Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Elk with the .280 Rem and .300 Savage

I do realize that while both of these cartridges are great "all-rounders", neither is something one would specifically recommend as an "elk-only" rifle these days.
That notwithstanding, these are what I have at present. My question is really about loading for elk. I have a box of 150-grain Partitions for the .280; I plan to load these on top of a stout charge of H4831. I plan to limit shots to 300 yards. Realistic? I can always go up to a 160-grain bullet if it's a worthwhile gain.
I plan to take the .300 Savage and hunt with it for a day or two just because a Savage 99 is a dang fine hunting rifle, and has that nostalgia factor to boot. My planned load is the Hornady 165-grain flatbase Interlock over Reloder 15 or Vihtavuori N140. Shots I plan to limit to 200, maybe 250 yards. Again, is this realistic? I can drop the yardage limit or load with a 180 if there's a practical performance gain.
Both these rifles are easily MOA-accurate from the bench and I shoot them pretty well.
The hunt will be in Northern British Columbia in fall of 2016, and will be my first elk hunt. And since a rifle loonie needs little urging, I would consider the idea of purchasing a .300 Mag of some ilk, though I don't think it's required.
Thanks in advance for all opinions!

John Barsness wrote that in 300 Savage a 165 on top of 42 grains of RL15 will get you where you want to be. I have no reason to doubt him.

Charlie, either will work fine. The 300 Savage was killing elk long before more powerful cartridges came on the scene. The Hornady bullet is a good choice in either round. I would load the 160gr Partition in the 280 but that's just me. powdr

Under those conditions, I would recommend both as 'elk-only' rifles, with any bullet you mentioned. Take 'em both!

Sorry, forgot it was the Gunwriter zone.

Your good grammar exempts you. Thanks!

Exactly. I have read the same recommendation from him.

I killed my first elk with the 280 and 150 Partitions.

My Uncle Bob got me in to elk hunting when I was in my late teens. For 15 years straight, we went elk hunting every season. The most powerful rifle he had was a Remington 760 in .300 Savage. When I first started elk hunting with him, that was the ONLY rifle he had. He got a Winchester 94 in .30-30 a few years later. He cleanly killed a few elk with that, too, but mostly used the pump-gun in .300 Savage. It didn't seem to handicap him much.

For a guy who isn't a particularly huge fan of it, I've shot a few critters with the .270 Winchester, including seven elk. The end result left nothing to complain about. I wouldn't think a .280 Remington would be that much different, and certainly wouldn't be less effective.

I've killed elk with my .280 Remington with my handload of 160 grains Nosler Partition, 54.0 grains of IMR 4350, and also a factory Remington 150 grains PSP Core-lokt.

The elk went down without any problem.

I doubt that ten grains of bullet weight would have made much difference with the Nosler bullets.

L.W.

Your .280 shouldn't have a problem as the last elk I killed was with my 7x57 and Nosler 150 Partitions loaded a bit over 2700 FPS.
The .300 will do everything an '06 will do if you're 75 yards closer.

About the only thing I'd consider would be possibly going with 150gr bullets in the 300 Savage if you want a bit more distance out of it. 150gr bullets at 2600fps-2700fps is going to work past 250 yards.

The heavier bullets will obviously work just fine, and some 99's simply prefer heavier bullets. Just giving you something to think about.