Another experience I've had was with my scoped Merkel 9.3x74 using Barnes 250 grain TSX at 750 mps - or actually 2410fps as measured through my chronograph. One shot was made out of a high tree stand at a "quartering to" whitetail at a lasered 265 metres. The bullet went in at the base of the neck, broke the spine and was found under the skin after passing through the off side rear quarter. The bullet was perfectly expanded, just like in the Barnes sales propaganda. The point here is not the ridiculous distance of that shot, but that the bullet would have been travelling really slowly at that distance yet it still expanded textbook well after passing through the entire length of a good size buck. On a different hunt, 2 caribou shot through the ribs at approximately 50 metres had a golf ball sized hole on the exit, but I never did find either of the bullets. Those caribou each went about 30, maybe 50 feet and expired.

Getting back to the original notion of experimenting with bullet performance, I'm not too sure if what happens in "small" big game will be indicative of what will happen when shooting something as big as a cape buffalo. Although I've not had the pleasure or any experience whatsoever in shooting thick skinned dangerous game, I suspect that it's a whole different kind of game. The books all tell me that heavy weights and strongly constructed bullets are the right answer for Cape buffalo, but I do know that those types of bullets will not expand much in deer or similar game. I also know that the deer don't go far when hit properly with these big heavy bullets. As they say, an un-expanded big bullet is often larger than an expanded small bore. Maybe someone here on the forum can talk about real world experience with big bullet performance in buffalo.