Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Long Range Hunting Looking for info on a long range type rifle in 338 lapua

Agree no need for a 338 Lapua for a mere 800 yards 1500 and beyond and they shine like few others

Really...?? 500-600 yards.. Is something a .308 Win. can handle repeatedly. Day in day out.

I'm having a hard time comprehending where this I gotta have a shoulder cannon to get past 200 yards comes from?

Sounds like those that are trying to increase the kill range should spend more time increasing their SKILL range....

buying bigger sin't going to make you better. It starts with fundamentals and basics marksmanship skills. You need to spend you money shooting/practicing.

This falls under the same category as "buy a magnum anything and get close".. magnums kill zone is much bigger than a non magnums...sheeesh...

I'm gonna go bang my head against the wall...

jus' sayin'

I am talking about first shot at game.
Not lobbing in after spotter rounds.

You are not telling me you can hit a deer at 1377 yards with the first shot of a 338LM after screwing on the elevation 60 moa are you?

I would have to see that.

I have been practicing with a lot of rifles, and getting a high probability of a kill at 600 yards at dawn with the first shot of the day is not easy. I am only up to 50% with no wind.

Any skilled knowledgeable long range hunter can indeed score first round kill shot on game at 500 yards with a 308. Anyone that is not sure of a first round hit in the kill zone at what ever the range should not take that shot. I know several long range hunter that have placed first round kill shot on game a lot farther than 1377 yards

You need a bit more knowledge as well as practice

I don't believe in the 1377 yard first shot of the day high probability kill.

Certainly can be and is done by skilled and knowledgeable individuals

Not certainly at all for me.

You can believe what you want to believe.
You can post anything you want to post.
But you can't get me to believe that.

Not sure where I call me taking a shot at 1300+ yards. But I'm gonna say If I was to practice a bit with the 338L I could do 12" steel at that distance.

Clark all you need is practice but it sounds like you may need some better equipment or better practice.

I can ding 10" steel at 500 meters one time after another and the groups gonna be less than 10" all day long with my .308.

I watched from a bluff about 3/4 of a mile away when jwp poked a speed goat at 777 yards outta the gate the first day on a doe speed goat hunt.

What the OP is asking to do is routinely done by people who put some time and dedication into learning their weapon. With much lesser cartridges than a 338L.

Clark I'll believe what has been posted because I don't have to guess.
I'll post as I do because again, I don't have to guess.

I could care less if you believe it or not because once again I'm not guessing that it can be done.

Holy crap, the Op wants a 338L and over half of the posters here are trying to talk him out of it.
OP, your $2500.00 for scope and rifle will get you into a 338L factory rifle ( Savage) and still leave you with plenty of cash for optics.
I enjoy my custom built 338L allot and it is very accurate ans well as a power house.
You will be able to find plenty of ammo, dies, and components for the 338L, more so than most any other 338, be it the Edge, RUM, Weatherby.

What you believe and the facts apparently aren't one and the same

I have a .338 RUM because a reasonably well put together hunter weight set up fell into my lap when I was debating twisting up a .338 LM. It shot well and the price was stupid good so I bought it or else I would have built .338 LM.

I have no qualms taking a 700 yd cold bore shot with mine assuming a good rest and a unspooked animal. It weighs 9lbs 3 oz fully loaded and that's with a .210 TSX... Gasp

I have an ample supply of .300 gr bullets for it and have an accurate load in them but no real place to practice much past 700 and where I use that particular rifle is mostly clear cuts etc and the possible range rarely exceeds 400yds or do.

I only have a 10x scope on mine as it is a Leica and came on gun and is superb for my uses. That said the rifle is going to get a rail and a higher magnification scope so I can start playing longer.

Have seen a buddy make first round hits on game to 750 yds and steel to 1100yds with a factory 7RM sendero and 180 gr loads with only bedding and a trigger job. It's the only rifle he owns and he shoots it a lot.

Sorry for the long winded post, long way of saying if the shooter is up to the task, any of the big 7mm calibers and up launching a bullet of even reasonably high BC in a load that a well set up rifle likes is capable of cold bore shots out past 1000 yds day in day out.

