Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Can this Elk rifle be beat?

.340 Wby Cor-Bon 225gr TTSX.

Can this be beat?

Here’s what it does based on my chrono out of my Mk V Accumark 26” bbl:

Rng / Vel. / Impact / KE / 10mph Drift
000 / 3160 / -1.75 / 4989 / 0.00
050 / 3057 / 0.72 / 4669 / 0.57
100 / 2962 / 2.25 / 4383 / 0.97
150 / 2869 / 2.79 / 4113 / 1.65
200 / 2778 / 2.27 / 3856 / 2.61
250 / 2688 / 0.63 / 3610 / 3.88
300 / 2601 / -2.23 / 3380 / 5.45
350 / 2515 / -6.38 / 3160 / 7.35
400 / 2432 / -11.91 / 2955 / 9.6
450 / 2350 / -18.91 / 2759 / 12.2
500 / 2270 / -27.49 / 2575 / 15.17

Sighted in 2-1/4” high at 100 yds, at 350 yds, without ever reaching 3” above the sight line: the bullet is only 6.4” low, is moving at over 2,500 fps, and has more energy than a 30-06 at the muzzle. Can anything beat that? Or almost 2,600 ft-lbs at 500 yds (as much as a .308 at the muzzle)?

For this purpose, please ignore recoil. I regularly have shot 1/2” and 3/4” groups with this rifle off the bench. In the field, I shot this guy with it three times at about 100 yds offhand in three or four seconds. I never felt anything more than the recoil of a Crossman bb gun with all of the excitement.



Assuming one can shoot it well (the rifle does its part), is there any more lethal elk hunting rifle/cartridge combo out there?

I’m not suggesting that there are not other super-capable elk rifles out there, but this one is pretty good.

Yeah. It weighs too much for me and you can make more power if so inclined. I’d like to think my custom .358 Norma that weighed 7 pounds with scope was a better combination of weight and power for my hunting. Kicked a lot but was manageable

Sounds like a great gun. Not discounting that. The .340 Wby Mk V AM is 8-1/4 lbs + scope/mounts. So I have to carry a bit more. Just wondering if there is anything in the same weigh class that can compete with the downrange numbers.

MarineHawk: That would be an exceptional Elk Rifle in my parts (western Montana) - more and more Grizzlies are roaming the areas I Hunt Elk in.
That 340 Weatherby would also come in handy in that regard.
BUT... ignoring that cartridges recoil is NOT possible - especially for me. I have shot a 340 Weatherby (and a 460 Weatherby!) and ignorance of the recoil was NOT possible in either instance.
Best of luck to you if you are getting after the Elk with that Rifle!
By the way dandy Moose there!
Good for you.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

30/06 is the best

oh no, that won't work.

I carefully looked at the picture, that is no Elk rifle, that is a MOOSE rifle....

you'll need to get a different rifle for elk...

Absolutely one of the best. Can it be beat? Well the 338 RUM and 338/378 Weatherby do beat it. For me the 338 Winchester is sort of a recoil threshold but I enjoy shooting an 8lb. 375 H&H. For shooting medium game around the world the 340 has few pears. The mediums below the 340 don't do much in my hands that a 300 mag. can't. If the 340 were legal across Africa it would be all you would need until Elephants became the main quarry. A 300 mag. and a 375 cover it well for me but the 340 does both duties. The exceptions are where not legal in Africa and for Big game as reckoned in Africa.

Beat?
Depends on what the word "beats" means to you.

A 408 Cheytac, 416 Barrett or a 50 BMG do it easily --------if you are talking about raw power, and so do some of the wildcats and ultra mags in the .375 bore size.

However I don't see how any of these "beat" a 30-06 or a 270 for killing elk. I have killed a lot of them and I have seen probably 3X more killed then I have killed myself. A good hit with the right bullet from a 270, 30-06 or any of the 300 mags drops them just fine, and dead is dead.

Dropping them in under 2 seconds (sometimes instantly) is pretty hard to "beat". I have done that with a LOT of different calibers and yet not "beat" many others I have seen used well by other hunters. As long as I did a good job with the tool I was using my elk all fell quickly and some instantly. This includes my 62 cal flintlock, a 454 Casull revolver, 44 magnum handgun, 3 different 270s, a few 30-06s, a 308 Winchester, a 338 mag, a 375H&H, and a few different 300 mags--------- just to name a few.
None of the elk I have killed in the last 45 years went more then a few yards if I used a good bullet, and about 1/3 of the have dropped at the shot. Of the rifles I have killed them with the 270s were on the bottom of the list in power, yet nearly ALL of my 270 elk kills have been instant, or down within 1-2 steps. The rifles the seem the fastest to drop them for me have been the 270 Winchester, the 375H&H and the 30-06 when firing 220 grain bullets

As soon as you have to start holding up for bullet drop, how much you hold is not important. You still have to HOLD for the drop. If you can hold still at those ranges, holding a few inches higher or lower means nothing. If you can't hold still, how flat your round shoots and hoiw little it drifts in the wind when you miss is unimportant.

I doubt anything out there "beats" your rifle in any meaningful way, -------- just as I can say that your rifles really doesn't "beat" most others ---- in any meaningful way.

