The .50 Alaskan ultimate bear stopper

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hyattnc

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During this last hunt my buddy introduced me to the .50 Alaskan which I say is the best bear cartridge Ive ever known. With 4300 ft lbs of stopping power this is the ultimate bear stopper. We came out of this last hunt satisfied with the round. Our rifle on this trip was the Master Guide. It doesnt look like much but it kicks and kicks bad.

MODERATOR NOTE: The above image is not the OP's and is misleading. It is from a hunt in California and is from http://www.wildwestguns.com/tejonbear.html
 
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4300ft-lbs is not what stops bears. Big, heavy, toughly constructed bullets with a high sectional density that break bones and make big, deep holes in tissue is what stops bears. Seriously, if a revolver cartridge producing a fraction of the energy of the mighty .50AK will do the same job, then maybe energy is not a proper measure of a cartridge/load's effectiveness.
 
It sure looks stopped to me.:neener:
In a bear hunt I wouldn't consider extra security a bad thing. Sure some tools will do the job,but other tools will do it better.
 
To be fair I did not post the link and would appreciate if the moderators removed the link. Its not my purpose to direct people to someone elses website to buy a product. If you dont like me or my writing style or the way I express myself you dont have to read what I write. By all means dont read my posts. The Code of Conduct on this site does prohibit personal attacks and following folks around the site to demean them.

I just wanted to express my positive sentiment about a round I enjoyed and thought had good stopping power. There is a lot of discussion nowadays about adequate bear stopping rounds and I think I found the right one. Its most certainly there as far as size and speed. Quite a kick but I didnt expect anything less than a very spirited kick.
 
I don't know that I would call the caliber the ultimate bear stopper, especially when showing a little black bear, but it is an impressive caliber. 4300 is definitely at the higher end of its spectrum. A lot of the loadings are more than 1000 lbs. lower...more in line with the high upper end of .45-70

Big, heavy, toughly constructed bullets with a high sectional density that break bones and make big, deep holes in tissue is what stops bears. Seriously, if a revolver cartridge producing a fraction of the energy of the mighty .50AK will do the same job, then maybe energy is not a proper measure of a cartridge/load's effectiveness.
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You can drive a .45-70, .50 Beowulf, or .458 Bushmaster through a bison, breaking bones along with the way, and with a lot less recoil. Bears are not particularly tough, especially the smaller black bears. There are a lot of myths about their abilities to shrug off being shot with reportedly great shot shots, but those bears never seem to get recovered and so the great shots never verified. No doubt the depth of the fur is often confused for body mass when in reality, it is mostly air.

There is a difference between just hunting and animal and stopping an animal. Most folks that want an animal stopped are dealing with an animal that is a problem, especially if it is already mad with you, charging, etc. People often aim poorly under those circumstances and followup shots can be equally problematic. They don't have the ability to aim at major locomotor structures that are in motion separate from the just the direction of travel, churning back and forth, to make a shot that necessarily cripples immediately. If they could do that, then they could make head CNS shots, neck CNS, or other high CNS destroying shots on demand and folks almost never seem to have that intentional capability during high stress until the bears are virtually at contact distances and even then still manage to screw up shots and have to make multiples because they cannot place shots such that their trajectory and penetration will do the necessarily damage to make the stop.
 
got news for you. Ive shot bear and pigs with my 50 beo, various 4570s and my 50ak and try the 50ak youll be a believer too. It HAMMERS animals where the others kill them. Ive also killed as much game with a 500 linebaugh and 475 as about anyone here and theres no comparison. The 50ak has the power of a 458 mag and that my friends is a stopping rifle. Linebaughs have killed about everything on the planet but there far from stopping guns.
 
Cute little gun, bet she kicks like a mule. Congrats on the bear. Maybe it's the angle, but in the pic, the barrel sure looks like it's pointed right at the other guys head.
 
Very Nice, my old shoulders won't take the beating of a hard kicking round any more but to you Kudos.
 
I'd buy one to shoot hogs, but I ain't that mad at 'em. :D

4300ft-lbs is not what stops bears.
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I think THAT one was adequately addressed by JohnM.:D I'd just add, I don't think it takes 4300 ft lbs to stop a bear, but wretched excess in these animals is probably a good thing. :D However, that looks like a big blacky to my untrained eye. Griz is what I'd prefer excess for. Plenty of blacks have been feld with 1800 ft lbs (.30-30) or even 700 ft lbs (.357 magnum) and I ain't as skirt of 'em as I would be a griz.
 
Girodin said:
Shooting a treed black bear proves something the ultimate bear stopper? :rolleyes:h
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That's nice, funny, don't hear of it used much up here, there ain't a "ultimate", Guy I know of with the most griz uses a MN, and a number of the Alaskan Natives used 30-40 to hunt Polar Bear....
 
Hey, I thought my Marlin .444 was the ultimate bear stopper.:eek::what:

Probably no such thing as an ultimate bear stopper since even the big boy's toys over 5000 ft-lbs of muzzle energy have failed stop some of the big boy bears at times. Sadly, all too many stories of folks killed by the bear that they killed.

Great little gun, but seeing how small and light it is with 4300 ft-lbs of muzzle energy makes me cringe in pain just thinking of that recoil action on my shoulder.

Can't go wrong with that as a true bear stopper, but ultimate? Not sure if there is such a thing.
 
Im pretty recoil resistant but will admit when loaded to the top end with 500 grain cast bullets the 50ak will get on you a bit!! But Ive never shot a true stopping level gun that didnt.
 
got news for you. Ive shot bear and pigs with my 50 beo, various 4570s and my 50ak and try the 50ak youll be a believer too. It HAMMERS animals where the others kill them
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Okay, thanks. I didn't know you could get more dead than dead. I will write that down.
 
I like your post and find it interesting and informative. Thank you for posting. :)
 
, and a number of the Alaskan Natives used 30-40 to hunt Polar Bear....
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There was a guy in our gun club, WW2 vet, think he passed away, but he was interesting. He got out of the service after the war and went to work as an Indian agent in Alaska. He said, at that time, the .30-30 was the gun of choice for everything from polar down to whatever. See, back then, .30-30 was ubiquitous, sold everywhere, and they didn't have the internet to order ammo. He went out griz hunting with 'em, wanted to take a griz, took along his .300 H&H. They laughed at him when the recoil made him miss and knocked him off the boat seat he was seated on. LOL He did get the bear, on the second try.

Then there's Caribou who takes everything with a Mosin Nagant 7.62x54R.
 
So, a big, heavy bullet hitting with 500 ft lbs is just as good as the same bullet hitting at 4300?
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Well maybe 1000 ft. lbs, but sure. I'd be as happy with a black powder cartridge rifle shooting a huge high-SD slug as a magnum shooting the same bullet. Less chance of a bullet failure and so long as there's enough juice to keep the round moving it will do the work.

Plus what happens to your ears with that porting and that level of load--ouch!
 
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