apprehension of .357 as a deer rifle quelled

[Moon Tree]

What little apprehensions I had of .357 as a deer rifle were quelled today. I did my little redneck penetration test using 1/2 gallon milk containers filled with water. It's not ballistic jello, but it give me a good idea what my bullet is doing passing through tissue, since tissue is mostly water anyhow. I've done this test before on my deer rifles. It can tell you a lot about your bullet and rifle. Like, Remmington Cor-Locks in a 270 actually separate with the copper penetrating 3 1/2 cartons and the lead penetrating 4 1/2 carton. I quit using them.

Anyhow here's pictures of my set up. Note I have a hay roll as an initial back stop and recycle telephone poles 3 feet behind the hay role. It's a pretty good system for recovering lead. I have 6 milk carton lined up in a wooden frame. The 2x4 sides of the frame were squared with the bottom before the shot. I shot at 50 yards.

I used a 168 gr. Keith Style SWC on top of 13 grains of Acc#9. Lyman's Cast Bullet Handbook list this at 1666 fps.

Well, the bullet shot through all 6 water filled milk cartons(that's 22.5 inches of water), through 3 feet of straw, hit the wooden back stop and bounced back 2 feet. The energy from the bullet exploded the milk cartons and bent the wood screws holding the previously vertical 2x4 supports.

If memory serves me correctly, my .243 with Win. Ballistic Silver tips only penetrated 4 1/2 cartons. I'll test that again when I save up more cartons. And I've killed lots of deer with that little rifle, some out to 300 yards with complete pass through performance. None ever went farther than 40 yards.

On a personal success story: I hit the milk carton dead center. I've been practicing hard to be able to shoot iron sights again.

[Trailboss]

Excellent report and photos. I really like the .357 for a light weight deer getter. Thanks for sharing your test.

[Ranch Dog]

Good setup for testing and yes, an excellent report!

I've killed a couple of deer now with my R92 357 Mag and a bunch of hogs. I'm using my 175-grain bullet.

[Sarge]

On the other end of the spectrum, this is a peripheral hit on a water-filled window wash jug with my 16" .357, at just a couple of feet shy of 200 yards. The load is a 140 grain XTP over a max dose of W296 for right at 2000 fps at the muzzle. I'm thinkin' it will kill just fine at that distance, if well placed. I'm waiting for a coyote to volunteer as the first long-distance recipient.

[Mike.44]

Good job Moon & Sarge. You guys need to drink more milk and wash those dirty windows!!! We need more tests. Would love to see that test with the Rossi 44 and 45 colt.

[Moon Tree]

Thanks guys for all the nice words. Initially, I didn't think about taking pictures of this process. But after the shot, I thought so of you might like to see how a KY redneck tests his rifle. So, I crabbed the camera. Next time I'll use 8 milk carton.

[Mike.44]

Now that sounds even MORE scientific. But heck......it works.

[Maximumbob54]

I've read some pretty crazy stories about when Remington and S&W intro'ed the .357 mag back in the day and deer was some of the smaller game taken with a revolver. Add the fact this is a rifle with better velocity and sights and I never get why this is such an issue. Besides, plenty of deer have been taken with similar calibers like the .32-20 so I'm not sure why the .357 with all the modern lead designs and brilliant jacketed bullets with the current line of powders pushing them would be a bad idea.

[Sarge]

Today I gave the 140 grain XTP (started at about 2000 fps from my 16” Rossi 92) a chance to fail an impromptu penetration test. I set water-filled Window Wash jugs in front of an old cable spool end and shot them at 50 and 100 yards. I figured I’d be able to pick the bullet or fragments out of the wooden spool end, but such was not the case. Both shots penetrated the jug and spool, including the separated jackets which were recovered from the ground behind it. What was left of the cores achieved at least some penetration into a second spool, where I normally hang targets. It has about 10 layers of old target paper on it and I didn’t bother with peeling them off. The photos-

50 Yard Jug on the left, 100 Yard Jug on the right:



Holes In Spool End- 50 Yard Shot on the left, 100 Yard Shot on the right:


50 Yard recovered jacket:



100 Yard recovered jacket:


My take is this. While the 357 Carbine doesn’t hit like a ‘real’ rifle (ground floor of 20” 30-30) it does hit hard enough & penetrates well enough to be useful on game to the size of deer, assuming reasonable range/proper placement. It should make a kick-ass defensive carbine. It is awfully handy, cheap to feed, versatile and accurate enough to be interesting. I think it’s a worthwhile compromise.

[Mike.44]

The 357 does seem to have some extra uumph in a rifle. I was reading where Paco Kelly has taken bear with the 357 in a rifle.