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

Model 70 SS, .338 WM...225 TTSX’s at 2950 fps! memtb

Model 70 SS, .338 WM , 8 1/2 pounds (scoped, loaded, with sling), .225 TTSX’s at 2950 fps! memtb

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".

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 .

And she took elk with it at 400 yds and a black bear at 378 yds with it.

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...

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 .

Thanks for all of the comments, even the snarky ones.

I have lighter rifles. I usually take my Wby Mk V Ultra Lightweight 7mm Wby when I go on backpacking hunts. It weighs 6-3/4 lbs / less than 8 lbs with scope/mounts. When I am hunting from a camp with a daypack, I generally take whatever I want. I use a safari sling that puts the rifle weight in front of me, which offsets the pack, and seems to make it feel lighter.

I carried the .340 many miles over rough Alaskan terrain with no problem. Same for this 375 Wby on an earlier hunt, which is even heavier.





I can’t recall being encumbered by its weight. Body weight + gun + gear/ pack is about 250 lbs. The extra weight of the 340 is less than 1% of that. Better to lose a few pounds on the waistline than worry about 1.5 lbs of rifle. Though, when I go heavy (backpacking), I bring the lighter 7mm.

As to recoil, yeah, you really can ignore it if you don’t convince yourself otherwise. I just took the 340 to the range today and chronoed it again. I got an average of 3,163, bout the same as above. If I am going to flinch, it’s at the range, shooting from the bench. Still, I shot eight 3-shot groups from the .340 and all of them were under an inch at 100 yds. I was using a Labradar, and what’s interesting about it is that it records downrange velocities. So, you can check the claimed ballistic coefficients. The TTSX’s claimed BCs were right on. I wear a Cabaela’s version of the Past-style shoulder pad when sighting in at the bench. It makes a BIG difference. If I’m flinching at the range and getting sub-MOA groups, I’m never going to think of that when I am upright and viewing an animal through the crosshairs.

The .338 RUM and Wby 338/378 may beat it by margins if you reload, but for available production loads, no. For example, Cor-Bon, which loads to the max, manufactures the load mentioned above, and they load the .338 RUM load for the same bullet at 100 fps less than for the .340 Wby. And the .338/375 loads (there are few) from Wby lists the .225gr TTSX as going 3,180—only 17 fps faster than the 340 I am getting. I’m sure you could reload the 338/378 faster than the .340 by a bit, but factory ammo options do not reflect this.

There are plenty of great elk rifles from the .270 on up. But I think this one is pretty capable. And I can carry it.

Never had a problem with a 26” barrel even in thick cover. Maybe it’s how I carry it.