Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting All hail the wonderful and mighty .338 Winchester Magnum

Bob, my conclusion is basically the same... for the recoil it just doesn't bring all that much to the table. In a rifle with a decent tube weight and decent overall weight (8.75 lbs all-up) recoil isn't a big deal. I always found myself with light 338's and, while shootable, I got sick of dealing with the recoil. The older I get the less I've found I like recoil.

My problem is I don't like heavy rifles and most 338's are. Still, if you put all the variables into a bag and shook them up I suppose an 8.5 lb, 22" bbl'd 338 WM would probably come out as the "ideal" elk rifle.

Just don't try to convince me there is any necromancy associated with it, or pursuade me there is other "magic" in certain velocity levels because cup/core bullets"behave"; that stuff is nothing more than misleading sophistry.

Well, here's my thinking........

I'm not too sensitive to recoil so that's not an issue for me.

I love 338's and I love 270's ('o6's almost as well).

I think of the 338 as just a big 270; trajectories are almost identical.

I've killed deer, elk and moose with 270's as well as elk with a 338 and while I've never felt undergunned or disadvantaged with the 270, make no mistake, the 338 thumps anything MUCH harder.

As for deer not being much of a test, to some degree, I concur, but on the other hand I disagree to a point.

I once shot a fairly large bodied mule deer (est. around 300 lbs on the hoof) and when skinning it, found what appeared to be a 24 caliber bullet balled up in one of the hams....nicely mushroomed, didn't come apart or blow up.........just didn't penetrate. Maybe shot at long range and no poop left; who's to know. Was obviously from a previous year and deer showed no ill effects.

For sure it was not an X bullet so won't go there on any comments, pro or con.

Point is, there is a bottom end, at least for mule deer, and in my book, I'd probably set a 25 caliber at >3000 FPS as low end cartridge.

My guess is that if that deer had been hit in the same place with a 270, 150 gr. Partition, he wouldn't have still been around for me to kill.

And if I were paying big bucks for an outfitted hunt for a GENUINE trophy caliber elk or moose, I'd be carrying a 338 instead of one of my beloved 270's.

Good friend of mine who PH'd in Tanzania once told me if it were legal, he'd let me use the 338 for cape buffalo......I think that says something about the potency of the cartridge.

Here's a matched pair of rifles; that is they are identical except for barrel diameter; one is a 270, one is a 338.

Both are Sako's, both have 22" barrels and both are in McM stocks.

The 270 weighs 8.0 lb; the 338 weighs 8 lb. 5 oz.

They are really the only 2 rifles I need for all NA game. If I feel the need to use something bigger than a 270 or 'o6, then I want something substantially bigger and the 338 fills that bill and does so in a reasonably sized package.

MM

Thanks 222!

Wow... didn't mean to walk away right when things got interesting! Had to take my daughter to a dance... which brings up the question, what's the best caliber for horn-dog boys?

I was simply keeping Bob and I's running debate alive. My feeling is that cartridges in a certain velocity window seem to perform best on game without resorting to exotics like all-copper bullets. Brad, while we've never discussed this, by your choices of caliber (fine choices by my reckoning I might add, 30-06 and .308), you too feel this way. .338 is sort of the medium-big version of this mindset, with Bob's choice of .375 being the big mac daddy of 'em all. Bob asked why I thought 2800-2900 fps was the shiznit and I attempted to elaborate! THAT'S where deer came into it, because in reality, a .338 Winchester Magnum is obscene overkill for any deer. I was using the game animal that I have had the most experience with, that's all.

Well, elk are technically deer... but you know what I mean! :-)

I have not killed an elk with a .338. I want to, badly... I have only killed one with a 45/70 and that is a whole seperate discussion.

I HAVE helped take apart several elk killed with .338's, a couple with 30-06's, and one with a 300 WSM. All of them were obviously dead or they would have kicked my a$$ as I cut them up. So all those calibers obviously worked.

I have said many times that I would hunt elk with a 30-06 any day, and in fact I have spent several seasons toting just that. I feel that a .338 gives me everything good about the 30-06 and then a little more, and I appreciate that little more. Maybe, someday, if by some miracle I get to kill enough elk to get jaded about it to where it doesn't matter so much if I have to let one walk because of a shot angle... I'll step down in power. For now, I have a wonderful, accurate rifle that is stable and is what Dober calls an "honest" rifle... and it's a .338... and I since I'll shoot any elk with horns, and take any shot angle that gets me to the vitals, I figure a .338 is a good choice for elk. And, it is!

We all have our areas of expertise. I daresay I could teach most of you a thing or two about blacktail hunting. Likewise, guys living in the heart of "easy" elk hunting (no such thing, but roll with me here) have experience I will probably never have- period! So while I might be a bit overgunned with my .338 and elk, it's hardly a mistake, or a bad elk caliber, by any stretch. In fact it's one of several excellent choices. I think, personally, all things factored in, it's the best choice for me. At 6'4" and 210 pounds and a bit of a numbskull, the recoil is a non-issue and we all know that a 225-gn .338 bullet at a MV of 2900 is gonna whack the crap out of any elk that walks if I do my part. And I feel that at the impact speeds I'll be seeing bullet construction, while important, is not a crisis like it would be if I were using say a 300 RUM or 7 STW.

If one of you Montana guys spent thousands of dollars to come to Oregon on an expedition to kill a blacktail, you'd put a lot of thought and effort and research into it, and most likely put some serious thought into your rifle and cartridge. Here, where the damn things are everywhere and I know how and where to go kill one if I put my mind to it, same as you do with elk Brad and Dober, I tend to experiment, try light calibers and heavy ones and this and that. I have that luxery. There's always tomorrow, the season is 5 weeks long, and I can hunt them on my own property if worse comes to worse.

Elk are not like that for me. It's a 5 day season with a low percentage rate of success. It's an obsession. I drive 12 hours to get there, set up several days in advance, go scouting, hunt hard, and most likely come home empty handed. Then I do it again next year. So if my .338 is indeed a little overpowered, I hope you'll understand that it's all in the honest attempt to KILL A F&%$IN' elk!

:-)

Peace, brutha's.

-jeff