Your bullet is excellent however, and I have NO DOUBT about that.

Now if we talk about marksmanship and hunting skills, we have something of substance we can talk about.

But ballistic numbers are not all that important for elk hunting.

Reading this post reminded me of the beginning of Safariman's post about ass-shooting the bear with his big .33 wildcat!

I have one 340 wby, but it doesn't get used much. More about the rifle than the cartridge though.

30/378 Roy with 180g TSX was plenty impressive 😎

I’ve killed alotta elk with a lot of different weapons, I like .338 rifles for elk....

Same here, been carrying the littler 338 Win Mag for a number of years now and works great for me. The 340 is just more of it..

Just mulling over the thread so I thought I'd add a bit here to illustrate my point about asking the wrong question and getting very detailed answers. The answer can be right, but the important point still missed.

Let's look at this scenario:

You have a family of 5, a wife 3 kids and you. You are asked to pick up the family at the movie house at 6:30 and you will all go to dinner shortly afterwords, about 10 blocks away.

So the questions is this............which vehicle is going to "beat" the other vehicle for the important task of picking up the family?

The Ford E350 All-Star Bus of the Toyota Full Size Avalon?

Before you answer remember the ONLY objective is only to get the family to dinner. There is NO competition at all involving how they get there, and no one but the driver will care how they got there by tomorrow morning.

You see......... "beat" is not even the right way to look at the question.

For one vehicle to "beat" the other there would have to be a contest between them, and there is none.

If the question were about the vehicles (ei. which one will do the 1/4 mile fastest, or which one will run a mountain road course better, or which one will carry more weight) we would have some subject matter to discuss.

When the question is asked about rifles and cartridges the numbers game is entertaining, but as soon as the focus is about killing elk, the issue is no longer about numbers, but about hunting. As soon as that became the focus of the thread (elk hunting) the question became misguided in my opinion.
That opinion is based in 52 years of hunting in many states, and in 5 countries, and with personal kills numbering in the hundreds and with witnessed kills numbering about 3X to maybe even 5X more.

As a gunsmith and an avid shooter, I too like to do these comparisons, so I mean no disrespect in my posts here but I like to stay on point when a question is asked and that point is that the OPs rifle and cartridge is excellent for the purpose, but the distraction far more about ballistics and the rifle, and has very little to do with the killing of elk in the real world.

As I said above, nothing out there is going to "Beat" your choice of elk rifle and shell but your rifle and shell doesn't "Beat" others either.
The objective is to kill an elk, just as the parallel is to get the family to dinner. Not to have a race or a competition with other rifles. To do that we'd need to know hunting methods and the area you hunt.

In the Selway, where I used to hunt and guide, I would say I'd rather have a 454 Casull handgun then a 340 Weatherby, because in my years of hunting there, and guiding hunters, I never had a shot, of saw a shot made past 60 yards. Not one! So for elk in that place a handgun was a far easier tool for me to kill elk with then my rifles, and that's the reason I quit even taking rifles with me for the last 2 years I hunted there. Here in Wyoming, the exact opposite would be true about my choices, if those 2 were the only 2 offered. I would choose your Weatherby every time if the objective was simply to kill an elk.

These days I hunt with a lot of "odd guns" just because I like them. I have killed so many animals with scope sighted rifles that the usual types hold little thrill for me now. I like old fashioned guns and despite my failing eyes I still like to go out with light weight iron-sighted guns and hunt. When and if I run short of time I still bring out the "old reliable" 270, 300 H&H or 375H&H, but I usually do that after I have been unable to get to "iron-sight range" a few days in a row, or if the weather is so bad the light will not allow me to see the front sight at all.

Anyway, just a different prospective I suppose, but I'd love to see input for other old-timers as to who agrees with me and who disagrees.
That is what makes these kind of threads interesting.
Comparison of experience and prospective.
That's called education. No one of us has all the info, so comparing the information we do have is how we all learn without having to make all our own mistakes one at a time.

Everything else is just petty "object worship".

Sheesh. My open-sighted .50 caliber muzzleloader beats it as an elk rifle hands-down, at least in Colorado.

Because it allows me to hunt in mid-September during the rut. It's all relative and there are many things more important than the cartridge and ft-lbs.

Can it be beat? Well yeah.... just for starters, your rifle outweighs a lot of "perfect" elk rifles and the barrel's way to fu cking long. Id wager a bet that most of us here would pick any of beretz's rifles over that beast. Just sayin

Other than it's too heavy, has too long of a barrel, and has too much recoil it's just about perfect...

I plan on using my 338 Lapua I had built to hunt elk with,which is about the same thing as a 340 Weatherby, yes you have a great choice on cartridge choice.my rifle with scope weighs 9 1/2 lbs. but it shoots very well and I don`t care about that extra pound I am bigger and taller than most people and as far as recoil a heavier rifle recoils less .

Lmao

Well so much for me posting up about my perfect elk killing rifle my barret 50 cal.. it was a great story too... oh well..

Gees get a room you two... good thing for me I don't need to bum a rifle off beretz 😜 sometimes I bum around with a stainless classic featherweight in a 338wsm.. but most days I carry that ol 06 of yours..