They say the third time is a charm, but with my Savage 10 ML and the Barnes Spit Fire 245 grain, every time has been a charm!  After dropping the two hogs below in their tracks, I wondered how would this combination perform on a big whitetail buck?  Well, Saturday 30 Oct 04, I found out.  The story behind this one is almost too much for me to believe, let alone anyone else, but here it is.  

I spotted this buck about 3/4 of mile away, out in the open, right at day break, while glassing from a vantage point.  The buck was checking out some does, but as soon as the sun appeared he trotted over to a meandering dry creek bed and disappeared from sight.  It looked like the type of buck I was looking for, so I waited a couple of hours and then made my way over to the creek bed on the upwind side and started easing along it, looking hard for the deer, hoping to spot him before he knew I was there.  You won't believe what happened next!  After easing along about 200 yards, I spotted parts of a deer in some tall grass in the creek bed, but it looked dead.  It was laying down with its head on the ground.  Part of its rack was all I could see and it wasn't enough to convince me that this was the one I was after, so I sat down on the bank of the eroded creek bed about 15 yards from the deer and decided I would throw a rock at the deer and see if it was alive or not.  I had my muzzleloader across my lap and when I threw the rock it landed just at the deer's neck on the ground.  The rack move ever so slightly, but never raised up any.  I thought maybe my eyes were playing tricks on me, so I found another rock threw it, I never hit the deer and it never moved.  I threw a third rock, still nothing.  Finally on the forth rock it hit the deer's antlers and rattle around some.  Then all hell broke loose.  The buck came to life before my eyes.  He came up quick, took one look at me, (at the same time I took a good luck at his rack and decided he was the one) snorted and busted out of the creek bed at a dead run.  I quickly picked him up in my scope and at about 50 yards I put the crosshairs on his shoulder and squeezed the trigger.  The buck folded and slid to a stop.  One could not have asked for a better hunt.  The buck was aged at 6 1/2 so, it was probably as big as it was going to get.

Ray,

I just received an Omega with the thumbhole stock and your 25 ACP adapter. I have used 410 primers in the past in a Remington MZ. I have had great success with your QT and Dead Centers for Whitetail and on paper but in the last two years I have been using Barnes TSX in my high power so I thought I would work up some loads with the Barnes 285 Spit-Fire. New gun, new ignition and new bullet. I chronographed 110 grains of 777 over 1900 fps with a good group at 100, 1” high so today I went to 200. I am using as you suggested the CCI small rifle primer and I get 100% containment. What a great product. 
The results at 200 yards are a 2 ¾ five shot group including the first shot out of a clean barrel. Remove the fouler shot and the next four went into 2”. The group fell 12 ½” low of point of aim. Consistency is the name of the game and your ignition kit gave me velocity within 10 ft per second with a fouled barrel according to my CED Chrono. I am throwing charges and tapping the measure until it will not take any more powder them wiping it off. I am using a wet patch (your way) followed by a dry patch. I waited for the barrel to become cold between shots. I hunt with three other guys and we all use the Dead Centers and all have found less than 1” groups at 100 with minimal work. With the DC’s we use 90 grains of 777. 

Thanks for great products,
TC

According to Brian Roberts, this one dropped in its tracks from a 245 grain Barnes Spit-Fire out of a Savage 10 ML II.

Ned Nelson let me take a picture of this target that he produced using his Savage 10 ML II and the Barnes Spit-Fire 245 grain.  He was sighting his rifle in with the Barnes Spit-Fire 245 grain muzzleloader bullets.  His first shot hit at the bottom.  He made a 1 1/2" adjustment up and thus #2; another adjustment of 1 1/2" up and #3; a 1" adjustment up and #4; a 1" adjustment to the right and #5; one inch up and #6;  one more inch up and fired for effect!  7, 8 and 9 all touching.  Ned claims he has never seen anything quite like this from any muzzleloading bullet. He immediately asked for two more packs of the Barnes Spit-Fire 245 grain muzzleloader bullets.  Now if he will just send me pictures of a successful hunt!

Before we get started let me give you a little background. Back in July 2004 I decided to sell my Savage 10 ML II and order me another one that was customized for better accuracy; the Henry Ball Savage 10 ML II. It took two months to get it. I finally got it back in September. I shot a few different bullets in it. One of them gave me a perfect cloverleaf one-hole group at 100 yards. That would be the Thompson Center Shock Wave 250 grain. Another gave me a group less that ¾ of an inch at 100 yards, while traveling at a little less than 2300 ft/sec. That would be the Barnes Spit-Fire 245 grain. I finally settled on the Spit-Fire because of its higher ballistic coefficient; solid copper and boat tail design. I couldn't wait to see how it performed on game. I have passed up a number of legal deer waiting for that wall-hanger to show up. 

This last Sunday while out deer hunting, I was watching some wild hogs rooting around about ½ mile away and since I wasn't seeing any deer I decided to go for it. I worked my way to within 150 yards of a nice boar hog and dropped him with a shot that broke both shoulders and the spine, lodging against the ¾ inch thick hide of the 200 pound boar; which by the way had some 2 and ½ inch or better choppers. The bullet performed flawlessly as I saw when I recovered it that it opened up just as the manufacturer said it was supposed to; see graphics below; six perfect petals opened up and folded back making a ¾ inch cutting chunk of copper that resembles a flower in shape; no bullet weight loss. As I went down to check on the kill I noticed there were still some hogs hanging around undecided on what to do. I shot another 120-pound sow off hand at around 50 yards; she dropped in her tracks too; however the bullet blew clear through so I wasn't able to recover it. Oh well, it did its job. 

The Henry Ball Savage 10 ML II limited edition is one terrific weapon; capable of shooting both black powder substitutes and smokeless powder equally well. I haven't found any of my higher BC bullets yet that it doesn't like. My only problem is so many choices, so little time. I am sold on the Barnes Spit-Fire 245 grain at the moment, maybe because its so dang pretty and shoots so flat and accurate, not to mention its devastating effect on game so far.

*Do to the extra weight of the 25 bullet boxes we must add an addition shipping charge of $1.25 per box.