I am new to the site and have attempted using the search function but haven’t quite found an answer that satiates me. I have a 6.5 creedmoor in a mdt savage ba10 chassis. Supposedly the 6.5 ba 110 is great for punching paper out to 1500 with great barrel life which is the original intent for buying said rifle for PRS competition but I’d like to know what range it stops being viable for animal hunting using a scale if possible. I realize load plays a huge part in this and using match rounds is not advisable for game hunting. So what I’m looking for is: Example up to 400 for elk or 200 for bear etc. up to 1000 or more if people have viable data. Thanks for any input!
- Thread starter Sorcice
- Start date
Thanks I’ll check that out. I’m curious what people have actually experienced though. It’s one thing to say you can drop a deer at 300 cause most calibers can. But most people don’t shoot super long for anything but paper. Figured with all the shooters here someone might have experience doing 800+
How far can you hit an 8” paper plate from field conditions with the first shot?
Be honest, now.
Be honest, now.
I’ve only been able to test with my 308 that was to 100 at local range which is pretty basic but sub 1moa. Looking at joining private range with new 6.5 which goes out to 1200. They host a number of competitions from 3 gun to prs/bench/f-class. Reason I’m asking about energy at distance is “SHTF” prep. If I need to buy something like a 7mm mag, 300wm, 338LM etc which I already know carry energy at over 1k. Reason I didn’t get one initially is barrel wear and cost of ammo compared to 6.5c. Really hoping I can use 6.5c for competition and hunting to well past what I realistically need so I don’t have to worry about not dropping what I’m shooting at if I do my job.
I’d settle for first shot.
Especially if you have to jog the last 50 yards to get into position before he feeds over the ridge.
And limit your total setup time to 30 seconds or less.
P
It stops when you can no longer make an ethical shot. There is no way to create a scale.
Not being a jerk but there is so much wrong here.
Never shot past 100 and want to put a deer down at 1000.
Asking how far can it kill but have no idea of “suggested energy” at distance
Punching paper at 1500 with a 6.5CM…ask those guys:
How many shots to get on paper
What size paper
What position
Was it windy (hunting isn’t a nice day at the square range on a bench)
1 Moa is 15” at that distance that’s bigger than most vitals
Truthfully you will get tons of responses but in reality you should start learning about ballistics through a calc as suggested.
Then you’ll need proper gear, decent scope decent LRF etc.
Example, is your scope or spotter good enough to tell if the antlers are what you expect…can you even make antlers out in a cluttered background. If you can’t it’s a no shot situation.
At distance in the field is a totally different animal than lobbing rounds at the range after 40 rounds of warm up.
Never shot past 100 and want to put a deer down at 1000.
Asking how far can it kill but have no idea of “suggested energy” at distance
Punching paper at 1500 with a 6.5CM…ask those guys:
How many shots to get on paper
What size paper
What position
Was it windy (hunting isn’t a nice day at the square range on a bench)
1 Moa is 15” at that distance that’s bigger than most vitals
Truthfully you will get tons of responses but in reality you should start learning about ballistics through a calc as suggested.
Then you’ll need proper gear, decent scope decent LRF etc.
Example, is your scope or spotter good enough to tell if the antlers are what you expect…can you even make antlers out in a cluttered background. If you can’t it’s a no shot situation.
At distance in the field is a totally different animal than lobbing rounds at the range after 40 rounds of warm up.
Ok there’s a lot to reply to so I’m gonna go section by section:
“Never shot past 100 and want to put a deer down at 1000. “ and “Asking how far can it kill but have no idea of “suggested energy” at distance”
I didn’t say I would be taking shots at 1000 for hunting. I asked for data if people had real life experience. I don’t often hear of anyone pushing out past 400. Hide density is also a consideration. What easily punches through a deer at 2-300 may not go through moose or bear as effectively leading to multiple hits to drop said animal.
“Truthfully you will get tons of responses but in reality you should start learning about ballistics through a calc as suggested.”
Working on this already. Thanks. I’m currently in process of finding an instructor for distance shooting.
