When I lived in Alaska one of my favorite rifles was a Savage M116 in .338 Winchester Magnum. A stainless rifle with plastic stock and 22" barrel, it served me well hunting moose, bear and caribou in stinking wet weather. But now I live in Texas and this rifle is pretty over-powered for our little deer and even for hogs. It also has more recoil than I want - it weighs under 8 lbs with scope.
I decided to try a reduced load with 200-grain bullets and H4895: 57 grains gave 2600 fps and very fine accuracy - well under moa for 5 shots. But the recoil was still more than I wanted, and the velocity was more than needed too. I settled on 34.0 grains of BlueDot for 2400 fps and recoil more like a .300 Savage. (36.0 grains proved maximum in my rifle with the same expansion ring growth than I had with full-power loads.) The 34.0/BD load puts five Hornadys into 1.5 moa consistantly and has a flat enough trajectory for 200+ yards so I'm happy.
Happy enough to take the rifle hog hunting last week where it harvested a 150 lb sow. Not huge but still a decent test. The bullet seemed to have expanded well, the wound channel was good sized and the animal's reaction was fast enough. No bullet to recover though.
Just one experience but the load looks very promising. Who else has hunting experience with either the 200 Hornady SP or the 200 Speer SP at velocities between 2300 and 2500 fps (.338 Federal, etc.)? I'm curious how well the Speers work slowed down. Thanks.
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Me.
I used 200gn Hornady with 59gn H 4895 for 2766fps and it shot very well and made a fine youth rifle.
JW
