Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Can someone explain what the 35 Brown Whelen is?

Length to shoulder, angle of shoulder? Thanks, powdr

A lot of info out there via search. I toyed with building one some years ago.

that's a nice illustration thanks!

And a whopping gain in case capacity, maybe one or two for the AI and 3-4 for the Brown. The only time I heard of what seemed like a rational justification was for the AI in a 20" barrel to equal the standard in a 22-24" barrel. But that is stretching it.

It's mostly a waste of time.

I have a custom Mauser in .35 APEX . As near as I can tell... It is merely a .35 Whelen A.I. with the shoulder moved forward about .010" Only advantage I can see is that one doesn't have to trim cases as often as the standard Whelen. - GH

addendum: Perhaps one day I'll sit down and chronograph the loads and see what it really does.

I've never had the Brown Whelen version, but did have a .35 Whelen Improved. Using about three or so grains more powder over the standard Whelen, I got a muzzle velocity gain of about 80 fps using the same 250 Speer in both rifles. Probably not worth the trouble, but the Whelen Improved looks neat.

I built a couple of Brown -Whelens in the late '70's. I would say the velocity gain, at the same pressure, was about 30 fps. GD

I have a custom Springfield in 300 Apex, pretty much duplicates the 308 Norma Mag or 30-338. A 35 cal version would probably equate to the 358 Norma Mag.

I'd never have guessed you can buy factory brass for the Brown Whelen. I reckon I need to get out more!
Qual Cart Brown Whelen brass

Mine is a 35 Whelen AI and I have found it has just a tiny bit (like a few tenths of a grain) more water capacity then my 9.3x62. Apples to apples - Both rifles with 250 grain bullets seated to 3.375, the magazine limiting length for them both. When both are loaded up they perform pretty much identically. The Brown would bring a little more. I would not mess with the @$$ pain for forming B-W cases - Basic Ackley AI are easy. But since you can buy Qual Carts for it...

Cheers,
Rex

Thanks Darryle for the pictures. Looks like a 35 Gibbs. powdr

It is based on the 280 Rem case, whose shoulder is further forward than a 270 Win or 30-06 case. Then, it is improved/ blown out with a minimum body taper and 40 degree shoulder. Its goal was to get the .358" bore the max amount of case capacity from that family of cartridges ( 270 Win, 280 Rem, 30-06) for velocity.