Sierra Game Changer

Tag. I'm interested, too.

I think they gave them the wrong name, I think they should have called it "The Nosler Ballistic Tip by Sierra".

It looks like they core separate just like a BT does.

https://www.americanrifleman.org/articles/2018/10/5/tested-sierra-gamechanger-bullets/

IME, almost any soft bullet is okay for game as small as deer.

Bill1225 said:

Well wasn't hoping to hear that, from the sound of things I shouldn't fix what I have been usIng with success

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Much unhappiness in the world is caused by the fixing of things that are not broken...

Every bullet that isn’t bonded or gilding metal has the “potential” for core separation. If you shoot a deer with one of those bullets and in the caliber you cited, as long as it isn’t a chest or Texas heart shot, good luck recovering one of the bullets. On top of that, suppose for a second it does shed its jacket. That would create two wound channels instead of one. As long as there is adequate penetration, why is that a bad thing?

The article someguy2800 linked to admitted that:

“No doubt the dry paper provided much tougher resistance than the ribs and vital organs of a game animal. Marshall said the books must have been much harder than ballistic gelatin, the material Sierra mostly used to test expansion of GameChangers. While testing GameChangers, Sierra engineers rarely recovered a bullet that had lost its core.“

Now I’ve always been a proponent of “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.” But in the shooting world, trying something new and if it doesn’t work out “unfixing it” is quite easy. Just simply go back to what was working so well before.

Haven't heard much about them yet, as they are still pretty recent. But my buddy had me load up some of the 30 cal. 165 gr. Game Changers for his 300 Win. Magnum so perhaps in the near future he will be able to give me some real world feedback that I could contribute here.

BigBore44 said:

Every bullet that isn’t bonded or gilding metal has the “potential” for core separation. If you shoot a deer with one of those bullets and in the caliber you cited, as long as it isn’t a chest or Texas heart shot, good luck recovering one of the bullets. On top of that, suppose for a second it does shed its jacket. That would create two wound channels instead of one. As long as there is adequate penetration, why is that a bad thing?

The article someguy2800 linked to admitted that:

“No doubt the dry paper provided much tougher resistance than the ribs and vital organs of a game animal. Marshall said the books must have been much harder than ballistic gelatin, the material Sierra mostly used to test expansion of GameChangers. While testing GameChangers, Sierra engineers rarely recovered a bullet that had lost its core.“

Now I’ve always been a proponent of “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.” But in the shooting world, trying something new and if it doesn’t work out “unfixing it” is quite easy. Just simply go back to what was working so well before.

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I have only shot one game animal with a nosler BT, a 115 grain in 25-06. That one exited and I did not find the core or base inside, but there were a bunch of chunks of jacket and core inside, including one piece of jacket that cut my hand while field dressing. I have shot 308 caliber 125, 150, and 180 grain BT's into water jugs and every one of them looses their jacket and fragments. They typically look just like the sierra pictures in that article. The 125 that I tested was only at 1950 fps (contender pistol) and it still came apart. Not saying that makes them bad bullets or that is necessarily applies to the sierras, but just food for thought. For the price and apparent performance I will stick to other options though.

someguy2800 said:

I have only shot one game animal with a nosler BT, a 115 grain in 25-06. That one exited and I did not find the core or base inside, but there were a bunch of chunks of jacket and core inside, including one piece of jacket that cut my hand while field dressing. I have shot 308 caliber 125, 150, and 180 grain BT's into water jugs and every one of them looses their jacket and fragments. They typically look just like the sierra pictures in that article. The 125 that I tested was only at 1950 fps (contender pistol) and it still came apart. Not saying that makes them bad bullets or that is necessarily applies to the sierras, but just food for thought. For the price and apparent performance I will stick to other options though.

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I was just up at Sierra’s plant in Sedalia last Wednesday buying some factory seconds. They sold out and have new owners now. They are no longer giving tours of the plant. I do worry that they are going to suffer QC issues if the new owners focus more on profit than quality. Sierra has always been near the top in the shooting world for accuracy and consistency. And for a handloader, they really offer a great value. But if I had two gripes, it would be that they don’t offer bonded bullets, and they don’t offer heavier bullets than 300gr in their .458 line. And I’m not sure why they don’t. Maybe there isn’t a big enough market for it. Maybe they are just holding on to the market they have.

