by Bryce Towsley - Friday, May 29, 2009
1) Nosler Partition This bullet epitomizes the concept of "way before its time." Designed in 1946, the Partition still sets the standard by which all other hunting bullets are measured. This is the most enduring hunting bullet design of modern times and I doubt there is a species of game animal on Earth that has not fallen to it.
2) Remington Core-Lokt "Price point" is an overused term these days, but this bullet matched the concept of performance with an affordable price. The result was the most popular "price point" bullet on the market. If there ever was a bullet for the masses the Core-Lokt would be it.
3) Sierra Matchking Built for accuracy, the Matchking is the most winning match bullet sold today. It offers top-end, custom-bullet accuracy with a mass-produced price. If your rifle won't shoot with this bullet, it's time to sell it to your brother-in-law.
4) Hornady Spire Point Joyce Hornady started his company with the .30-caliber 150-grain Spire Point. Still popular today, it is the bullet that launched a shooting dynasty.
5) Barnes X-Bullet/TSX It takes a "shop guy" to develop new ideas, and Randy Brooks once told me that he is most comfortable with concrete under his feet. It also takes a guy who (to use an overused phrase) "thinks outside the box" to conceive an idea worth developing. Browning, Colt, Ruger, they all were those kinds of guys; Randy is too. When everybody else believed that rifle bullets should be made only out of lead wrapped with gilding metal, Randy made a homogenous, all-copper bullet. The X-bullet became one of the best-performing game bullets ever to whack a moose, and with continuing refinements it just keeps getting better and better.
6) Nosler Ballistic Tip When this plastic-tipped bullet was introduced it was designed to stop bullet damage in the rifle's magazine. Nobody gave much thought to the ballistics, so when the design turned out to be accurate and devastating on game it was almost a surprise. The point is Nosler had no clue that they were launching a revolution. Polymer-tipped bullets now rule the hunting world from varmints to big game, and it all started with the Ballistic Tip.
7) Trophy Bonded Bear Claw Bonded-core hunting bullets have been all the rage for several years now, and it all started with Art Carter's Trophy Bonded Bear Claw. The newest incarnation, the Tipped Trophy Bonded, takes it to the next level and will set the standard for lead-core hunting bullets for a while to come.
8) Winchester Silvertip You gotta love the name-it just shouts refinement and class. When it was first introduced the affordable Silvertip looked high-tech, expensive and cutting edge, and it ranked very high on the "cool factor" scale. That alone sold it, but the fact that it's a pretty good deer bullet ensured immortality.
9) Swift Scirocco Some ideas are just so obvious that you wonder what took so long. It was inevitable that somebody would combine bonded-core technology with a polymer tip. Everybody has a bonded-core, tipped bullet these days, but Swift did it first.
10) Fusion When Speer developed a new way to build a bullet by plating the jacket to the core one molecule at a time they rocked conventional wisdom. This design brought bonded-core technology to affordable ammo. It's accurate and it performs well on game, but more importantly, it's priced to sell. The name is kinda catchy, too.
