OzHunter,

The 480gr Woodleighs have the cannelure in the wrong place for the 458wm (but the right place for the 450NE's) and there is substantially less powder room using the 480gr than the 500gr (though I have recently heard that you can special order the 480gr with the cannelure placed further rearward for the 458wm.) I tried loading the 480's and noticed no benefit compared to the 500's, though with a properly placed cannelure, this might change.

I get 2145fps with the 500's so nothing is wanting from my rifle regarding performance with the 500's.

This trip I relied on the Woodleigh 500's for the first shot and North Fork 450's for the second shot.

I had an incident in May in which a North Fork may have failed to penetrate a bull's zygomatic arch, just under the earhole, on a side brain shot and instead veered almost 90* and ended up in the neck. As a result I am relying on the tried and true performance of the 500gr Woodleighs at 2145fps for the first shot.

My thinking is that the first shot is going to be a brain shot, or at least an attempted brain shot, and while sufficient penetration is certainly required, the 500gr Woodleighs at 2145fps give plenty, and in my experience, can be relied on to break bone and travel straight for as far as required for any brain shot. For a second shot, which might require as much penetration as can be mustered in the event of a failed brain shot, I'm relying on the significantly greater penetration of the 450gr flat nose North Forks, which definitely travel straight in the body. But the 500's penetrate well on body shots too, just not as far as the North Forks.

Each bullet shoots well in my rifle, and to the same POI, with the North Forks shooting more accurately, but the 1" groups at 50yds that I have gotten with the North Forks aren't significantly better than what the Woodleighs produce, for the purpose. (BTW, since North Fork changed their bullet a couple of years ago, I haven't found the magic load that gets me 1" groups like the old style, yet.)

JPK