Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Let's Talk 35 Whelen, Who Loves Them?

I use a Whelen for Primitive Weapons season in Louisiana. It's not very primitive (stainless Apex single shot with 3-9x40). I load it down with RL10x and the 225 Accubond at a bit over 2,400fps. Shoots plenty flat enough for a 225-250yd rifle that won't kick a person too hard. Kills well, even at those ranges.

Does it kill like Congress?

I second that motion. Problem is he knows not that he knows not.
Ignorance can be fixed by education but stupid cannot be fixed. Methinks he's . stupid.
Paul B.

I've been hunting with my 7600 in 35 Whelen since 2005. KYHillChick bought me the rifle with the help of the guys here as a ST Hubert's Day present. I've shot more deer with it than anything else using mostly 200 gr Remington CL's . It was my rifle of choice for topping off the freezer for a decade. Last year I took it out of the rotation for a 30-06 and a 25-06, and I was happy with the decision.

My reasons for switching away from The Whelenizer:

1) There is only so much mass to a whitetail. There is only so much force to impart by the Whelen before . . . oops, you're out of the deer and in the dirt!
2) I'm reloading, but it was still an expensive rifle to shoot-- a lot more than an '06. It took more powder, bigger bullets.
3) The results were not significantly better than the other deer chamberings I use. Dead's dead, and the Whelenizer was not making them that much deader.
4) Recoil. Look, I don't mind a stout load, but when you can kill a deer with significantly less recoil, you have my attention. When I shoot it, I'm glad Mom made me drink my milk.
5) A few times I went looking for the Remington 200 gr CL and there weren't any.

I'm not a guy that demands DRT, pole-ax, laser death ray performance. I'm a realist. If I can shoot and the deer falls down somwhere I can see from standing in the deer's tracks, I'm happy. By that standard Whelenizer did as good a job as any of my 06's or my 308 using 165 grainers. All can reach out 200+ yards and bring down a deer. If I really had to pick based on dead-in-their-tracks performance, I would probably pick the '06. The Whelenizer just wasn't THAT much better.

On the plus side for the Whelenizer:

1) It is a cool round. I keep one by my chair.
2) It has a distinctive report. Everyone around knows when I've taken a deer. In fact I've had strangers come up to me and ask.
3) It has growth potential. If I ever draw a KY Elk tag, this will be my first choice in a rifle.
4) My buddy shot with a 300 Win Mag for a few years. I thought that kicked much more than my Whelenizer. His was a much heavier rifle too.


So what's the future of the Whelenizer?
It sat out last season, but I am working up a cast load with H4895 and the 200 grain GC RCBS bullet. I hope to be pointing it at a whitetail again this fall. I'm shooting for roughly 35 REM to 358 WIN velocities. I'll be using the same amount of powder as my current 308 loads, and the bullets will be powder-coated pure lead. What's not to like?

BTW: The new chambering I added to the rotation was the 25-06. 35 Whelen is probably the high-water mark for my whitetail battery. I'm starting to investigate the smaller calibers now. It did well as a freezer filler its first time out. Better than the Whelenizer? I shot, the deer ran around the field a little bit and piled up dead. No great muss or fuss. By the time I'm in my 90's, I figure to be taking them from my wheelchair with .223 REM.

I think you'll find pure lead is way too soft for that application, both in the bore and on impact. Air cooled wheel weights is about the right hardness for that velocity range, depending on the meplat size of your bullet. Even with air cooled wheel weights I found a significant accuracy improvement from applying lube on top of the powder coating (to keep the lube grooves from collapsing, not to lube the bullet). That was with the heavier Saeco 352 though; the lighter RCBS bullet may not collapse that way.

Sorry, I didn't mean the way it came out. I meant that in contrast to jacketed.

Actually, I'm still experimenting with the hardness. My first loads came out ridiculously hard, even though they were a modest 50-50 wheelweight/lead . They worked for proving the combination worked, but I'm sure they'd shatter on the deer.

I'm still tinkering with it. I've got some powder coat on the way too. Lube and PC? I think I'll give that a try.

More powder? That's where you lost me.

Sure, depending on the powder. I promise you that you'll use more say 4064 in the Whelen than you will in an 06

Something's weird if your 50/50 ww mix is too hard. Are you water quenching them? That would make them too hard. Straight wheel weights, air cooled, expand nicely without shattering. I use it for hunting bullets in my rifles, and all of my pistol or subsonic rifle hollow points.

Bullets on the left are the Saeco 352 (245gr) fired from a 35 Remington. (Far left is old stock, before I powder coated.) Bullet on the right is a subsonic hollow point I made for the 35 Rem and 35 Whelen. All of these are cast from straight wheel weights, air cooled.

I also use straight wheel weights in the Whelen.

Even if its an average of 60 grains of powder for the Whelen and 55 for the 30-06 per pound (which I doubt if its that high for most powders commonly used in both rounds). That means you can only make roughly 116 rounds per pound of powder for the Whelen and 127 for pound of powder with the 30-06.

Figure $35 per pound of powder then powder per round on the Whelen is roughly .30 vs 27 and a half cents for the 30-06. Hardly a drastic difference in cost IMO. Skip the latte once a week and you can shoot 200 rounds per week in the difference.

Hard to deny the 30-06 is much more versatile, but the cost in rifle powder is hardly the reason to pick it over a Whelen.

And a Whelen kills deer NO better than say a 7mm08 (because saying 223 snaps too many people), which uses much less powder.

HAHA so true...Whelen would be way down the list if only shooting deer.

But the "cool factor" of the Whelen Is off the charts.

I was scratching my head at your response and then it dawned on me what we were each saying.

If you were trying to shoot a 200 grain bullet out of a 30-06, I don't know how much powder it would take vs shooting it out of a 35 Whelen. My guess it would be near the same. So in that respect, I agree.

For me however, it was the difference between a 200 grain 35 Whelen round and my standard whitetail load which was a 30-06 165 grain Hornady SP. In that case, both using H4895, the 35 Whelen was taking 10% more powder.

Both do a good job on deer, but between brass, powder, and bullet, the 35 Whelen probably costs me about 20% more than my 30-06 to shoot. I agree that is not a HUGE difference, but it was enough to get me thinking about alternatives.

If I was to limit myself to factory ammo, the difference would be much greater. A box of Remmie Green Box '06 might set me back locally about $20 these days. I saw Remmie Green Box 35 Whelen last fall at Dunhams. The price was $45.

Let's compare bullets of the similar sectional density, so there's an apple-to-apples comparison.

Always used 57.5 gr of 4831 and a 180 gr bullet.

I use 56.o gr of 4064 or Varget and a 250 gr bullet.

Check the economics of 158 jacketed pistol bullet and 13.o gr Blue Dot. Cast bullets are even cheaper to shoot.

What's this factory ammo you speak of?

Damn right!

Arthur "Whelen" Fonzarelli

I kindda like it, well I don't know!!!!!