Any of you folks have experience with these bullets? John Taffin has good things to say about them. I would like to hear from other folks that have used them. Looking to hear the Good Bad and The Ugly.

WV Hitman should chime in, with his experiences.

Wow..I could write a small book on this one!
I started using Hawk?s 44 caliber 300gr x .025 HP out of my Knight in-line muzzloader in the mid 90?s. I switched to the 458 300gr x .025 HP when the orange sabot came on the market; I took many a deer with each. The Hawk 358 180gr x .025 FP is my go to choice out of my Contender in 358JDJ this setup has accounted for several deer with excellent accuracy and terminal performance. 1996 I took my first handgun deer with the 309JDJ with a Hawk 150gr x .035 SPT it dropped where it stood complete pass through with 2? of internal damage. While I have not taken any animal with my 416JDJ I have test in wet newsprint the 300gr and 350gr .025 round tip, my hunting choice is the 350gr x .025 RT.
I have wet newsprint test the Hawk 452 caliber 260 x .025 HP out of my BFR 454 Casull (pictured).

I have Hawk 475?s in 300 & 350gr .025 HP?s for my BFR 475LB but have not tested them.
I have tested and continue to test the 458 300gr & 350gr x .025 HP out of my 458 Win Mag Encore pistol as well as the 300gr & 400gr x.025 HP out of my Encore 50 B&M Alaskan pistol. I can say in wet newsprint the Hawks are some of the most destructive of all I have tested, those I have used on deer mirror what I see in these tests. The .025 jacket is likely fine for thin skinned game like deer as the recovered bullets are nearly flat. I have not tried any of the thicker jacket offerings in the big bore lineup. As of this morning I don?t have pictures of these but can put some together if you like.
B..

My experience with Hawk bullets is in rifles (at rifle velocities) only. They are extremely soft and prone to core separation. That said, they might be perfect at revolver velocities.

Bullet tests

This was from testing I was doing developing commercial ammo. My 45-70 loads with the Hawk ended up killing lions, cape buffalo, eland, kudu, zebra and about everything else in Africa.

I should note these were custom Hawks with a .050" jacket.

Thanks, Ken. My experience with Hawks was one short year. I try to test most new bullets introduced on my local groundhogs and deer before my serious hunts.
I did this with 400 gr. Hawks (and Swifts) years ago preparing for my first lion hunt in my .416 Taylor Encore. I shot a lot of 'hogs with these two bullets. They did super on groundhogs and summer crop damage deer, sort of the Perfect Packin' Pistol round for those two critters (yes, I'm weird like that).
Before I went my Encore started having misfires- a lot. JD told me I wasn't loading right, but I was doing only 90% of max loads. Sent him the gun soon after. Come to find out the frame had stretched from all the firing I'd done.
JD said the problem is that Hawk and Swift big caliber bullets are made with thick jackets which jack up the pressures in Encore/Contenders and cause the frame to stretch!!!
I immediately stopped using Hawks and Swifts in my single shots (the thinner jacketed revolver rounds are OK). I had Northern Precision make me a really cool 400 gr. SP bullet very similar to BTs. I dropped the lion on a 24 yd. charge with one shot offhand from my .416 Encore. Really screwed his insides up, just like a BT.
So, for that reason I swore off Hawks 100% and the only Swift I use is 265 gr. .454 loaded 1.5 gr. less than other 265 gr. bullets.
There are so many other good bullets out there that I never saw the need to go back to Hawks.
I'm glad reflex has had good results, but be careful.
Oh, Thompson gave me a new Encore frame!!

Hey Doc. What jacket thickness were you using? I heard about some of the pressure issues and the reason we backed up to 380grs was to cut down bearing surface. Pressures were a bit erratic at the low end in the 45-70. The goal was to stay at 38,000cup and below. When I started testing the same bullet in the .450 marlin it was a match made in heaven. Using the 43,000psi ceiling everything just came together.

Reflex, they were .050 if I remember right. Your .025 should be great.
In my .416 Taylor now I use 400 gr. Horn. DG-x, DG-X, TSX, and 350 gr. Speer, TSX, and Alaska Bullet Works Flat nose (it put a massive hurting on a 900# ,28" roan (free ranging) at 130 yds.
In my .375/.284 I use ABs, Horn. GMX, Lehigh 250 Fracturing HPs, and 260 Nosler Solids.
All the above perform extremely well and have taken game from the roan up to elephants, so I quit experimenting with the large calibers.
They all work well on my BIG WV groundhogs and deer !?!

Would you guys consider the HAWK on par with a Swift A Frame in .475 linebaugh? Swift doesn't make A Frames in .475. The owner suggested getting .480 shooters to petition Federal to make factory ammo using A frames. Swift says there is not enough demand from .475 handloaders to justify a run. Are Hawks a good alternative to the XTP

I personally feel that they are not in the same league - not even close. The Swift is a true premium bullet, the Hawk not so much. Unless something has changed they are a very basic non-bonded cup and core bullet.

