Hello, everyone!

For those that aren't aware of Apex Outdoors, we are a Swiss lathe-turned, bullet manufacturer, headquartered here in Texas, who began launching products earlier this summer. I thought I'd put a brief summary of Apex Outdoors and our bullet lines in one condensed post for quick reference.

Apex Outdoors
A company dedicated to providing best-in-class, patent pending, lead-free, bullets for the handloader and small ammunition provider for hunting and target shooting.

Afterburner Bullets
Our flagship bullet, designed to maximize performance across an immense range of parameters for a "no compromises", "no weaknesses" bullet. It's a low friction and fouling, ultra-high BC, petal shedding, mono-metal bullet with an incredibly impressive performance score card in EVERY category. It will correctly expand and shed petals in "tissue only" hits as low as 1650 fps, while providing maximum trauma and penetration on direct frontal hits into the brisket or skull of a charging brown bear at well over 3500 fps. Its ballistic coefficient for its weight is virtually unmatched, and it's one of the lowest friction bullets for minimal barrel fouling and wear coupled with higher starting muzzle velocities, accentuating its BC potential. We left nothing on the table with this bullet; it does it all.






Haymaker Bullets
If our Afterburner is akin to the Corvette ZR1, the Haymaker is the Dodge Demon, raw and powerful. This bullet is all about absolutely maximizing terminal performance in the short to mid range operating window for the cartridges it's designed for. The Haymaker series has a more narrowed design scope. For instance, our first Haymaker, the 161gr 30 cal, is designed specifically for the 300 Blackout. No other cartridge criteria restricted the design, even though it will work well in some small 30 cal pistol platforms, like the 30-30. In the Blackout, whether a rifle or pistol platform, the 161gr Haymaker maximizes terminal performance at all ranges the Blackout would be shot at. It will open and fracture the front off at subsonic velocities and maintain that same exact terminal profile all the way to its maximum recommended impact velocity of 2400 fps, well above Blackout maximum velocities. As a midweight, it offers much improved trajectories over the heavyweights shot exclusively at subsonic velocities, and it hits harder than anything else in the Blackout. A 16" Blackout should yield roughly 1900 fps muzzle velocity near the upper end.







Target
While this particular line of bullets is self-explanatory, we incorporated our patent pending, low friction geometry to increase muzzle velocity and reduce friction and fouling. This feature, coupled with extremely high BCs in light weight designs, changes trajectory profiles, but more importantly significantly reduces time of flight for less overall error due to wind drift. Our currently released 30 cal 166gr easily attains 3200 fps in a 24" barreled 300 Win Mag, while maintaining a G7 BC of .293. Most other target bullets for 1:10" twist rifles that yield near that BC have nowhere near that muzzle velocity due to the fact that they're much heavier.





More information can be found on our website. I wanted to keep this post relatively brief. Feel free to ask any questions you may have. We are here to help! For those that have chosen to shoot Apex Outdoors bullets this hunting season, we thank you and wish you the best! Happy hunting!

Mark
apex-outdoors.com

Look, we get it.

You’re selling extreme Gucci bullets that don’t do anything a decades old Sierra Gameking can’t for half the cost. You don’t need to constantly spam.

Your bullet weights are awfully light.

You don't Hammer, Bro?

The reasons behind the weights are best explained on our site. It goes in depth. The Afterburners will in fact be the lightest monos available for their respective twist rates, but they will have BCs that rival competitors up to three weight classes higher, typically.

From a terminal performance standpoint, while it’s difficult to shake the heavy for caliber moniker (I used to be one of those people), the Afterburners are top performers. Our 153gr was pitted against other 30 cals in a close range torture test and came out on top. That test included the 200gr Swift A-Frame, which, of course, performed well also.

How do the pressures and velocities compare to monos like Cutting Edge and Badlands?

Your bullets look similarly designed to the Badlands, which tend to spike in pressure sooner than a traditional bullet in the same weight range, whereas a Cutting Edge will typically spike later (as powder charges increase.)

For example, what kind of velocity can a person expect out of your 7mm Afterburner in a 22” 7-08?