“Then you’ll need proper gear, decent scope decent LRF etc. “
currently I have a sig 1600 LRF and the savage ba10 in 6.5cm. I’m saving for a decent FFP scope currently. I hear vortex and leupold make nice glass for the price. Any observations on glass I should be aware of? Spending limit is around 3k.
“Never shot past 100 and want to put a deer down at 1000. “ and “Asking how far can it kill but have no idea of “suggested energy” at distance”
I didn’t say I would be taking shots at 1000 for hunting. I asked for data if people had real life experience. I don’t often hear of anyone pushing out past 400. Hide density is also a consideration. What easily punches through a deer at 2-300 may not go through moose or bear as effectively leading to multiple hits to drop said animal.
“Truthfully you will get tons of responses but in reality you should start learning about ballistics through a calc as suggested.”
Working on this already. Thanks. I’m currently in process of finding an instructor for distance shooting.
“Then you’ll need proper gear, decent scope decent LRF etc. “
currently I have a sig 1600 LRF and the savage ba10 in 6.5cm. I’m saving for a decent FFP scope currently. I hear vortex and leupold make nice glass for the price. Any observations on glass I should be aware of? Spending limit is around 3k.
I should have been more specific on the scale. For instance, ethical shots I assume are 1:1 in most cases as in 1 shot 1 kill. If hide density or size of the animal is a factor that may change the ratio to 2-3:1 which isn’t ethically worth doing. So what may drop a white tail at 400 only needing to penetrate 8in with hide may only punch in 4-6in with hide on a moose at even 300 possibly not touching vitals. Hence asking for scale. I realize this is all dependent on caliber load/weight/velocity/etc which is why I asked for real life data because they’d have that info to base off.
If you can put a hole through something important reliably every time on an animal at a given distance, then you can hunt at that distance.
The energy on target thing is BS for measuring how far you can put something down. Look up the ft lbs of energy that arrows have. People are shooting elk with projectiles carrying less than 100 ft lbs of energy.
It's all about where you can reliably put that hole.
The energy on target thing is BS for measuring how far you can put something down. Look up the ft lbs of energy that arrows have. People are shooting elk with projectiles carrying less than 100 ft lbs of energy.
It's all about where you can reliably put that hole.
I bow hunt as well so I'd chime in.
A bullet and an arrow are different. A bullet requires the energy for expansion. An arrow doesn't really expand (except mechanical broadheads but the energy required is miniscule). The arrow also as a shaft which can contribute to tissue damage.
The tissue damage pattern is completely different.
False equivalence.
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The arrow shaft can contribute to tissue damage, but a slow bullet can't. 
Shoot them through the vitals, they die. Its really that simple. Someone killed one of friends dogs once with a .177 caliber BB gun. He went home from work one day and his dog was acting weird. It died later that night. He took it to the vet, and they found BB had passed between two rips and punctured the dogs heart.
Here is my thought, and I have two 6.5 creeds for hunting. I have shoot them both to 1000 plus many times. I personally feel comfortable at about 800 to put it where I want it “in the right conditions”. Time, wind, animal behavior. But I think I would limit that cartridge for me to about 650 on an elk. I have heard of longer but at some point I still want more energy
So I bench 300, work concrete and have a bazillion bow kills,
All that aside,
I do crop damage for whitetail deer. So I get a lot of experience hunting at distance. Currently have 34 kills over 600 yards with several over 1,000.
