Pellet energy transfer

[plinker]

I've hunted whitetail deer for 40 years and I have never lost one. I use a Federal premium nosler partition in .243 and have been very precise in bullet placement. I've dropped dozens of deer in their tracks shooting them in the neck at distances from 10 to 250 yards. This bullet causes a hydrostatic shock with so much of the energy transferred to the game, that there is a 12 inch blistered area on the hide on the exit side. 
Now to pellets. I purchased a synrod and started with crosman premier hollow points due to instant availability. Accuracy isn't my question, because at 30 yards the groups are insane, and by that I mean excellent. I have shot 50+ squirrels(my primary target) and have easily taken all of them. However, the .22 synrod launched pellets pass through with a very neat hole of almost equal diameter on each side of the squirrel. There is plenty of energy because they always keep going and I hear them striking branches or trees. I tried some crosman destroyers with equal kill success, but not much change in expansion or exit hole diameter. 
Now to my question. Is this just the nature of the beast( not the squirrels, but pellet hunting itself), or have any of you found other pellets that slam hard? My set up is dropping them fine, I just wonder about the even better, without having to order the sampler pack. Is the best choice just the most accurate pellet? How do you select? Pellet weight, head shape etc... Thanks in advance for the vast knowledge found here!

 

[KYAirgunner]

I used to shoot JSB 18.1 grain pellets out of my Discovery at chipmunks and all other sorts of critters and i had the same one hole pass through. Then they just randomly lost accuracy so i switched to the Crosman premiers hollow points. Theres not much of a difference but i think there is enough to notice I've been seeing more noticeable holes, I've also blown a hole in a chipmunks side about the side of my thumb nail and done the same to ones skull. I think overall the Premiers have just been hitting harder but I'm not 100% on that. I don't think air rifles are just overall fast enough to make the pellet expand on impact, I know it's fast enough to go through animals but not fast enough to expand most smaller calibers that is.
Leo

 

[EXZIVER]

"plinker"I've hunted whitetail deer for 40 years and I have never lost one. I use a Federal premium nosler partition in .243 and have been very precise in bullet placement. I've dropped dozens of deer in their tracks shooting them in the neck at distances from 10 to 250 yards. This bullet causes a hydrostatic shock with so much of the energy transferred to the game, that there is a 12 inch blistered area on the hide on the exit side. 
Now to pellets. I purchased a synrod and started with crosman premier hollow points due to instant availability. Accuracy isn't my question, because at 30 yards the groups are insane, and by that I mean excellent. I have shot 50+ squirrels(my primary target) and have easily taken all of them. However, the .22 synrod launched pellets pass through with a very neat hole of almost equal diameter on each side of the squirrel. There is plenty of energy because they always keep going and I hear them striking branches or trees. I tried some crosman destroyers with equal kill success, but not much change in expansion or exit hole diameter. 
Now to my question. Is this just the nature of the beast( not the squirrels, but pellet hunting itself), or have any of you found other pellets that slam hard? My set up is dropping them fine, I just wonder about the even better, without having to order the sampler pack. Is the best choice just the most accurate pellet? How do you select? Pellet weight, head shape etc... Thanks in advance for the vast knowledge found here!

Plinker, If the Predator Polymags will shot well out of your gun, it would be hard to beat the devastation they do to squirrels. Now granted this is my .25 Condor, but if you get a chance watch this Squirrel hunt I filmed using them. They are Nasty!

 

[Gritz]

I am pretty inexperienced as an air gunner but in my experience shooting small critters leaves nothing hard enough to cause expansion at modest velocities. My recovered pellets from pest birds often were slightly flattened but not expanded much (premier hollow points). But I was hitting them at around 500 ft./sec. Even the bones on small birds will be broken with very little force. If I shot, say, a metal plate with that same pellet it would flatten out impressively. This is all in .22. .25 cal is a different ball game since the surface area is larger and even at low velocities is seemed like I was getting pretty good flare out on my Crow Magnums. But the real king of energy transfer, in my opinion, is the predator polymags. I can't say scientifically, why this is so. This is purely observation and theorizing on the result but I had shot a few squirrels out of a break barrel using polymags in .177. This was back before I knew much about air rifles, ballistics, or squirrel hunting so try not to judge too harshly, but I was taking body shots with an 850-900 ft./sec gun. But it didn't matter because the polymags really seemed to explode inside a squirrel chest and was pretty effective. I think that it has something to do with the tip pushing into the hollow lead cavity and forcing quick expansion and then the entire pellet fragmenting. I can't imagine that the velocity was too high out at 30 yards but I found the pellets came apart and I would find those red tips in the corners of squirrels and pieces of pellet. I would say that if you are looking for something based purely on devastation and expansion then polymags is where I would direct you. The really big hollow points like the crow magnums seem like they would also be a good bet but that might be much more dependent upon velocity and caliber. Good luck and be sure to pass on if you manage to get any good insights in your journey for the pellet that puts the most smack down for the power.

 

[plinker]

Thanks all. I'll give the polymags a try! Exziver- The video was great!