BigBore44 said:

I was just up at Sierra’s plant in Sedalia last Wednesday buying some factory seconds. They sold out and have new owners now. They are no longer giving tours of the plant. I do worry that they are going to suffer QC issues if the new owners focus more on profit than quality. Sierra has always been near the top in the shooting world for accuracy and consistency. And for a handloader, they really offer a great value. But if I had two gripes, it would be that they don’t offer bonded bullets, and they don’t offer heavier bullets than 300gr in their .458 line. And I’m not sure why they don’t. Maybe there isn’t a big enough market for it. Maybe they are just holding on to the market they have.

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Not to bring my personal biases into it but I've never had any love for Sierra. I shot 2 different types of their cup and core hunting bullets (1 game king, and 1 pro hunter) and the on game performance of both was poor (granted small sample size, mabey 5 deer). I do like a couple of their JSP revolver bullets with the 3% antimony core, but as far as their rifle bullets go I think pretty much everything in their catalog is outdone both in performance and cost by hornady, so I've pretty much written them off.

The rifle tends to choose the bullet, not the other way around. While it is nice to standardize, sometimes what you choose will not shoot well in your rifle while another bullet of the same weight will work just fine.

Historically, I have found that Hornady Interlock, Speer HotCore, and SOME Nosler's (Not partition or ballistic tip--how I wish they would bring the old solid base back) work very well. Much worse luck with Sierra, Remington, and Winchester bullets.

But that is just my opinion and is worth what you paid for it.

I don’t think I’ve ever shot a whitetail with a bullet that didn’t lose some, or all, of its jacket if it hits bone.

If it didn’t hit bone (like a double lung shot) It usually passes through and I don’t find the bullet.

Here the 10 point I shot last year, entry and exit, shot with a .35 cal 225g Gameking. I don’t think much of the core stayed with the jacket and I’m not sure why I should care. He went 30 yards and fell over. Shot was 130 yards and traveling at a pedestrian 2,500 FPS



Since I started reloading I try them all. Even the solds like Barns fragment when they hit bone.

What am I missing?

My shooting is done at pretty close range and a high BC bullet just isn't anything I need. After a bad experience with a 30 cal Nosler BT up close a couple years back**, I put all that stuff on the shelf and went to a Hornady Interlock. The higher BC bullets aren't optimized for hitting at speeds close to muzzle velocity.

I'm sure the new Sierra is a lot better behaved at 300 than it is at 100yds. But that's just not something I can make use of.


**20yd broadside shot; 150gr bullet detonated and eviscerated the deer. Nothing vital damaged, just unzipped her from sternum to crotch.

I've tried various bullets over time.
Sierra Game Kings are my go to hunting bullet. No need to change.

Here is a .308 sampling, hope it helps.

Picture is of a 130 grain Hornady GMX out of a .270 at about 3,100 fps, hitting a 140lb buck from a tree stand as it ran flat-out toward a woods road. Perfect mushroom from a solid copper bullet, hitting the deer about 40 yards running toward a woods road opening. The bullet hit near the backbone and ended up in the neck, about 30 inches of penetration. It only lost about 3 grains of weight, perhaps about the plastic tip weight?

Shot was left-handed, the first I'd ever fired that way when hunting. The deer was called-in, ran within a foot of the tree behind my tree stand, then stopped about 35 yards to my right. Raised the rifle left-handed, but couldn't get my finger into the trigger guard, because the sling was in the way. I flicked it away, the buck saw the movement, and took off like a rocket! He only made it about 10 yards before the bullet caught up with him.

GMX bullets have been good for me, but last year, my son shot a small buck at about 40 yards with 150grain GMXs from his '06 and it ran about 60 yards uphill in the woods before we found it. There was very little blood to follow and the bullet went right through the lungs.

This year, he's gone back to his 150 grain Rem Core-Loct factory loads. I'm trying 140 grain Nosler 140 grain Accu-Bonds in my '270 Win. Had them left-over from killing a moose last year at about 270 yards (one-shot kill and it only went 15 yards in a field).

Remington Core-Lokt is an excellent deer load.

