Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Express Rifles and Big Bores Only An interesting note regarding gun weight

If you tote a heavy rifle in your hands for a week, you'll be an instant devotee to lighter rifles.

My first 458 lott was 9 1/2 pounds, really too light, second one 10 1/2 pounds, just about right. My 500 Jeffrey is 11#'s, which is just about right.

While an 11# 375 would be a pussycat to shoot, it's the kind of rifle that begs for a gun bearer to carry.

Obviously, whatever works for you guys is best for you.

My .340 Wby weighs in at around 9.5 lbs (10.5 lbs if I leave the easily attachable/detachable bipod on it).

My .300 Win Mag weighs in at around 8.5 lbs scoped.

I happily carry my .340 around up to 5 hours - 6 hours per day up and down mountains, but agree that the .300 or something else lighter might be better if I was hunting elk/sheep for weeks above tree line hiking long days everyday. Admittedly I don't do that.

FWIW, not everyone who disagrees with someone else about the ideal weight of a heavy-recoiling rifle is just some lame hapless flatlander. For example, most people with whom I go backpacking or who otherwise go on long non-hunting backpacking adventures in the mountains would never, ever, ever carry a three-pound firearm for security. I would, however, no matter how high and steep the terrain is. That's a three-puond difference. These include many rugged individuals. It's just a matter of priority/preference.

With the big-boomers, I would rather add a pound or so to make the range time more pleasant and carry the equivalent of a box of breakfast cereal for extra weight.

Putting a removable bipod on a rifle while at the range is a decent way of taming the recoil at the range somewhat, but allowing you to remove it when you hunt, where the recoil will never be noticed, if you want. IMO, in my expeirence, the amount of felt recoil goes up exponentially as the rifle gets lighter. Physics says so too. So adding maybe a pound to a light rifle may be worth the trouble for some. Not others. I literally got to where I do not flinch with my .375 Wby. I'm doubtful I could have done that if it was 8.0 lbs.

Not everyone is going to carry a .375 20 miles a day.

I carried my hefty .375 Wby around as much as I needed to, and in part because of my complete comfort and confidence with the thing, I was able to do this with one shot when it mattered without hesitating:



It's a .375 Wby, not a sheep gun.

Did you notice the recoil when you fired?

Not at all.

But I do at the range when I would fire it 30-60 times in an afternoon.

I was fairly happy with myself in learning to shoot that thing without flinching the way it is set up. I think I would be asking too much of myself to try to avoid flinching when shooting that thing at 8.0 - 8.5 lbs. Maybe I could do so. I've never tried. I just went the easy route - carry a couple extra pounds. That approach apparently works for some, but not others.

Some on here may fail to understand some others' limitations. I work like a dog in a non-hunting job throughout the year while trying to raise a family well. I can't spend too many hours a week at the range trying to learn to shoot an 8-lb .375 wby, unless I give up being a decent father to these guys:



I think I spent my time as efficiently as possible really working to get great with the heavier .375 rifle than struggling to overcome the much-more-violent recoil of a lighter rifle. If I were a PH or guide, it might be different. Not sure.

Gotcha. Good looking pair of young men there, Dad. That mount must provide them a ton of imaginative fun. Most of my range time is spent shooting 220 grain flat nosed Hornadys with the occasional higher velocity round mixed in. This spring I want to run some experiments using a particular hunting bullet fired at a range of velocities to examine penetration and expansion qualities into a variety of mediums. Not like this hasn't been done a million times in the past but it's always fun to run your own experiments.

One thing I noted: I have a recovered 300 grain Hornday Interlock RN in my desk fired at 100 yards into water jugs lined up end to end. It was found in number 6. All these rounds are absolutely devestating. I'm also an inveterate bullet digger. Did you examine the bear's wounds with the hide off? That I'd be curious to hear about.

Thanks bluefish. I look forward to seeing your results.

