I liked your debate about using smaller cartridges for elk. I’m on the small cartridge side, if the old fellas did it and your willing to put in the work to ensure a perfect shot that would be pretty rewarding. What I’m wondering is how a small but fast cartridge, like the 22 Creedmore, would react with a tough copper bullet. In theory it should open up really well, so maybe speed not size should determine the use of coppers. It would be cool to see in ballistics jell a comparison of 22 and 6.5 creed then maybe 308 and 300 win mag, all with an eldx then a tough copper.
On an elk hunt 30 years ago in Craig Colorado. The outfitter and his wife both shot Remington 700’s in 25-06 using 120g Rem Core-Lokt. They were amused with the “Big Boys” needing their 300 Mags. To be fair, they were the outfitter / guides so they were very familiar with the critters that came through their ranch and rarely had a shot over 150yds. He would double lung the elk and let them walk off, generally about 100 yds then they would lay down because they were not feeling very well and not being pressured. He would give them 30 minutes to an hour then go start gutting, claimed he never lost one and didn’t blow up the meat. He personally didn’t care for heart shots, double lung the elk or mule deer and let the heart pump the blood out of the meat and into the thoracic cavity, the meat didn’t get gamey. I thought that to be sage advice and have done the same when able.
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We did a ballistic gel test a bit ago where we tested exactly this. Essentially, the question of can I just switch to a copper bullet for elk and still use a tiny cartridge? The results were not inspiring.
Copper bullets leave a THIN wound channel, so if you’re using a thin cartridge as well, the wound was pretty skinny. That’s my opinion anyway.