Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 7 Rem mag as good as it gets

LOL! I didn't say I'd rather have a 7mm over a 45-70 ya know.

CRAWFISH ! !


Jerry

I wouldn't either, but if I had the kind of money to hunt big bears in the first place I'd take a minimum of a 30-06 and 200 gr NPT's . Good enuf for Phil it's good enuf for me. I'm only 63 and been shooting the 06 and 7 mm Rem Mag since I was 15. Don't see either lacking using the right bullet. Les Bowman who basically invented the 7 mm Rem Mag that Mike Walker fine tuned into the 700 in 1962 shot elk and G bears with it. Another argument that needs to desist until most understand the nut behind the butt needs to be up to the job before worrying about picking nits.

When I made my first trip to South Africa, '96, my Afrikaner friend/Lay Minister/professional Hunter "hated" the 7mm Rem Mag! When I pressed him on just "why", it was the bullet. At that time, some of you will remember< Remington was pushing the 162(?) Extended Range Ammo. It was just a simple thin jacketed, hollow point, soft bullet meant to open at long range. Two hunters, two trips back to back, came with the same ammo and would not listen to his recommendations of 300WM/180 grain. He was forced to shoot/finish every bigger antelope that they shot. Cape eland, zebra, hartebeest and several Blue Wildebeest. He used a 300WM and the old 180 Speer Mag Tip bullet. All their bullets had broken up and were found barely through the hides. They were all shooting shoulder shots he said. I brought him the first Barnes he had ever used, the 180XBT for his 300WM and I was using the old Barnes 250X/35 WAI. I only found two bullets from the Whelen after about 2 1/5 to 3 ft of zebra and Kudu! I shot Impala/Blesbuck/zebra with his 300WM/180XBT.It was pure poison and didn't ruin any meat. I told him a 7mm Mag with even the 150-160 Barnes would do just like His 300WM. He was still soured on the 7mm Mags! Some folks are hard to convince. Wait a minute...did I just say that Afrikaners are "hard headed"...? lol

Nothing wrong with a 7mm pushing bullets at speeds that the 7mm Remington Magnum is capable of. Never said there was and quite frankly I think those speeds are quite ideal. I would be contradicting myself if I said there was because that is what I get with prudent loading of my AI. However I disagree that the 7mm Remington Magnum is as good as it gets. And that has been my sticking point from post one. The 7mm Remington Magnum has a lot of baggage with it as far as case design and erratic pressure. TO ME that is enough for me to steer clear of it. I can count the number of boxes of factory ammunition I have bought in my life on one hand. My dad was a machinist who loved to load his own ammunition and so have I since age ten or twelve. What’s on the shelf means squat to me. Factory ammunition that I have looked at for the 7mm Remington Magnum in any weight spec out at the same or very close with what I can get with my 280 AI. The SAAMI spec 280 and the 280 AI are far more efficient than the 7mm Remington Magnum and that is more appealing to me. And at the end of the day the 7mm Remington Magnum won’t do anything noticeably more than my 280 or 280 AI. If I were to go to a bigger belted magnum it would likely be the Mashburn,Weatherby or better yet a non-belted Dakota with a custom barrel and chamber to avoid the issues that the Remington suffers in factory guise.

Funny to here a guy bitch about “erratic pressure”... then proceed to load his AI at 70,000+ psi....

Whatever you’re doing with the .280 AI... you could do with the 7 Rem... but at sane pressure.

Hear ! Hear !

That’s been my contention all along. As Well, one of our Profs & Mentors has testified moren once that
the 280 AI does not = 7 RM velocities EXCEPT at HI pressures.

Jerry

A lot more wear and tear on your rifle to load at high pressure.

Not really when you compare book or quick load data for the AI and then factory Remington or Hornady loads for the 7mm Rem Mag. Last I looked at a box of Hornady 7mm Mag 162 ELDX precision hunter ammunition It is running at 2940 FPS out of a 24” barrel. The Hornady manual shows three loads getting that from a Kimber Montana in 280 AI with a 24” 1:9.5 twist. That’s with RL19,RL22 and H4831. Quick Load shows RL26 running the same bullet in the AI a wee bit faster over the 3K mark. Now I know you can hand load the 7 Mag hotter , that’s a given. But if you’ve been paying attention from the start I have said that I can get 7 Mag factory performance out of prudent and safe loading with my AI. And many others for years have reported pressure spikes for supposedly no apparent reason with the 7mm RM. Is that due to piss poor quality control of the rifle? I don’t know. But I have no need to venture down the 7mm Remington Magnum road when I can get just as good of performance and hunt the same game at the same ranges as effectively with what I have. If I wanted more out of a 7mm I would skip by the Remington and bypass the drama.

