Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 35 Whelen or 9.3x62?

Yup,plenty bullet choices for a .35 Whelen. There is still North Fork, Hawk and Kodiak .358" too chose from. A .35 Whelen owner has a smorgasbord of choices.

Pick one and go forth and kill big game with it.

Thank you for validating my decision to dump my 35s for 36s, John.

One thing that I might mention is that all five 9,3X62s I've owned, some just garden variety old Husqvarnas, shot much better than the 4 Whelens I've owned over the years. The worst of my 9,3s shot better than the best of my Whelens, and I worked like a dog to get the 35s to close up the groups.

Is the 9,3X62 inherently more accurate?

DaShadow: " The 9.3 has killed lots of Buffs and Elephants, the 35W not so." Maybe because the 35 Whelen is not legal for Big 5 in Africa but the 9.3x62 is in some countries?
"

The 6.5 M-S and 7 Mauser have killed a lot of buffs and elephants, too. Likely thousands of them. American hunters say some weird, irrelevant stuff regarding African game hunting sometimes, I notice.

Bruce,

In my experience the 9.3x62 is indeed more "inherently accurate" than the .35 Whelen--and that's not just my opinion but that of one well-known accuracy gunsmith. Exactly that should be so is a mystery, but he often compares the 9.3x62 to a "big .308." They're that easy to get to shoot really small groups.

However, the other side of all this is exactly how small groups have to be in order to kill big game, especially BIGGER big game at, say, 300 yards, or even 400. Not many hunters chose either round for shooting beyond 400!

Maybe the anemic twist rate of 1:16 on factory Whelen rifles has something to do with that? My 1:12 Whelen was easy to get great groups with.

That's interesting, and surprising, John. I had no idea of the Mauser's reputation for accuracy. I can't fathom why, other than perhaps the shorter neck.

However, if I end up with a Whelen, and it puts select bullets into the groups that the '06's I've shot do, I'll be plenty satisfied. As you say, there's no call for a long-range setup using the Whelen or the 9.3x62. Maybe I could get a 1:8 twist .358" bore and talk Berger into some experimenting. Definitely would want the AI chamber then....

That has been my experience as well. I built more custom 9,3x62's for customers than any other chambering. All were incredibly easy to get to shoot. I kept a good supply of Prvi ammo on hand for test firing and never had a problem getting one to shoot sub MOA. I have several Husqvarnas so chambered that are also great shooters.

Given that I built Mausers, I didn't do many in .308, but I've shot a ton and would agree with that analogy. Irony is that most 9,3x62's have a fairly long throat and still shoot well. This really messes with those that insist that only rifles with a short jump to the lands can be accurate.

I'm going to hazard a guess here as to why this may be. The 9.3x62 usually comes in European guns which are typically better made than American guns, the Ruger's have a good reputation as well. For the longest time only Remington offered 35 Whelen brass which in my experience varies from lot to lot, some are good others are bad. The 9.3x62 brass again is often European and usually is top notch. I have started loading Norma 35 Whelen brass which has been real nice so far, much more consistent than Remington brass.

Anyway that's my guess as to a couple factors which might be going on here.

I would certainly own a 9.3x62 as soon as my Whelen wears out! And though I have only owned 2 different Whelens both have been capable of better than MOA 3 shot groups. They both had 1-14 twists and loved 250 grain bullets. Beyond all of that I really like the 250 grain Hornady RN. What a bullet, same goes for the Woodleigh 225 RN.

From the OP.

"The "What for?" would be elk, deer, and bear in mountainous areas."


How and why did this get to which has better heavies available and will be better for elephants?

( I would build a .338-06 )

z1r,

Very interesting that you've had the same experience as Charlie Sisk, the gunsmith I mentioned--and yep, European rifles and brass do tend to be of higher consistency.

But he builds rifles on whatever the customer wants, usually American bolt actions, especially Remington 700's and Winchester Model 70's, though he's also built 'em on Ruger 77's. He uses the same two brands of American-made after-market barrels on all his rifles (or at least he did, last time I talked to him about it) and buys most of his reamers from one company.

