The 257 is a great one!
A friend and I acquired a custom 257 Weatherby reamer with less freebore and a 1 1/2 degree throat. We built four rifles for ourselves. Two heavies and two lightweight. Then several friends used the reamer to make their 257s. All rifles use Lilja 3 groove 1 in 10 twist SS barrels.
The rifles use the 115 Berger VLD hunting bullet exclusively. This bullet has a good mix of BC and velocity. IMO a great advantage is the flatness of the trajectory and mild recoil. Most rifles use RL-25 for very accurate, lethal loads. Barrel lengths vary from 24" to 28". Velocities run from 3350 fps to 3700 fps.
While few animals were killed at close distances, many were taken from 250 yds to just under 600. Many kills were spectacular DRTs.
The list just keeps growing:
29 coues wt
8 elk
4 mule deer
2 antelope
2 javelina
IMO it is the one of the best chamberings for coues wt. This is my rifle's trajectory for 4000 ft:
100 +3.0
200 +4.9
300 +3.7
400 -0.9
500 -9.3 drift in a 10 mph 90 degree crosswind 8/9"