My brother in law who's literally hunted all over the world with all kinds of ammo said his groups go to ammo for deer sized game at resonable distances is Remington Core-lokts.
If the new Sierras perform like Nosler BT's they csn keep them. Hunted 1 year with BT's. Had bad performance on a doe at 75yds and my son saw similar performance with a buck at 100. Bullet separation / poor penetration - both deer were recovered.
I really want a bullet I can draw a straight line from the muzzle to the entrance to the exit.

Ditto. Remington core lokt and federal fusion are in my opinion some of the best hunting bullets available at any price.

This is a 120 grain federal fusion shot into water jugs at 100 yards. 98% weight retention.

I hunt with 8-9 dudes every year and we take between 15-20 deer a season.

This year I’ll document what I see as it relates to what bullet was used and how they performed because I’m curious.

Honestly, I’ve alway measured success as either dead or not dead. In the 40 odd years I’ve hunted I can’t remeber a deer not dying because the bullet failed. Generally, when a deer doesn’t expire within 70-ish yards its because of a poor shot.

These are my experiences and we’re talking whitetail. Game over 300 lbs may be a different story

Nature Boy said:

I hunt with 8-9 dudes every year and we take between 15-20 deer a season.

This year I’ll document what I see as it relates to what bullet was used and how they performed because I’m curious.

Honestly, I’ve alway measured success as either dead or not dead. In the 40 odd years I’ve hunted I can’t remeber a deer not dying because the bullet failed. Generally, when a deer doesn’t expire within 70-ish yards its because of a poor shot.

These are my experiences and we’re talking whitetail. Game over 300 lbs may be a different story

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This is something I’ve been paying close attention to for a long time. My hunting group shoots about 12-15 a year and I participate in recovering almost all of them so I always note the shot placement, internal damage, how far the deer went, size of blood trail ect...

The area we hunt is dense brush, red willows and high slough grass, so recovery is often challenging if there is not a substantial blood trail. It’s not unusual for use to spend an hour or two to find a deer that went 100 yards. For our specific circumstance the size of exit wound and amount of blood trail is very important. We are typically taking double lung shots, so a 55 grain fmj would kill the deer just as dead as anything else, but your chances of actually recovering the deer would be significantly reduced.

someguy2800 said:

recovery is often challenging if there is not a substantial blood trail.

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That’s true for just about anywhere that isn’t an open field. As an aside, most of my hunting when I was younger was in the swamp. Really hard to find a blood trail. We run dogs and deer dogs usually have no interest in a dead deer. If you hit a deer in front of the dogs that kept running you usually know hes down because when the dogs get to him they stop barking. After a minute or two they take off hunting for something else. The first place you look is the last place they barked.

Back to blood trails. Sometimes they just don’t bleed, regardless of where you hit them and how much damage you do. The picture of the deer I posted above is an example. He left a few tiny drops and that was it. Of course, he didn’t run very far either

This picture was a few years ago from an 8 point I hit with one of those much maligned Nosler ballistic tips. 180g from a 308, double lung, ran 60 yards. The trail started from where he was hit and went like this almost all the way to where he was laying. We’d never lose a deer if they were all like this

Nature Boy said:

That’s true for just about anywhere that isn’t an open field. As an aside, most of my hunting when I was younger was in the swamp. Really hard to find a blood trail. We run dogs and deer dogs usually have no interest in a dead deer. If you hit a deer in front of the dogs that kept running you usually know hes down because when the dogs get to him they stop barking. After a minute or two they take off hunting for something else. The first place you look is the last place they barked.

Back to blood trails. Sometimes they just don’t bleed, regardless of where you hit them and how much damage you do. The picture of the deer I posted above is an example. He left a few tiny drops and that was it. Of course, he didn’t run very far either

This picture was a few years ago from an 8 point I hit with one of those much maligned Nosler ballistic tips. 180g from a 308, double lung, ran 60 yards. The trail started from where he was hit and went like this almost all the way to where he was laying. We’d never lose a deer if they were all like this

View attachment 809833

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That what it looks like with my 444 marlin from the spot you shoot them to where they go down, except its from both sides. You'll find blood frozen on the willow branches at eye level, its crazy.

Yes I don’t care what bullet I use as long as I get the results I want which are as follows good blood trail and I really prefer complete pass throughs 2 holes bleed better than 1

Also I want a short track job but that is more up to my shot placement than bullet choice!