Hornady and Speer bullets act pretty much like solids in the Linebaugh, so I shoot a lot of Cast Performace and BRP casts (no longer made, but the best cast bullet out there. I have a lot in 335, 395, 420 gr.) UNTIL I started shooting 275 gr. Xs.
If you want tissue damage this is THE bullet. Wide, gaping hole up front and the integrity of the X. I've done groundhogs, deer, a lioness, and Cape buff with it. All showed respectable damage.
The few Hawks I used seemed soft.
AFrames are great, but I see no need for them in the .475 with the X available.

BFR 475 LB ? 7.5?
I had not taken the time to test these in wet newsprint until now.
Barnes 275X \ Hawk 300 x .025HP \ Hornady 325 XTP \ Hawk 350 x .025HP

Side view of the recovered bullets

They all did rather well in my test medium, no broken pedals or jacket separation.
B..

I hit a small hog in the shoulder with a Hawk that came apart, the jacket departing hog number one, severing the spine of hog number two about 10 yards behind hog number one. As I mentioned before it was a rifle at rifle velocities, but it gave me cause for pause considering the lack of stature of the two aforementioned hogs. All of the lead stayed in number one, the copper in hog number two.

Absolutely not. Decent enough bullets, but theres no way an unbonded bullet without the aframe design can touch it The aframe is like a much improved nosler partition which is a great bullet in its own right. Can u think of another expandable you would use maxed out of a 454 on cape buffalo and maintain its integrity? I cant either and thats why i used a swift on my cape buff. Worked awesome! By the way i used the x bullet 250 grain on penetration testing on the cape buff. Not as deep but is definitely the king of expansion, weight retention and destruction. Never seen as much tissue destruction as the barnes and penetration out of proportion to grain weight. The aframe isnt abailable in the 475 so barnes is it. I have a few hundred to be loaded in my 480

Excellent test results Buck358! Glad to hear what Whitworth and WVHitman have to say as well. I was looking for pros and cons and got both backed up with experience. I had a long convesation with John Linebaugh on the .475 recently as well. I had come to the conclusion based on conversations with the folks at FA that the discontinuation of 400 gr. XTP's and Speer .400 gr. Deep curl that the .475 L. would lose it's edge in performance over the .480 Ruger and be handicaped from reaching the potential it was created to achieve. Yes there are cast bullets available in 400 gr. but not my first choice. Swift A frame was at the top of my list. Some folks always want what they can't have. After reading about how much folks here like their .475s and .480s I have that itch that there is only one way to scratch. I understand that bullets need to be seated deeper to work in the FA cylinder which is shorter than Ruger cylinders or possibly BFR cylinders(not familiar with them). Does this make the .475L in a FA 83 something other than the .475L in a longer cylinder that does not restrict C.O.L.??

If you drop back the lighter barnes bullets vs heavy jacketed or cast bullets in the .475L does it not lose it's edge in performance over the .454?

Ive had both and still have the 454's obviously. Many will disagree but really based on similiar experience i.e. Comparing the beat either caliber has to offer but imho the only place the 475 has an advantage is with cast vs cast. With hp's the 454 wins imho and with punch or monometal solids its pretty well a wash if you redline either. There is no advantage if you redline both and use bullets that can stand up to the 454's velocity. In every penetration test i did you really have to step up to at least the 500 jrh redline to get an advantage and the. You must use better than cast. In fact redlining the barnes is a way to actually close the hp gap bw the two. I will take either barnes or aframe out of a 454 redlined over any 485 cast load when dealing with big bovines. Bigger than that and ur best off using a punch or monometal solid and then the 454 closes the caliner gap with velocity when it comes to wound channel. The 454 has velocity and the 475 has size. The bullet determines whether the velocity of the 454 is at a disadvantage or not. The jrh has the size and the speed with large projectiles. While a 420 grain cast slug at 1400 fps is nothing to sneeze at and works well, the jrh with a 440 at over 1500 which is achievable overtaxes the cast bullet but take a monometal solid or punch and you can take advantage of the speed. The 275 barnes is roughly equal to the 250 barnes in the 454 if you redline both. Both are preferrable imho over a solid due to the damage they inflict up to about 1800lbs maybe even 2000

Thanks Trademark! I was torn between .454 and .475L a few years ago and went with the .454. Your logic has blown holes(pun) in my rationalization that I NEED a 475L Bummmerr!

The Hawk will never be a partition or A-frame. It can work well as mine did but in order to make it work right everything has to be perfect. That is hard to achieve.