As per always the nut pulling the trigger is typically the limiting factor of first round cold bore LR hits.

Spot on, +1..........

We had a philosophy professor in 1969 we were to give oral arguments. Usually, after each one he would say, "Maybe so, but still, I am not convinced."

I have been doing consulting engineering for companies where engineers are stuck. I have become very fussy about what is true and what is not.

You can lead a horse to water....

Clarkm the numbers you throw out there for the Lapua are inaccurate . You can run a Lapua 4 inches high at 100 yards and only be at 35 Moa at 1400 yards . Your velocity is also way off. Use a accurate ballistic calculator and real numbers in the field and it might impress you. We had a cold bore 1 shot kill on a bear past 1000 yards last year with a 338 edge. My 18 yr old son who is very new to long range shooting can make cold bore hits on rocks the size of a soccer ball in the 1000-1100 yard range off a bipod. It's all about quality equipment ,knowledge and practice......

+1............

If you really want to go for the gusto here is data on the A-Square 338 Excalibur.
http://a-squareco.com/.338_Excal_200_gr_NosBT.html

+100

Respectfully, 500 yards is a chip shot and certainly doesn't call for a .338 LM or any magnum for that matter.

I'm only a mediocre long-range shooter and cold bore shots at 800-900y are only mildly exciting with a .338 LM.




I'm all for you getting whatever gun you want, OP. I'd suggest that a good 6.5mm would serve you far better than a .338, though. I have both and would take the 6.5 EVERY time on a target at a mere 500y.

Ya'll remind me of videos of Basilisk and frill-necked lizards erecting their crests and fringes in response to another male "infringing" on his territory.

You ALL have good contributions that are capable of teaching others a great deal IF ya'll would start cooperating instead of shooting at each other.

CONSIDER THIS. HOW MANY of you have no trouble hitting a squirrel at 100 yds with a scope sighted 22 LR rifle sighted in to that range??? I'm half blind, twitchy from age but I have little trouble hitting sage ratz at that distance with my scoped, 6" High Standard auto using CCI Stingers...cold barrel OR hot...about 50% of the time anyway.

I can stretch that distance to 150-175 with ANY of my several scope sighted 22LR cal rifles with Stingers OR standare LR and be 90%...and when I bring out my 17's or larger cal varmint rigs with 20x scopes and a range finder, that range goes to 400 minimum and be 100% unless the wind is blowing a gale...and I'm no where NEAR the shooter I was 40 years ago.

A sage rat has a instant kill zone about 2" x 2"...don't get nitpiky. Most of the deer/Elk/antelope I've killed have a kill zone about 10 times that...20 x 20", some larger, some smaller.

If you can take a sage rat at 100 yds first shot, anytime...you can do the SAME THING to a deer at 1000 yds as long as you have the right equipment, understand just a small amount of ballistics and can punch buttons on a calculator or cell phone...it's nothing but a ratio thing...a deer at 1000 yds looks about the same size and has the same relative size kill zone in your scope as a sage rat does at 100 yds.

If you haven't learned how to use the scope reticle as a range finder you need to learn how to do that also.

ANYONE can calculate drop, MRT, PBR, etc, for ANY bullet, for ANY range, for ANY BC/VELO, at ANY TIME...and with todays technology you can carry that information/program in your shirt pocket OR cellular phone EVERYWHERE you go.

ANY rifle with a minimum of .5 MOA is a chip shot for those ranges and well beyond. ALL my varminting rigs do MUCH less than .5 MOA. Even my big bore rifle will do > .5 MOA with certain bullets. When I get bored smacking ratz I start on pine cones, flower heads, rocks, lizards etc. You want nice small targets, try Lodgepole pinecones...they run golfball size and blow up nicely. If you DON'T understand this, you need to stop arguing and start learning, because you are WAY behind the curve.

The ONLY unknown variable is the wind. Doping the wind is 50% luck and 50% knowledge...by guess and by golly most of the time because the wind can shift the moment you pull the trigger. The laws of physics AND MURPHY'S law always apply and love to combine to humble and embarrass you.