I don't hand load. So, I was limited in that rifle (without going through Superior or someone like that) to a Nosler 260gr Accubond starting out at about 2,975 fps (according to my chrono) or a 300gr NP starting at about 2,750 fps (same). I chose the latter. According to my range-finder, I was shooting 97 yds from where I hit the guy. So, the bullet was moving at a little above 2,500 fps when hit. It was a perpendicular profile shot. The entrance and exit wounds both were about 1" in diameter and just behind each shoulder. I shot the bear at about 12:45 pm. After celebrating a bit, we finished skinning him at around 5:30pm. We made two trips getting the skull and hide back to camp, and I flooded my waders crossing a river on the second trip. I really wanted to do a layman's autopsy on the guy, but by the time we got the hide back to camp the second trip, it was starting to get dark, the weather was getting pretty nasty, and my guide likely would have felt compelled to follow me back there to the big predator-attracting meat pile if I went, which really didn't seem appetizing to either of us at the time. So, I didn't go back to the carcass. My guess is that there was a bulb-shaped area of destruction in the heart/lung area between the exit and entrance wounds. After hit, the boar jumped/ran turning to bite the thing that was biting him and then collapsed and stopped moving completely after about 1.5 seconds. He lay 25 feet from where the shot hit him (blood spatter and obvious paw launch point). Obviously, there was no prospect of finding the bullet.

Happy hunting. I got my older boy (almost nine) a .243, and hope to take him deer (and possibly black bear) hunting this next fall/winter. Elk hunting likely would be a few years off, but I can't wait to take him.

Our three year old girl has accompanied us on hunts. No mystery to her there and she knows where food comes from and why we donate it to others less fortunate than we. The other day my wife was talking about a trip to stomp hogs some time and the little one said, "Daddy, I want to shoot a big old nasty hog, too! And then give the meat away!".

Kids are great. Anyway, back to shoveling...

Nice. My older, almost-9-yr-old, son is working out now so that he can hold his .243 better. My younger son, was four when I was getting to ready to go on he bear hunt, and he informed me that he was planning on going along and hjunting with me. I told him that he couldn't, that time, because among other things, he couldn't hold and shoot a rifle yet. He said "That's okay daddy, just get me a bow and I'll shoot one with that."

My Ruger RSM .375 H & H weighs about 10.5 lbs as carried during a hunt. It is heavy, but very easy to shoot well. I like that, and I don't mind carrying the weight for the kind of hunting I do with it. The weight is well distributed, fit is good, handling is lively for such a heavy rifle and the recoil does not bother me. I'm not sure I would want a lighter .375, since this is the only one I've ever shot - but those who like them lighter certainly are in the majority. I'm curious what an 8 - 9 lb 375 would be like to shoot in field positions. I suspect it would recoil a bit more than I'd prefer.

My Ruger RSM in 375 H & H weighs 11.5 lbs with the Leupold 1.5x5 scope. So far I like it but admittedly have not carried it afield.
YET !
Rolly

Did I get that right you're shooting factory ammo at an average of $120. a box 30-60 rounds in one visit to the range. WOW thats an expensive range trip.

I paid less than $120 for most boxes. The rifle came with six boxes of the 300gr NP ammo. It was barely fired, and the owner realized he wasn't going to use it. But yeah, some of my later range sessions cost me over $100. Of course, I have quite a bunch of once-fired .375 Wby brass if I ever do start to handload or I try to sell it. If I had hand-loaded, in the short term, I don't know how much I would have saved. The hunt wasn't cheap overall. I don't go out to eat much though, haven't ever spent a penny on a video game, don't go to the movies, and I don't do cocaine or go to Vegas. So, it all evens out in the end for me.

I bought one of the first of these imported into Canada, in Oct. 1990 and had some mods done on the sights. I carried it every day for 5.5 months, working solo on a "fire tower" close to Jasper National Park, as there are some Grizzly issues there.

I then took it on a rough, two week, horsepack hunt in N.E. BC as a "spare" to me P-64 Mod. 70 Alaskan, .338WM. When, the season ended and I got home to Vancouver, I traded it off as the thing was a club and much too heavy and poorly balanced for a .375H&H and a rifle meant for defence against dangerous animals.

I then bought the first of three original and one custom .375s, all P-64s, that I have had in the 20+ years since and I retain two of these. I much prefer a Mod. 70 CRF over that Ruger, YMMV, of course.

A rifle that weighs over 9 lbs. is too heavy for carrying all day in the mountains and "less is more" in most respects in this situation.