of results Ive seen.

Originally Posted by 284 Gypsy

308 subsonic...
I'm a bit late to the party.

Ok here goes.....

Request some ideas.

I have a 308 16" rifle. And*have had success with this over the years bush hunting.

With a variety of projectiles. It*has a 11 twist factory barrel.

A mate has a new dog and has expressed interest in shooting subsonic loads over his dog. In*the Southland bush.

My interest is in the reloading side of this exercise rather than the dog side of the exercise.

Previous reloading of Sunsonic*

I have tried some 208grain pills with trailboss a few years ago. And*these work well in terms of grouping out to 50m (about 1").

But in terms of hunting I'm concerned about the lethaly of these.

With only having shot a small fallow(in the neck), and a number of rabbit type creatures.

Current reloading efforts Subsonic**

I have just tried the new Nosler 220 sub sonic pills.

But these must almost be coming out of the barrel sideways! See*image of tumbling at 25m!

I knew that this was probable outcome of this being the case because of the twist rate.

Some options-

A. Option to use these or the Lehigh projectiles is to rebarrel to a faster twist.

Unlikely to do this immediately.

B. Option to go to a cast projectile. I*believe someone makes cast projectiles on the forum.

Questions ...

Who is using the cast option?

What effect does the cast projectile have on my barrel in terms of being able to switch between subsonic load and a supersonic*Berger load?

Lead coating in barrel?

i.e. I want to have the option of shooting subsonic in bush and still be able to shoot supers on a scree slip on same day.

Whoa. That is a lot of txt!

Cheers for any ideas.

Attachment 106120

Attachment 106119

You won't get any lead fouling with cast bullets at subsonic velocity, most people can get good enough accuracy for head shots at 50 metres
I would not bother with the Lehigh bullets they recommend a 1:8" twist same with the Nosler the Hornady will probably be the same,
The extra weight over the 151HP will only give more penetration which is not much use when the 151HP will shoot through a goat with a heart-lung shot.

Thanks for the reply.

I have trademed some from you earlier today.

I’ve got some 200gn casts off shooternz here if you want to try them.

Another option to consider is going slow but not subsonic, the rounds I fired were still supersonic but lots quieter than "normal" 308 rounds, and would be quieter still with a suppressor.
A 151gr cast bullet at 1500fps has double the energy of the same bullet at 1050fps, still need to pick your shots but a bit more room for error.

Yep I would go for reduced load not subsonic for deer with the 151g cast,been down the subsonic rabbit hole few years now,addictive for sure.trail boss is good for the casts as well.