HI Greg....... LOL... I see you like your Raptor, good for you........ on many points I agree with your assessment, I concur it kicks the crap out of 458 Socom. I had forgotten what I said on this thread way back 17-18 months ago until it was brought back up with your assessment of the Raptor.......... At that time I looked and favored the 450 Bushmaster, even not having one. Recently I converted a couple of my guns over to 450 Bushmaster, 16 inches and have made some very incredible discovery, which would also apply to your Raptor favorably.........
The biggest is Bullet Technology and choice. This can make or break any cartridge. If you get very serious about your Raptor, then there are two bullets you need to look at, that I can promise and guarantee will out perform anything else available in .452 caliber............ and just so happens in my guns shoot to the same POI out to 50 yards. The first is the 160 gr Copper Raptor from Cutting Edge Bullets, the second is 250 Copper Raptor also from CEB. With these two bullets, you can handle anything that you will encounter in North American...... I am working on a good Solid load that will back those two bullets up. Feeding the first round in the magazine is the issue, but second round down works fine, but I need way more work with that before my confidence goes up with it.......... Do not consider these bullets in the same light as you would a conventional bullet, they are not. The 160 will handle anything up to and including black bear with ease. I would use the 250s for heavier critters, brown bear and say moose........... These loads are not over pressure, I have not found anything that works better than LilGun.
On one of my guns I have a 1X Vortex Circle dot type sight, I think its called a Spitfire, point is there is no magnification, and with my eyesight I am lucky to get things to shoot properly....... I did a 50 yard test to check out POI for the three bullets and maybe get lucky enough to decide if accuracy was suitable in my guns......
At 50 yards the Maximus accuracy just was not as good as the Raptors, and perhaps it was because they are .451 and not .452????? Whatever the reason, the Raptors shot far better than I can see or shoot, and even more important the POI of those two bullets are so close that I feel very easy about pick and choosing either bullet without changing sight in....... I decided to go with the 160 Raptor for 99% of what I would need, and have a few 250s on hand to handle heavier weights...........
I sighted in with the 160s......
And just received my shipment to start laying away some ammo ............
If you get serious about your Raptor............ LOAD "RAPTORS"............ HEH HEH....