Meat damage with .222 and Rhinos

[Webster]

I hunted Blesbuck yesterday and was very surprised and disappointed with the final outcome. My 14 yr old son pulled off a very good shot with his .222 using 50gr Rhinos running at about 3000fps. He hit a big ram just behind the shoulder at about 180m and it ran 50m and collapsed - textbook stuff. I was delighted with the shot and the bullet performance. Then we skinned it and a different picture unfolded before our eyes. I had to throw away both shoulders and most of the ribs - sop nat bloed k@k! I could not believe what I saw - the damage caused by that little bullet was unbelievable! So much for Premiums reducing meat damage - my Sierras have never caused such damage.
Any body have an explanation?

[driepootx]

50gr Rhinos must be substatially longer than a normal 55gr bullet. What has most probably happened is that the bullet is stable in flight but tumbles as soon as it hits something. Then it really whacks the meat!!!

[wrm]

And there I was looking at the subject line and thinking "a 222 won't do much damage to a rhino..."

[Tweety]

And there I was looking at the subject line and thinking "a 222 won't do much damage to a rhino..."

Shoo...im not the only one.

[BEX]

That kind of damage sounds a bit out of line. Normally you will have a a lot of meat damage on one of the sides , entry side if it hits heavy bone on entry or exit side if hiting nothing or only a rib on entry. Sometimes the blood is only under the skin and it rinses of easily with water and a bit of vinegar.

[MyLani]

I used the 50g Rhino's in my .222, and meat damage was very acceptable.
The damage you described sounds out of the ordinary

[surfer]

I experienced the same scenario with Rhino bullets during this season while hunting kudu - big bore calibre at only 2200fps! Although both penetration and killing effect were spectacular, meat damage was very extensive. I reckon this is due to the propeller shape of the expanded bullet, the sharp petals peeling backwards and turning at high speed while entering the tisue - I prefer the good round mushroom shape from a Swift-A-Frame bullet, good penetration, expansion and less meat damage. My two cents...

[GameFarmer]

I use Rhino bullets in quite a number of calibers, and never had this type of issue.

The difference though is that I've bought all my bullets in large quantities more than ten years ago, and I still have ample left.

Could it be that 'recent' batches have a problem?

I would suggest that you contact Rhino. If there is a problem, I'm sure they'll fix it pronto.

[THOMAST]

Dave, was the bleeding in the muscle too, or just in the layers between the muscles?

[Pirate]

I experienced the same scenario with Rhino bullets during this season while hunting kudu - big bore calibre at only 2200fps! Although both penetration and killing effect were spectacular, meat damage was very extensive. I reckon this is due to the propeller shape of the expanded bullet, the sharp petals peeling backwards and turning at high speed while entering the tisue - I prefer the good round mushroom shape from a Swift-A-Frame bullet, good penetration, expansion and less meat damage. My two cents...

Remember, a bullet doesn't "drill" through the target... think about it: a barrel with a 1 in 10" rifling rate means the bullet only does 1 revolution around its spin axis for every 254mm of forward travel.

I don't know very much about terminal ballistics, but did you recover the bullet? did it actually expand fully, or did it perhaps "stay together" too much and then started tumbling right after the initial impact?

:- P