As Kutenay pointed out, the 9.3 X 62 is VERY popular in B.C. And, as I've researched this fine cartridge in the past few years, I've discovered it has been a favorite, if not overly popular, rifle in Canada for at least a-half century, especially across the North where larger, sometimes dangerous game are encountered.
There's a fellow from the Yukon who posts on here and has made a name for himself in using and promoting the 9.3 X 62 for over thirty years! Due to his posting on a favorite Canadian forum, and killing a large grizzly in the Yukon last year with one of his, including pics and load, there is no rifle-cartridge for larger/dangerous game in Canada that is more popular! Just about everyone from coast to coast is making a run on them and they are getting scarcer by the minute!
My own opinion is, after a couple of years use, that it is about as ideal as it gets for a one rifle/cartridge do-it-all kind of thing... and I've come to that conclusion after owning, handloading for and using many medium-bore rifles, including .338s, .358s and .375s. It literally will do it all... IF the shooter knows what he is doing!
Bob
www.bigbores.ca I was in wholehearted agreement until I got down to the 375 part.
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I actually consider the 9.3x62 a "better" choice for BC situations for most people and for very practical reasons.
I think that, for a serious big game hunter, with an orientation to trophies, the two "best" rounds offered commercially are the .308Norma and the .338WM, my lifelong favourite. This is really "splitting hairs" and fine blonde ones at that, but, it is my opinion, not worth much, but, WTH.
Where the 9.3 really shines, IMO, is in doing the type of bush work that I did, by choice, for many years-and wish I were still engaged in- as it is so easy to load for, shoot well due to less perceived recoil and seems to be as accurate in hunting rifles as any other round I have used/shot.
My much-loved Brno ZG-47 rifles factory chambered for the oldtimer, weigh around 8 lbs, scoped, in Micky Edge handles and hold FIVE rounds. With my loads, derived from my favourite gunscribe, well, he and Phil Shoemaker, our buddy here, MD, and are far more accurate than I can now hold. They are reliable, as Mauser 98 types are and very pleasant to carry and shoot, so, they REALLY work.
The .375 H&H is so justly famous that it hardly needs an old grumpy geezer like me to add to it's luster and I have two fine rifles so chambered. But, a rifle in .375 tends to be a bit heavy for packing in the mountains and most hold, at max, only four cartridges.
To me, then, since the excellent "short" mags, the .338WM, the .358NM and so on, also have this issue as offered in commercial rifles that are all most hunters can afford, the 9,3 makes a LOT of sense.
Actually, a pair of Mausers, such as an Oberndorf 1933 "Postal" action and a G-33/40, chambered in the old 9.3x62 and the even more hoary 7x57 or 6.5x55 are as fine a choice for any hunting I have ever done or wish to do as a man can obtain and all of these are easy to shoot, load for and have "reps" based on long successful use....which,is why, with four fine rifles in 7x57 and as many in 9,3, I REALLY NEED a 6.5x55 or two.....we all know that, eh!