Here is what I’ve learned
My longest kill at 1121 was with a 260. All honesty I was running a 142 SMK bullet. It did the job but pin hole in and pin hole out. That caliber (6.5) just isn’t meant for 1,000 yard hunting. Unless it’s maybe a prairie dog or coyote
I’ve shot many deer with a 6.5 CM, 260 Rem (the man version of 6.5 CM), 308, 300 WM, 338 LM and 50 cal
The 6.5 is an excellent target round for 1,000 yards. When it comes to killing power it simply lacks. I’ve shot several deer from 600-800 yards with 6.5 143 ELDX bullets. I haven’t been impressed. The 178 ELDX in 30 cal is much more forgiving. That doesn’t mean 6.5 won’t do the job but there’s definitely better
I’d consider the 6.5/260/308 a decent round for out to 800 yards. Not perfect but decent. Beyond that I’d step it up to a 7mm/300 etc variant
Will the bullet get there, yes
Will the bullet kill the deer, yes
Will you recover the deer, hopefully
Will you be impressed, probably not
Are there better options, yes
There’s I’m sure several people who will tell you the 6.5 CM will kill very well to 1000 yards. Likely they’re basing their results off a single or at least very small sample size of kill shots.
Your taking a life. You owe it to the animal to make it ethical.
You also have a lot to learn. So become proficient before you start shooting at animals. At any distance
Don’t be that guy that shows up, brags his 6.5 can kill at 1,000 yards, fire a pile of rounds, maybe touch the target 10-25% of the shots, then go out hunting at that distance
If you want to kill ethnically with the 6.5. Keep it inside 800 in my opinion. Others will disagree. 6.5 PRC/6.5-284 are the only 6.5 I’d consider for true LR hunting
All that aside,
I do crop damage for whitetail deer. So I get a lot of experience hunting at distance. Currently have 34 kills over 600 yards with several over 1,000.
Here is what I’ve learned
My longest kill at 1121 was with a 260. All honesty I was running a 142 SMK bullet. It did the job but pin hole in and pin hole out. That caliber (6.5) just isn’t meant for 1,000 yard hunting. Unless it’s maybe a prairie dog or coyote
I’ve shot many deer with a 6.5 CM, 260 Rem (the man version of 6.5 CM), 308, 300 WM, 338 LM and 50 cal
The 6.5 is an excellent target round for 1,000 yards. When it comes to killing power it simply lacks. I’ve shot several deer from 600-800 yards with 6.5 143 ELDX bullets. I haven’t been impressed. The 178 ELDX in 30 cal is much more forgiving. That doesn’t mean 6.5 won’t do the job but there’s definitely better
I’d consider the 6.5/260/308 a decent round for out to 800 yards. Not perfect but decent. Beyond that I’d step it up to a 7mm/300 etc variant
Will the bullet get there, yes
Will the bullet kill the deer, yes
Will you recover the deer, hopefully
Will you be impressed, probably not
Are there better options, yes
There’s I’m sure several people who will tell you the 6.5 CM will kill very well to 1000 yards. Likely they’re basing their results off a single or at least very small sample size of kill shots.
Your taking a life. You owe it to the animal to make it ethical.
You also have a lot to learn. So become proficient before you start shooting at animals. At any distance
Don’t be that guy that shows up, brags his 6.5 can kill at 1,000 yards, fire a pile of rounds, maybe touch the target 10-25% of the shots, then go out hunting at that distance
If you want to kill ethnically with the 6.5. Keep it inside 800 in my opinion. Others will disagree. 6.5 PRC/6.5-284 are the only 6.5 I’d consider for true LR hunting
The problem with telling someone that they can take large game with a small/slow/target bullet is that they'll take it out of context.The arrow shaft can contribute to tissue damage, but a slow bullet can't.
Shoot them through the vitals, they die. Its really that simple. Someone killed one of friends dogs once with a .177 caliber BB gun. He went home from work one day and his dog was acting weird. It died later that night. He took it to the vet, and they found BB had passed between two rips and punctured the dogs heart.
If you can shoot a peppercorn and place it in the heart or brain, that'll do but the level of precision required is surgical.
More often than not, if our projectile were a laser beam, we missed. Our saving grace is the expansive damage caused by our well designed projectile.
The vitals of a deer is about six inches. There's enough ways to throw our shot off. Let's say we're all elite shooters and shoot 1/2 moa on a bad day. At 1000 yards, we pretty much have to perform that 1/2 moa from POA first shot after lugging our rifle up the mountain, dealing with the adrenaline of spotting a big buck and getting into position in short order. Then we add the inaccuracies or elevation, temps, wind...
