So what is the big mystery with Hornady you think?

[Meketrefe]

What do you think is the next big thing?

I think polymer cased ammo or a bullet that reduces friction and pressure and therefore much faster, are good possibilities.

...or perhaps some new marketing for snake oil, what do you think?

[24Pink14Stink]

I'll guess snake oil.

[Pissed Off Patriot]

A bullet with rocket fins.

Straight to the moon, Alice!

[dwa12479]

I'll guess snake oil.

My initial thought as well. I hope we're wrong though, that would mean that they're bringing something exciting (read: expensive) to the market.

[thughes]

Polymer bullets.

[Meketrefe]

A bullet with rocket fins.

Straight to the moon, Alice!

hahaha

[Meketrefe]

They shot themselves on the foot.
The bullet might be great but what they presented sounds, looks and feels like an infomercial.

Bullets...
hornadyeldbullets.jpg

[Meketrefe]

These are the actual coefficients ...
Here are the G7 BC's of the most common bullets used in competition and target shooting. Some great for hunting too.
Lapua 0.308" 155gr Scenar 0.236
Sierra 0.308" 155gr Palma 0.229
Hornady 0.308" 155gr Amax 0.212
Hornady 0.308" 168gr Amax 0.230
Sierra 0.308" 168gr Matchking 0.218
Nosler 0.308" 168gr Competition 0.218
Sierra 0.308" 175gr Matchking 0.243
Hornady 0.308" 178gr Amax 0.240
Sierra 0.308" 190gr Matchking 0.270
Hornady 0.308" 208gr Amax 0.324
Berger 0.284" 180gr VLD 0.337
Sierra 0.284" 175gr Matchking 0.327
Hornady 0.284" 162gr Amax 0.307
Sierra 0.264" 142gr Matchking 0.301
JLK 0.264" 140gr VLD 0.327
Berger 0.264" 140gr VLD 0.313
Hornady 0.264" 140gr Amax 0.299
Nosler 0.264" 140gr Competition 0.281
Lapua 0.264" 139gr Scenar 0.285
Berger 0.264" 130gr VLD 0.282
Sierra 0.264" 123gr Matchking 0.260
Berger 0.243" 115gr VLD 0.279
Tubb 0.243" 115gr Dtac 0.276
Sierra 0.243" 107gr Matchking Use 0.510 G1 bc
Sierra 0.224" 69gr Matchking 0.169
Berger 0.224" 75gr VLD 0.217
Hornady 0.224" 75gr Amax 0.212
Sierra 0.224" 77gr Matchking 0.190
Berger 0.224" 80gr VLD 0.228
Sierra 0.224" 80gr Matchking 0.217
Berger 0.224" 90gr VLD 0.281

[Liberty's Teeth]

It's a rapid reaction to a serious marketing problem they have. Word is the target community discovered that the plastic tip are deforming in flight from heat and screwing up BC.

[Meketrefe]

I think in the long term this should not damage Hornady's good brand but at the moment they have created a bit of a mess.
We are not alone, many forums are talking about this due to the huge hype they created.
It seems to me, so far, their marketing recipe for this bullet consists of: 1/3 technology, 1/3 hype and 1/3 BS.

I suspect these new bullets will be good bullets but I doubt they will be the best bullets for any application as some people
might see them based on the infomercial they released.

The pdf shows some inconsistencies according to those competing manufacturers tests and some other individual tests
and the actual experiences with those bullets so it is a bit arbitrary at best.

The advertised industry changing development might be nothing more than an improvement to their assortment so only time
will tell but I think we are smart enough to understand that the corrected or improved BC cannot make such big difference
or otherwise our current BCs would not work in the estimated ballistics paths, but they do. Doppler or no Doppler the targets
don't lie.

We know that Hornady has not been as accurate as Sierra, Berger or Lapua on their advertised BCs but people have been
putting their corrections and then go to work with it. Quality software will also come with the corrected values so one just
has to do small variations for batch or even special shooting conditions. So maybe this is a way Hornady wants to tell
us they are going to be more accurate and reliable with our advertised BCs like some of the competition have been doing.
Sierra, Berger and others provide coeficients at different speed spectrums and/or G7 coefficient that is a lot better for
long range calculations.

Lets take one example.
If we put a standard correction to the popular 178gr AMAX (that BTW is a very nice long range hunting bullet), the bullet
is very consistent and it doesn't show any signs of erratic trajectories at any distance other than when aproaching transsonic
range that happens to many bullets anyway and depending on rifling, wind, etc.... So depending on how you do your
calculations you can do this in a number of ways but the goal is the same, to map the estimated path to the actual path
during training and testing. Lets take their superformance match load shot from a varmint/tactical rifle with a 24" pipe,
555ft Elev.on a mild 20C weather. Lets forget about the wind to simplify things.

Starting with a corrected value of G7 .240 that translates into G1: .469 ( Corrected from the advertised G1: .530) and
then playing with small extra adjustments like increasing the retardation coeficient by 10% will have an insignificant impact
at 800 yards form a 308 winchester from 6.69 to 6.71 mils of elevation. Even by using a different adjusted BC like some
use of G1 .471 the value comes to 6.67 mils of elevation w/o touching retardation coefficient or other variables that might not
be available in popular over the counter software anyway.

1/10th mil at 800 yards is 8cm so the differences above of 8cmx 0.3 = 2.4 that is less than an inch maximum.
In practical terms an error like this would be insignificant at 800 yards. This is the reality of it.
An error in reading the wind of dialing the wrong drop would have far more consequences that would be actually measurable
than any tip or meplat improvement of any kind.

So in summary they are telling us that their BCs are now more accurate and I am sure we will see an improvement in ballistic coefficient
but not sure how much. Also keep in mind that both Sierra, Berger and others offer superior BCs that can even be further improved with
meplat work. And also don't forget the Sierra TMKs that are have been working great so far.

I know this might be getting too complicated but just in case one is interested I provide the following link....

http://www.bfxyz.nl/docs/bfxaboutdragfunctions.shtml

Here we can see Nate Foster melting some of those Amax tips....