Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 300 SAVAGE EFFICACY..

Channeling Elmer are we?

I think he meant it was accurate enough for coyotes.

I'm sure he did.

A .300 Savage/ Model 99 rifle WILL NOT WORK ON GAME! The bullets will bounce off!


....... I only say this because this thread will single handedly drive up the used prices and lower the availability of my personal favorite cartridge/model combo :-). I've been collecting (accumulating) them since 1983, and while I don't have as many as some, I have more than most. -TomT

I didn't say it was ONLY good for coyotes. Reading comprehension is a lost art.


late 80's, Savage 99, 300 Savage, 335 yards




2010, Remington 700 300 Savage 110 yards

Scott,

Still have that 99?

I sometimes complain that I have four .300 Savages - three 99's, and a 1920. Today I took the 1920 out, and had a couple of good groups with it at 100 yards, despite the iron sights. It reminds me why I have four of them.

The vintage Savages usually were not fancy rifles, but they were well made, with good barrels, and the .300 has shot well in all I've tried. I think it was Mule Deer who once said the .308 would shoot well with single base manure, and I think that goes for the .300 Savage as well.

I like Varget in the .300, which I also use in many other cartridges. It's a fun and satisfying round to load & shoot.

I've spoke of my Uncle Bill's 99 EG in .300 before, scoped with an old K4...one with covered turrents but a non-centered retical. Those crosshairs were always a bit low and left of center, but pretty close. Bill was the best shot at running deer I have ever seen. When I was a kid, we were walking a gentle coulee with a long hill on the other side. This was in the 1970s when a person could get multiple mule deer doe tags. Six mule deer does came running out the far side of the coulee and headed up that hill. Bill started with the furthest one, and when the rifle was empty there were five deer rolling down that hill, all hit in the front half. Shots were probably about 70-90 yards. I was impressed.

jorgeI,

Fwiw, I believe the .300SAV is suited to ANY Western Hemisphere game EXCEPT the biggest bears. = My favorite & "go to" rifle for USA hunting.
(My usual load is a Spanish-American War "clone" of the old .30-40 US Army & loaded with a 180 grain bullet.)

IF I was going for grizzly, make mine the 9.3x62mm & loaded with 286 JSP at about 2400FPS. = 'Ole Otto Bock knew what he was about in 1905, as it is suitable for most any game up to & including elephant.

At my age, I figure I have one more BIG -$$$ hunt left & that one will be in Fall 2019 for Cape Buffalo & (HOPEFULLY) a leopard.

yours, tex

Since I rarely have a big Clear Cut or long Highline over this way, the 2.5 is just right for most of the Bow shots that we get. But if I was to have to come over to PA and hunt it likely might need an El Passo 4x..........

Great thread guys. thanks

Now yer talkin'!

Saturday I was wearing out a 6" gong at 300 yards with a scope set to 3x, so the 4x may be a bit much.

Negative, the sins of youth. I think I paid $100 for it, back in the days with you tripped over 99's at gun shops. I do have a few replacements for it though.

300 Savage is one I'll not be without.

And I know you got the Power Points (which is the other bullet I load for my 300's) but a 130gr TTSX going close to 3K is a killer diller and the most accurate bullet I've used in the 300 and 308.


130gr TTSX 300 Savage (2010 coyote pic was 130gr TTSX too)

Those TSX's are next on my list to try in the .300. I'm sold on their efficacy, just haven't gotten around to them yet. The box I have on the shelf may soon go bad so I better not dilly dally.

I've loaded it in both the Savage and the Safari 308. One one Savage (99R) I had a bit of sticky extraction but not in the older (1921). Both very accurate. Since this is a "geezer" rifle, I'm shooting the 180 Speers Gunner 500 gave me with the rifle, but I am shooting the 130s in the 308 and as with all TTSXs the most accurate bullets on average.

I have a Nosler 150 partition load for just such an opportunity, if it ever comes up. I have 3 rifles in that caliber, My great grandfathers M99, a Rem 81, and a Rem 722. The funny part is I think they were all built in 1948. I use a moderate load with RE15.

Now for the obligatory 300 Savage story: When I was about twelve about mid week in the utah deer hunt I went out with my dad, He had the M99 with him it only had iron sights on it, in the past it had a weaver on stith mounts. I think he was shooting red box federal 150 grain loads. We went to a canyon where deer in the evening would come down some of the side canyons to the river below. Looking through his navy surplus binoculars he made out a small two point across the river and way up the hillside. It looked a long ways away, he said it was about 600 yards. We sit there for a bit, watching to see if the deer come closer. Eventually my dad walks towards the river finds a downed cottonwood and finds a good rest, starts aiming, he does this for two minutes, he tells me to watch with the binoculars and tell him how high or low the shot lands, one deer high or one deer low. First shot, goes low by two deer I call out, deer didn't move. Next shot at his feet. Third shot the deer rolled down the hill. I don't know how he did it, he did have good eyesight, being a navy pilot.

The next year he got a 7mm Mag with a Mcmillan stock and a nice Leupold scope, he never had a shot past 150 yards present itself after that.

Nice story!

Years ago my late father-in-law killed a good bull elk with one shot with his M99 .300 savage . He couldn't tell me exactly what load except it was a 180 gr. factory load. He kept Win. and Rem. round nose and spitzers mixed in boxes and in the magazine. He said they all seemed to shot the same so he didn't keep track of what he was using at any given time. It kind of disilllusioned me about precisely loading the perfect load with the perfect bullet for hunting.
Some people see the .300 Savage as a lower powered .308, I see it more as a super .30-30; either way makes it a good game killer especially in those slick handling old 99's.