Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles WSSM owners, UNITE!

Winchester Suckass Short Mag. Imagine if they'd put the effort into something worthwhile.

The WSSM thing is one of those, "if you never tried it, you can't understand it" sort of things. For those of us who bought into the WSSM, many of us appreciate the big performance in a smaller package the WSSMs offers.

In the comfortable world of 20/20 hindsight, the WSSMs weren't successful, but what part of that was due to them being introduced close to the end for Winchester/USRA, when QC could be iffy?

Or, was Winchester/Olin's failure to offer a better selection of standard grade/priced ammo for the 25 WSSM a contributing factor?

Or ????????????????????????

We WSSM owners who have loaded for our 223/243/25 WSSMs are generally pretty loyal, although some of us find it difficult to stay loyal when Winchester/Olin has neglected us for so long.

When I became tired of messing with the pipsqueak 6mm PPC as a varmint cartridge, I had a super-duper prefit Savage barrel chambered for the .243 WSSM. Ordered a 1:8" twist, for the 62 grain Barnes Varmint Grenade. Threaded the barrel onto a Savage Target Action, and proceeded to shoot a .187" 10 shot group at 100 yards (49.0 grains of Hunter). Killed sage rats out to 300 yards, in a gale occasionally punctuated by passing rain or sleet. From then on it was my new favorite cartridge. The squirrels unraveled, actually disappeared if they had been gorging on wet alfalfa. They popped like a water balloon - I could hear the impact through my ear plugs, sounded like a .22LR going off. Turned the farmer's field into Splat City, USA.

So, I bought every bag of brass I could find. Sat them in the cabinet next to the cases of .348 Winchester brass, the bags of .375 Winchester brass, and those marvelous .357 Maximum cases. Now, I am as obsolete as those cartridges, but will have enough to shoot until I croak. Always buy lots of brass - once the gun writers begin badmouthing 'em they will slide into the valley of the Seasonal Run, or completely disappear as a once great notion.

I bought 10K pieces of Federal WSSM brass when Graf & Son was closing it out several years ago. I occasionally have accurate foresight.

I have rifles chambered for a bunch of obsolete cartridges, some of which haven't had factory ammo or components made since before I was born.

The .243 WSSM is fugging amazing...

I've killed everything from prairie dogs to Mule Deer with it. It's my favorite coyote rifle.


I've got about 500 pieces of brass and anneal on every loading....

I have some WSSM brass from my pdog rifles that has been loaded 9x. Out of the original 300 cases for a 70 Coyote parts gun, I've still got 290 in service, 5 lost to shoulder cracks and 5 lost somewhere on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota.

I sent an email to Winchester asking them to focus on more mainstream cartridges and cartridges that have been around for decades and not worry about some short run cartridge that no one cares about.

They agreed.

270 is plentiful, embrace diversity.

I have 10 rifles chambered in 270; 1x Colt, 3x Remington, 1x Ruger, and 5x Husqvarna. I'm all about diversity, if you consider that having rifles chambered for 56 different cf cartridges is sufficiently diverse.