With all the tolerances stacking against us, why not choose a projectile that will maximise success?
Personally, a humane kill is very important. I do not expect anyone else to care as much but it does grind my gears when someone makes claims of a clean kill on a blood trail leading halfway home.
If anyone is wondering here is what a 260 Remington, 142 SMK, leaving the barrel at 2,835 FPS does to a deers heart at 1,121 yards
That's very much on target. Good shooting.
There's definitely minimal projectile expansion there. Almost look like perfect circles through a paper target. Not a lot of blood clotting around the exit wound either.
Pin hole through the hide, through the heart, pin hole out through hide on other side
I walked up to find this deer 1/2 hour later. Located 30 yards from where I shot. Not one single once of blood
The deer was hunched up on the ground looking at me. I had to finish it off
A larger caliber hits with more energy so its more forgiving on shot placement. Its also more forgiving in the wind. Since you don’t get sighters when hunting and likely won’t get practice at that location prior to the kill shot little advantages like that are good for both shooter and game animal alike
Fortunately for me on the above shot I was hunting on our private property. I actually was shooting steel just prior to making this kill shot as the deer don’t care I’m shooting here because I do all year anyways. Without that luxury I don’t think I’d have made a kill
I shoot 1 mile benchrest and ELR using a 300PRC with a Berger 245gr EOL. Not the OP's platform...just saying...eventhough I do this and win...honestly...8" pie plate....variable wind....field conditions...maybe a little winded hiking up a hillside....I'd max out at 800yds...and it better be in a wide open area to where I can see where the animal stumbles off to.
I can’t believe my eyes…
Did a hide member actually admit that “half Moa all day” might not be possible lol
…someone had to say it…
Truthfully though 1moa at 800 no sighters….not unless I’m starving
Yea...I'll admit it. However, if you told me that; "I bet you $20 that you can't hit that squirrel at 1500yds"....in a hurricane wind....well...sorry Mr. Squirrel... $20 is $20.
The quarter inch of expansion coupled with an incredibly high velocity, yes it sure can
I’ll answer my own question.
If the deer/elk/antelope is farther than 600 yards, he walks.
Significantly less if the wind is gusting.
The last thing I’ll do is vote Democrat.
The second to the last thing is shoot without confidence.
P
If the deer/elk/antelope is farther than 600 yards, he walks.
Significantly less if the wind is gusting.
The last thing I’ll do is vote Democrat.
The second to the last thing is shoot without confidence.
P
Yep.
The limfac is your ability to put the bullet where you want it to go.
The limfac is your ability to put the bullet where you want it to go.
Just goes to show, even perfect shot placement with insufficient expansion isn't sufficient for a quick death.
Great shot though. I don't have the wind reading confidence to try that distance on an animal.
I think you owe it to the animal to use the proper caliber for the ani and conditions you hunt. Sounds like you don't have a-lot of experience in the shooting or hunting area. I may be wrong here but unless you have the experience and no how i wouldnt be taking 1000 yard shots.
I’m a LE pistol shotgun instructor. Where I lack is distance which is why I’m pursuing a long range instructor and came here for real world data hunting wise. I also reiterated above I’m not looking to take 1000 shots hunting. I prob won’t go past 400 just because of ethics hunting wise. Just wanted data on yardage and what was taken on a 1 shot/kill basis.
I disagree with this statement.
For many, myself included, a smaller cartridge is easier to shoot well. I don’t give two hoots about energy. As long as the velocity upon impact is within the bullet’s performance window, you’re good. Energy shmenergy.
Placement trumps everything.
Maybe I missed something, but i thought “hafejd30“ was referring to a heavier bullets ability to kill the animal. I’ve always understood that a 3006 was better at bringing down deer than say a 243. The larger harder hitting bullet (more energy), does quite a bit more damage inside the animal than the smaller caliber bullet striking the animal with less energy. Thats been my experience hunting deer and bears. YMMV.