Needs have very little to do with it. I would get what i wanted and have done so. Just dont expect different results. If i wanted bigger than a 454 i would fet a 500jrh. Many people dont look at the 500 jrh as a "classic" caliber and have a romance with other well known calibers but it is the best of the 500's imho for a variety of reasons and if everyone knew all the back stories about what jack huntington has done for the handgun hunting industry they would realize that theres alot of history and prestige in the jrh cartridge.

so to back up my post on effectiveness of the 454 and why i've said what i've said, i ran some numbers. comparing a few loads, the legendary 475 load which has a great reputation for a very very good reason plays out like this. 420 gr at 1400 fps. fpe is 1827, momentum is 84, and tko is 39. the 454 that i've come to love is best not with cast, not with crummy 2nd rate cup and core hollow points, but with new tech bullets like the frame and the barnes. the aframe load i use on large animals is the following, 325 gr frame, 1680 fps out of my 7.5" fa83. fpe 2036, momentum is 78, and using what it expands to and hold together well is at .8" at this velocity. the tko is 62. which gives a good idea of why it smacks large game so well. my most devastating cast load that i use is the btw 340 grain load, it runs 1790 fps, energy is 2418, momentum of 86, tko of 39. i run the 300 grain monumental solids at 1710 fps, fpe of 1947, momentum 73, tko of 32.
now the 500 jrh as loaded previously by buffalo bore with the 425 gr truncated cone bullet chronies out of my sons 7.5" bfr at 1480fps, gives 2066 fpe and a momentum of 89, tko of 44. it will run a 400gr monumental at 1500 fps which gives similar numbers but will absolutely hold together at these velocities.

using beartooth bullets wound channel calculator which mirrors the most consistent predictors of wound channel in ballistics gel yields these results
for the .475 load the permanent wound channel is an impressive 1.365"

for the 454 340 load without any expansion from the impact velocity is 1.522"
for the 454 300 gr lehigh defense solid copper is 1.539" b
for the 454 325 gr aframe load as its expansion was when shot into buffalo that i have recovered is 3.36" for the wound channel

for giggles i put in the calculations for the 460 smith running 275 gr barnes at 2100fps its, 4.2" of permanent wound cavity.

i thought that in addition to posting what my results in the field were i would add some objective calculations. so whether you're stuck on fps, buy into momentum, or jump up when someone posts a tko value i would use all three and wound channel size results to back up my field observations. several of these are the same calculations many builders and revolver afficianados have used to discuss big bore effectiveness in the past. they're not mine.

so......to the OP in another thread that kinda merges into this one, can you make a smaller caliber perform as good as a larger caliber? in a word, depending on which smaller caliber you have......YES! but i wouldn't try it with a cup and core bullet.
i can do this with a swift, cannot do this with a hawk. the hawk works ok but not on par with the swift. then again nothing does.

for giggles i calculated out what a 500jrh will do should swift ever come out with a 400 gr a frame which they should imho! the permanent wound channel is 3.375", the tko value is an insane 77, fpe is 2000, momentum would be 85. imho that is the ultimate packable load for large and dangerous game, or really, any game one could hunt. please swift, make the bullet.

also as a side note, i do not use any loads that are over book, sticky extraction and just to prove it i fired the above loads on a day the temp was at 107 degrees. they're not just cold weather high elevation loads.

That is good information tradmark. I get the picture why you sold your .475s and went with the .454s. You read my mind about the desire to own classic cartridges and wanting a .475. As I read your data I draw the conclusion that the .475 would be a step sideways and the 500 JRH would be the step up in peformance. My guess is Swift would make bullets for the .475s before the 50s if volume is the deciding factor.

Negative, i talked to swift, and with the 500's being used in the jrh as well as the 500 smith. The volume is heavily in the 500's favor. The reason swift doesnt make heavier in the 500 than 325 gr is they believe its too much recoil for the average shooter so they dont feel a 400 is warranted. The only problem is that as the bullet gets bigger the friction in an animal increases "exponentially" per se. Ive seen bullets that i wouldve expected to have better penetration in 50 cal do horribly and its really the increased diameter so if ya want a 50 then solids are a good way to go. There they shine imho amd until theres an aframe thats what id stick with. The 325 wont go as deep as a 45 cal run hard in 300 or 325gr pill. Imho in a solid the 475 is a lateral step at best and with premo hp's in the 454 its a step backwards. The 500 jrh is a bad mofo, but i know of two that can use it well redlined, and make no mistake as loaded by the factory its not at its potential
Try 400's at just over 1600fps in a gun not heavier if not lighter than the same equivalent ruger or bfr in 44 mag or 454. Loaded up its an absolute handful. I hate shooting it that way. My son loves it. Shoots it ridiculously well too. We will double team an asiatic waterbuff at this years bovine bash, me with select grizzly loads in 460 sw and him with grizzly 500 jrh loads.

People lament the 454's high pressure when max loaded. However, this is what forced jacketed bullet makers to make em
Tougher than in other calibers and this led to the best bullets working so well in that caliber.

IF you add up the bullets used in the .480 plus the Linebaugh will this number come close to the usage of .50 cal bullets? You have more technical data to work with than I do but I would guess the recoil of the 50's to be a show stopper for the average shooter. I always saw the .454 as my personal limit after a few shots with full house .475L. With a couple of years experience with the .454 I think I could handle the .475L in small doses. I have no experience with a 50 cal handgun so I would rely on other's experience until I have the oportunity to shoot one. My platform of choice is the FA83 7.5" unported with iron sights

When you get into 460 does that mean the S&W large frame gun ported etc? From what tradmark is telling me it seems a second .454 would be in order with one sighted for a given bullet/load and a second sighted for another bullet/load. I feel an OCD attack coming on!

Back to the original topic.....Hawk Bullets are perfect for deer sized game. PERFECT!, but not for anything larger