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Nathan Foster

This is not the easiest of subjects so you will have to excuse me as I try to type this out.

From time to time, I am asked why I have not tested a certain brand of bullet- one that may be the latest and hottest thing.

What I want you guys to understand is that I have tested most bullets, including many I have not written about. In some instances, I may be sent test bullets from the manufacturer or from an importer who is investigating the merits of a certain design. This also often occurs at the prototype stage.

Sometimes, the bullets I test simply fail to perform regarding both accuracy and terminal performance. The bullets may vary a great deal in weight from bullet to bullet (accuracy issues). Some may completely fail to expand no matter the angle I use them from or the impact velocity. Others may produce good performance but only at certain velocities. Others still may produce a delayed reaction allowing game to break into a long dead run- OK for flat land, no good for shooting game in the mountains over ravines.

I make my reports and send them away with photos. Some folk are happy with this (Dustin from DRT is a good example along with his father). Others give no response, not even a thank you- when things don't go their way.

Following this, I try to give the maker / importer some space to find resolutions to any discovered issues along with any advice I think might help.

Many of my tests occurred years before a bullet became well known. In the past, I have performed this work freely for the benefit of the bullet makers or importers, the hunters and their game. I have charged nothing for this, working purely on good will. My bad. In some cases, I know my reports to an importer never reached the bullet maker because the bullet maker has later asked me to test their bullets, not knowing that I have already done so (including their prototypes). I generally delete these emails.

So sometimes, when I say nothing, it is for the best. It gives the bullet maker room to grow without me damning them from the start. In other cases, my point of contact has been so arrogant or disrespectful that I could care less how the bullet performs, I don't want a bar of it. I may highlight both the strengths and limitations of a generally good bullet design, but my point of contact will not accept the limitations, holding the performance of the bullet above realistic standards and beyond basic physics and biology, willingly misleading hunters. The strengths and excellent performance I reported were simply not good enough for this person. However, if I continue to give that person space, they may give some ground eventually of their own volition and finally include such things as velocity / expansion parameters within their sales data. In other cases, my own research may be defunct if the bullet I tested has changed over time without my knowledge and again, such old reports may be unfair to the evolving manufacturer.

As I have said, this is not an easy thing to write about. If a bullet maker tools up for a certain bullet, commits a wad of cash to the project, he wants results. Consulting me after the fact is often not the best way to approach this. Nor is putting down hunters for snap shot errors or shooting what the maker considers to be too far such as ridge to ridge shots down south. As most of you know, I look for a range of factors in a bullet. I cannot afford to think small. I have to think like a Canadian hunter, a US hunter, a UK hunter, a kiwi hunter and so forth. I have to take your cultural methods into consideration, your game animals, your ranges and terrain. I spoke to some extent about 'forgiving bullets' in my previous podcast.

I do not understand why some people think that a certain bullet can only have strengths or only have weaknesses, thinking purely in absolutes. Sure, I have tested a few duds that would not expand at all but what I am talking about here is a bullet that works well yet has limitations, yet no more or less than others. When a bullet maker or importer tries to force me into believing that his bullets have no limitations, I simply cut him off and would rather say nothing.

I hope you each understand where I am coming from.