Since we have a Pressure Trace II for chamber pressure analysis, we have a bit of data on that. Not an extensive amount with all the various bullets, but enough to get a feel of certain design behaviors. Cutting Edge’s pressure curves remind me of a cup and core, surprisingly, which kind of goes along with what you’re saying above. As far as the Badlands, we don’t have quite as much time with that one, but what we do have was pre-SB2. The original had less friction for sure, but sacrifices some BC because of it. Knowing how the front of their bullet is designed, especially on the newer SB2, I would also agree with your assessment of an earlier rise in pressure.

While ours is copper with an aluminum tip, like the Bulldozer, the similarities are few from there. We employ a center bore riding surface with a case alignment boss on each side. From the nose, we progress to a shallow crimp groove, followed by the first case alignment boss. This allows sufficient control authority of the bullet by the lands but minimizes engraving forces considerably. Our engraving force is just slightly more than a GS Custom, which is the lowest I’ve ever seen. If we coated ours, like they do, they would be even closer. As far as how they pressure up, they appear even and normal in that regard. No strange early or late surges, just what would be expected.

I would think a 22” barreled 7-08 will comfortably see 3150 fps and probably 3200 fps.

I appreciate your responses.

I think you probably have a very good product that will do very well in certain applications. I suspect that most people in this particular market will want heavier bullets with higher ballistic coefficients. I think that will limit your sales, given your current production line, but I have no idea what your business model is. I’m also not a bullet expert or business man. I just do my best to keep up with bullet designs, and I think you’d do well to expand your line in the direction of heavier, higher BC bullets. Seems to me that the people willing to spend that kind of money on ultra premium, precision bullets are not the ones looking for bullets that go fast and have a decent BC.

I would think that the kind of people in that market are the old timers that are stuck in the duplex reticle era of guessing holdover and relying on speed to minimize errors at medium ranges. They’d love these bullets, assuming they hand load.

I could be way off here, but those are my honest and initial thoughts. I haven’t run the numbers, but I just can’t see these lightweight monos keeping up with any heavy, streamlined bullet at any moderate range. I’m assuming that’s a part of your focus, given your stressing of the BC numbers, and the premium price (which is not at all out of line, but certainly needs justified.)

It just seems like a very limited market, to me. There’s also nothing wrong with that. It just doesn’t seem to me that’s what you’re going for.

Sneaky,
Your market analysis is right on the money. Addressing that market (both ends of it) with monos is different. Physics requires it. Unfortunately, marketing has trumped physics in the past, and folks who have tried monos designed out of bounds many times experienced poor performance.

As far as company focus, actually, our number one goal is the highest level of terminal performance. We mention that on our site as the number one goal as well. BC will always come into the discussion early for two reasons. One, the look of the Afterburner, and two, the light weight.

As you’ve noticed, our current line of released Afterburners is designed around cartridges that have been around awhile with more standard twist rate barrels. The lone exception, the .264 with a 1:8” twist. Our 153gr in 30 cal maximizes a 1:10” twist. It really can’t be heavier in the Afterburner profile, not according to physics anyway. Now, that same 153gr shows the same BC on our radar as the Barnes 190gr LRX while having substantially better terminal performance as well. I would have to ask if that changes the perspective some? It’s easy to get lost on the grain size number, we know.

Surprisingly, some our biggest customers at the moment are some long range guys really enjoying shooting their non-specialty rigs at 1000 yards. One particular customer is about to test for shot drops at 1200 yards with his 300 WSM and the 144gr. He’s sending them out at 3350 fps, and running about .2 MOA, at least from what I’ve seen so far.

Those same guys are excited about the direction of our future business, something you were wondering about above. Yes, we do plan for faster twist scenarios. In fact, all of those for every caliber we will be releasing are already designed and in print here at Apex Outdoors. They will still all be lighter than any other competitive bullet for a certain twist rate, but as we start to break away from SAAMI into the specialty area, to include some of the newer cartridges that follow that theme and are to SAAMI, those will be very streamlined and compete well with dedicated long range cup and core bullets at range.

Very good. Makes sense. I think you’ll do well with it. Thanks for the feedback.

Thanks, Sneaky! Oh, and I forgot to mention, I love the "old timer" method of hunting, and mostly employ those tactics myself with a few modern techniques to extend old school max ranges a bit further when needed, but nowhere near as committed to long range as some of the specialists. It's my hunting preference more than anything else, but I love walking the canyons, glassing, and preparing a stalk. It just completes the experience for me. Good luck to you this year in the woods!