No matter WHAT the caliber, a bullet with a specific BC and specific MV will drop exactly the same distance and take exactly the same time to target. That's just simple physics.

A bullet with a BC of ~750 with a MV of ~2800fs will take ~1.34 seconds to 1000 yd target and will drop ~80.5", at 1500 yds it will drop ~517" and take ~2.38 second. The bullet will drop from 485" at 1475 yds to 517" at 1500 yds. That's about 32" of drop over a distance of 25 yds or ~1.28" drop per yd of distance and while the bullet is pointing relatively level, it is coming in at a fairly steep angle.

YOU BETTER HAVE A VERY ACCURATE RANGING DEVICE because 32" of drop in 25 yds means you will miss if your ranging is off by 25 yds. Even with knowing the exact range and having your rifle zeroed at 1475 yds, the difference is STILL ~24" of drop or ~1.5 MOA zero between 1475 and 1500 yds.

AGAIN, don't get nitpiky...these are just calculated figures for illustrative purposes...what happens in real life YOU have to work out.

The main point I'm trying to make to the nay sayers is; ANYONE with the right equipment and an accurate rifle and the ability to whack a squirrel at 100 yds and do the same to a deer at 1000 yds...it AIN'T NO THANG, BRO.

And for the "Elitists"; It's great to have the equipment and the rifle and the capabilities to do these neat things...but IT AIN'T NO THANG, BRO...people have been doing it the HARD way for MANY years...WITHOUT all the fancy toys. Be proud, but be humble at the same time. Use your knowledge to your advantage and the advantage/advancement of others who like this part of this sport and climb down amoung us mortals.

AND...don't forget you DON'T have to have a full blown "long range" rifle OR load to the max in ANY caliber, to have lots of fun. I shoot 300 gr Sierras MK in my 338-06, it actually fits the long throat better than the 225 Hornady, but has to be single loaded...there are some hi BC 375 and 416 cal bullet available now that might turn my big bores into real bugholers and even single loading the old "thuty-thuty" with a long VLD will surprise you with just how accurate a Win 94/Marlin 336 can be with a little work.

Don't let your vision or interests narrow so much you forget about the rest of the world of shooting in headlong pursuit of whatever "long range" means to you.

FWIW...

A bit more information on cases and volumes in general...

Just received the Norma 338 Lapua brass ..this is a comparison between 3 Hornady and 3 Norma brass.

NORMA - AVE of 3 new, clean, unfired cases.
LENGTH - ~2.720", ave case weight ~330.1 gr, vol 114 gr H2O.

HORNADY
LENGTH - ~2.728", ave case weight ~307.6 gr, vol 118 gr H2O.

This is ~3.4% difference in case volumes...doesn't sound like much but it is just slightly lower than the ~5% that AI'ing some cartridges does and look at all the smoke that arises from that.

This illustrates what the differences can be between brands, what weights are posted and what weights are in software probrams and points up the fact that you need to use your own case data in software programs when calculating loads.

Somewhere down the road I will get some Lapua brass ordered, when I can get $300 bucks scraped together in one pile.

Sometime later:

I remeasured and weight sorted the 20 bulk Norma 338 Lapua brass.

LENGH RANGE - 2.713" TO 2.719" then neck sized because the necks were dinged a bit from the bulk bag and trimmed to 2.71".

WEIGHT ran from 326.5 gr to 331.9 gr..two at 326.5, one at 327.3 and the rest from 328.5 gr to 331.9 evenly distributed in one gr increments, 3-5 per increment...not too bad for such a large case.

Fired off a couple of 200 gr out into the woods and startled a couple of pinus coneys that were snooping around. The wind was blowing a gal...snow, wind and rain storms moving through this little valley all week long.

The 2.710" trimmed fired cases had ~1 gr increase in volume which was the same as the 2.728" Hornady cases...the 0.018" difference in length equal to 0.41 gr H20 has a small affect on the total case volume certainly and is similar in effect as changing bullet seating depth.