He's also the gunsmith who built my Remington 700 in the wildcat we co-designed, the 9.3 Barsness-Sisk the .350 Remington Magnum necked up. Like most wildcats, it's totally redundant, since its basically provides 9.3x62 ballistics in a short action, the reason we usually shorten the name to the 9.3 B-S. But we both use Remington brass, the same brand used in most .35 Whelens, and not only my rifle but the couple dozen Charlie's built for other people (including himself) are also very accurate, just like most 9.3x62's.

So I dunno!

John,

You have a much more vast connection with rifle lunacy but I was wondering if you have heard of anybody converting a 1895 Winchester to 9.3X62. I have a very much bubbized 1895 in 30-40 Krag that I purchased for $350. I thought that it might be a fantastic truck or boat gun if I had it converted and then cerakoted.

I've seen at least three that were converted from .30-06 to 9,3x62 which is a fairly simple rebarrel or rebore job. Converting form a 30-40 is more involved due to the .30-40's larger rim. You may need a new bolt and or other tweaks to he internals.

35-40 (30-40 rebored) is popular among cast bullet shooters. No reason why a 9.3-40 would not work. An original 95 is probably not up for 9.3x62 pressures.

You want to t/w Jesse. Top quality and fast turnaround.

http://35caliber.com/3.html

Allow me to "cut in" Kabok (:)) I know the 1895 was rebarelled/chambered tot he .375 Scovill (originally a necked up 9.3x62 case, later done with '06 brass) many have been done in the Whelen. Interestingly enough, the first time I ever "heard" of a 9.3x62 was about 45 yrs ago reading an article in some gunbook...the story was a one armed guy wanted a gunsmith to rebore/etc his Remington 742 to 9.3x62. He was going on a Brown Bear hunt and wanted all the "poop" he could get in a semi. The smith was writing the story and saying what all he had to do to get it to work right ( as did the gent who got a .458 winmag to work in a BAR) and the hunter got his bear. That got me to looking at both the 35 Whelen, 35 Brown Whelen and the 338/06 (really read up on that one and wanted one SO BAD) 9.3x62. Then, as a poor Bible School student in '87-'89 I read about Boddington killing that moose with the new Classic ( which I dearly love) in 35 Whelen. It was not until late '94 that I found a nice used one in the gun rack. By then I had read of the 35 Whelen Ackley ( I was a big believer in my 257 Roberts AI I had to sell later) so I immediately sent it off to Gary Stiles and had it rechambered. I worked up a load of 53gr 2015br/250X to 2550fps, went to South Africa in early '96. The farm owner had never heard of it, so I said "its about like the 9.3x62" and he smiled really big! I killed Blue Wildebeast, Zebra, Red Hartebeast, Kudu and the smaller Oryx. I only recovered 2 bullets, both from lengthwise shots on the zebra/kudu. I was amazed at their reaction when I pulled the trigger...they got that "OMG I've been shot!" look on their face! ha I I used the 200X in 2002 for Black Wildebeast (347yds) and another zebra (250yds) with the same effect as the 250x! Gotta love the Medium bores..

Hmm, they were chambered in .30-06 which operates at 4050 bar and the 9,3x62 operates at only 3900 bar. 50KCup vs approximately 49KCup.

For comparison

22" barrel
I did load the 35whelen to the max 110% full of r17, 3.34 oal, mag primers, 225nolser part.
2784fps, no sign of pressure issues, 59.9k is the calc'd pressure
7/8" group


Ran 275 woodlieghs, 3.44oal, mag primers, r17
2540fps, no pressure signs, 7/8" group also, 59k calc'd pressure
Went one grain higher 3" group
One more grain, bigger group again

Still working on the 9.3 testing

Kaboku68,

Here is a link to a Win. 1895 in 9.3x62 you might find interesting.
http://forums.accuratereloading.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/8721043/m/7591084712

9.3x62