Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Whats the best cartridge developed in last 20 years.

Just wondering what the pros think, I just bought a savage A17 17 hmr and instantly fell in love with the cartridge. Not only me but everyone of my friends that have shot it went out and bought one. I can't remember having so much fun shooting a gun as we do with this caliber. I can easily see the 22 mag becoming obsolete.

300 WSM and 6.5 Creed.

Doc

Most, if not all developments in your time frame have been more about fitting existing ballistics into smaller actions, AR platforms, etc. Ballistics, aside from improvements due to new propellants, have remained pretty much the same. Better bullets have extended the usefulness of many rounds a bit and faster twists allow longer bullets to be used for increased range.

All of that aside, The 6.5 CM is the one that appeals to me most, even though I don't have one, and likely never will.

204 Ruger

If it isn't the 6.5 Creedmoor I don't know what else it might be.

Im with the OP....17HMR



Though Im a fan of the .204 as well.....

300 BLK for me.......custom AR build in July...

then a Ruger Ranch 3 weeks later.....

Handloader's dream.....

260 Remington for me........

I would have said the 7mm08 but its 35 years old

Isn't the 260 older than 20 years?

"Best" is a tough one: best for what? Most popular might be the 17 HMR, while the .204 certainly has utility and isn't going away anytime soon. For my use, the 6.5 Creedmoor wins but that's a matter of preference and hunting/shooting interest.

More interesting to me is that all three were developed by Hornady or Hornady collaborating with Ruger. Dave Emary's fingerprints are on all three, unless I'm mistaken. Smart folks at work in Grand Island.

20 years is not a long time,and as with most cartridges development was designed with first sales in mind and a specific use,or enhancement.P O Ackerly,Roy Weatherby may be the 2 biggest proponents of the enhancement theory.there were others like Whelen.
Now even more than calibers powder developement has been an even bigger jump. the 270,the 25-06 were mediocre rounds until powder was developed to enchance their performance.and pill design has jumped leaps and bounds. these 2 developements have made many calibers even better by making terminal ballistics extraordinary.

Don't hold your breath.

Yeah, the .22 Magnum isn't going anywhere, though there's no doubt the .17 HMR has cut into its market. But the .22 Magnum ise very useful for some tasks the .17 HMR just doesn't do as well. It's much like the difference between the .25-06 and .30-06: Same case but with a vast difference in possible bullet weights and field performance.

But the .17 HMR did provide an entirely different kind of performance than the .22 Magnum. Probably some 5mm Remington fans will argue "their" round did it earlier, but the original Remington 5mm factory load wasn't much different than the .22 Magnum's, which is why the 5mm went tits-up.

Most of the cartridges mentioned so far simply reproduce the ballistics of much older cartridges, but in a shorter package to fit in shorter magazines. The .300 WSM doesn't do anything the .300 H&H won't do, and the same applies to the 6.5 Creedmoor and .260 Remington when comparing them to the 6.5x55, or 7mm-08 and 7x57. That's not revolutionary, just a realistic rearrangement of case shape to conform to modern bolt action magazines.

The .300 Blackout is pretty much exactly the .300 Whisper, which J.D. Jones developed more than 20 years ago. The .204 is interesting, but .20-caliber wildcats on the .223 case have been around much longer than 20 years.

I think revolutionary would have been a better question then best. Very interesting stuff. Thank you

Though I want to vote for the .260, because I like it so well, I've got to give the .204 Ruger the nod. There were many wildcats, as Mule Deer noted, but this factory round brought .20 caliber performance to anyone with a checkbook and access to a gunstore. My cousin just bought one in a RAR and he loves it. No rebarreling, no custom dies, just a trip to Cabelas and leave with rifle, factory ammo, and a set of dies. And I hate to admit it, but that RAR feels good, functions great, and shoots well.

17 HMR is without doubt the best round developed in the last 20 years.

B-29.

7mm WSM

For me it is the .375 Ruger...

jim