Keep telling yourself bro.....

If you’re running 3k with a 162 outta the .280 AI.... then you could run the same bullet at 3150 outta the 7RM.... given equal pressure.

I know.... I know... AI fairy dust and unicorn farts make it “more efficient”..... but that’s straight bullschitt.... there’s no replacement for displacement.

I’ve owned and shot the crap outta several .280 AIs, none of them could hang with real 7 Mag loads.

Well, look who showed up! This thread will be over in a heartbeat now that Mr. I wanna argue with every single person I possibly can is here.

Let the name calling begin and self appointed heroes be recognized! Seriously dude! Whatever in the Sam he'll is wrecking your world you need to root it the he'll out of your life start living man!



Trystan

And in what universe does 150fps make a chit bit of difference when hunting critters in North America. That was rhetorical, none. Not even when considering what cartridge is as good as it gets. Any difference between the two is purely lost in the field and is only evident with a chrony. I’ll run an AI because it makes sense with the performance it gives me and with over 800 pieces of high quality brass I have on hand, more loads per pound, efficiency, etc. You can stick with your 7mm Rem Mag that makes you feel better for whatever reason that feeds your fantasy. If it makes anyone feel better I’ll make sure to tell all the dead animals that I shot them with a magnum so they don’t feel cheated when they fall over dead. Now off to the shop to load some dangerously high pressure rounds that will only bounce of critters because there ain’t no belt to make’m go fast nuff.

Good thing the inter web and this forum wasn’t around when Bell was toting his 7X57 around killing critters in Africa or when Hemingway was knocking over Kudu and Buff with his loley ol’ ‘06.

Says the dude who calls everyone “cowards”......

Yes, no and maybe all at once.
Less than Big Bear.... as in polar, coastal brown and pissed off interior grizz you are, in this day and age, over gunned for 99% of what you are doing. The true American Hero in that sense is likely the 6.5 Creedmoor. It will dispatch Moose Elk and most other heavy hoofed cud chewer on the North American continent with relative ease and with much less racket and recoil. Ammo can be had and any Wal-Mart in the country. Designed from the ground up to be efficient, reliable and accurate you can't knock it, even with the 7mm Remington Magnum. The darling Big 7 is a hot mess when you look at efficiency, ease of loading and any other category for that matter. However, ran in safe mode with factory ammo it will get the job done on anything in NA even with all it's baggage. But at that speed it is no more and no less a 280 Rem or 270 Win. in any practical hunting scenario.

For the Great Bears; Not very many get to hunt those boys anymore and if you do I'm sure you wallet can get you something with a little more dazzle than the lowly 7mm Remington Magnum. "In a pinch" rumor has it that spray works better on an angry grizz.

You can have my share of the Gaymoor. I don't wear a man bun or Chic jeans..

The #s don't lie. The lowly 270 Win is AHEAD of the 6.5 C for at Least 600 yds before it catches up

The 7 RM even more than that.

They are NOT in the same class. Less is NOT more


Jerry



rant over

Jerry: you sound like a good guy...stubborn, but good.

I agree....with real 7 Mag loads. The problem is 95% of hunters don't load their own and most are using factory ammo. Some I've seen is only 100 fps faster than 280 ammo with the same bullet and I know Federal has 150 Partitions for the 270 that are only about 100 fps behind their 160 Partition in the 7 Mag.

Doesn't matter to me what someone uses, but I hear too many around here who shoot factory ammo talk up the 7 Mag like they have a real advantage over someone using an '06, 270 or 280 when it's not really doing anything the others aren't.

I have some Fed TBT's to try. These 160's or the140's should be interesting in the 7RM.

www.midwayusa.com/product/369466/fe...grain-polymer-tipped-boat-tail-box-of-50

DF

Yeah ! He who stands for nothing.....

will fall for anything !


Jerry