6.5 Grendel Bullet Performance on Deer. What are you shooting?

Not a grendal but I have a 6.8spc 120gr sst and the result was almost the same as yours. They do a ton of damage but do not exit and no or very little blood trail.
I was going to change over to fusions (they perform well in my .223 and 270) last year but got sidetracked and now good luck on finding anything.

I shoot the 123gr sst out of my AR platform. The one deer I killed was a neck shot, so dropped in his tracks. Am shooting the ELD Black 123gr out of my Ranch Rifle. It is technically a match grade boat-tail, but I read about a lot of good hunting results with it. Forward shoulder/lower neck shot on this #180 sow, and it performed pretty damn good (was a close shot). Tons of blood, and she didn't go 20 feet from where I shot her.

I really like the Fusion, but I shoot a .270. Since I switched to them the farthest a deer has gone is about 35-40 yards, and had a good blood trail. I am not a fan of the ballistic tip for the reasons stated above.

Gold dots do well.

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the SST is a ballistic tip and gives that type of performance. Entry hole with explosive internal damage and no exit.

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This

Have similar response on 120 Fusion in 7-08. Daughter killed a nice 8 pt yesterday and no blood for about 100 yards. When loaded on the truck blood poured out of the deer.

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Ballistic Tip bullets will exit if you have enough powder behind it. Perhaps shooters are expecting more from the lighter 6.5 rounds than they can deliver.

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I don't have experience w/ hunting Ballistic Tips at high velocity, but from my personal experience, the Ballistic Tips penetrate deeper and exit better at reduced velocities. All my deer hunting is done w/ specialty handguns w/ 14-15" barrels in rifle type rounds. In the handgun hunting community, the BT is a staple. At the slightly reduced velocities handgun hunters use, it performs more like a controlled expansion bullet, not the highly fragile, "explosive" bullet observed by many at the usual rifle velocities. I've killed about 30 head of big game w/ the 120 gr NBT in the 6.5 JDJ handgun. In this gun, the bullet has a muzzle velocity of 2400 fps. The Grendel runs at about the same velocity, but in a rifle. If I was hunting w/ a Grendel, I'd use Nosler's 120 gr Ballistic Tip load. The 130 Nosler Accubond would prob also work well.

Good to hear. I would trust nosler more so.

My specific experience at our lease has been with Winchester silvertip black box BT. it has lead to hours of wasted tracking and a few broken hearts.

Offhand I can remember 3 lost deer and 1 we found 300 yards away with ONE drop of blood and shite house luck.

I forgot to mention the 125 gr Nosler Partition. It also has a history of reliable performance at modest velocities w/ full penetration and decent expansion. When hunting w/ a gun using bullets at modest velocity, good exit wounds and a blood trail are highly desirable since you won’t typically get the “bang-flop” you see w/ high velocity rounds.