What I’m saying is my 338 Lapua with a 300 grain chunk of lead did far more damage at 1000 yards than any 6.5 bullet did over 800 yards
Yes shot placement is key. If you suck at shooting a 6.5 CM the 338 won’t do you any favors either.
But I will promise you a deer shot through the heart with the energy of a 300 WM or 338 Lapua at 1121 yards would have faired better. As it has for the countless deer shot with heavier calibers next to the 6.5 that I’ve seen
If you don’t believe me just crunch the numbers of foot lbs of energy between a 6.5 CM and 300 WM at 1,000 yards.
FT lbs = Energy/knockdown power
The longer the bullet retains that energy the more effect it has
I shot a deer over 1k with my 338 LM with a 300 SMK. The difference was very apparent
Bullet design of course taken into account. I would expect a 338 LM shooting a solid FMJ style bullet to be very unimpressive at distance as well. Which being honest the SMK isn’t far from this
Yes shot placement is key. If you suck at shooting a 6.5 CM the 338 won’t do you any favors either.
But I will promise you a deer shot through the heart with the energy of a 300 WM or 338 Lapua at 1121 yards would have faired better. As it has for the countless deer shot with heavier calibers next to the 6.5 that I’ve seen
If you don’t believe me just crunch the numbers of foot lbs of energy between a 6.5 CM and 300 WM at 1,000 yards.
FT lbs = Energy/knockdown power
The longer the bullet retains that energy the more effect it has
I shot a deer over 1k with my 338 LM with a 300 SMK. The difference was very apparent
Bullet design of course taken into account. I would expect a 338 LM shooting a solid FMJ style bullet to be very unimpressive at distance as well. Which being honest the SMK isn’t far from this
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cross-sectional density? never heard of her
I agree. 150 eldx from a 7mm-08 for antelope, deer, and elk.
162 eldx from a 7mm Rem Mag for deer and elk. Excellent performance.
P
Do you reckon you can hit a 6" to 9" circle at 800 yrds, in the field, with elevated heart rate, on a slope, over a log or backpack, cold bore shot?
300 Win Mag kills a buck in his tracks - not “knocked off his feet” vs a little doe that ran 80 yards after a 650 gr 50 BMG.
Try again.
Sure looked like the 300 WM “knocked that buck off its feet” to me.
I suppose we could trade videos all day long, but personal experience would never be trumped by some random videos. Been hunting for 45 years, and I’ve seen more deer drop in their tracts shot from a 3006, Vs a 243. How long you been hunting, and what has been your personal experience? -I think that is what the OP was after, and not speculation based on other folks experiences.
I chuckle a little when I see dudes on the internet go to extremes. Energy is how we measure a bullets’s ability to do work. We consider the target, bullet mass, sectional density / cross sectional area, and bullet construction when we think about how the bullet will use its energy to do work.
You can make the argument that violent expansion leads to emphatic mechanical wounding and thus the minimum energy required is much lower than commonly accepted. You can argue that you are consider animals making long dead runs or pin hole wounding acceptable performance. You cannot argue that energy does not matter - because that’s what makes the hole in the first place. ;-)
You can make the argument that violent expansion leads to emphatic mechanical wounding and thus the minimum energy required is much lower than commonly accepted. You can argue that you are consider animals making long dead runs or pin hole wounding acceptable performance. You cannot argue that energy does not matter - because that’s what makes the hole in the first place. ;-)
Been hunting for 46 years. No idea on deer, but lots. Three antelope, 14 elk.
I‘ve knocked the pee out of a lot of animals. I’ve killed more that took a mortal wound and ran off. Not far, but surely not knocked off their feet. Sometimes energy just means the bullet makes more noise when it hits the ground on the far side of the animal.
7mm-08, .30-06, .300 Wby Mag. Deer and elk with all three cartridges.
I don’t buy the energy argument based on my personal experience. Placement is more important in my opinion.
P
Of course we need to assume a reasonable floor but I consider velocity and bullet construction rather than energy. If the bullet is within its performance window of velocity and is well placed I expect a fast, humane death. I don’t consider long death runs or any wounding as acceptable performance.
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