Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 6mm-06

Liked your article MD.
I'm curious what bullet(s) you would use if you were using that cartridge and the rifle in your article if you were going after a trophy Mule Deer or perhaps a caribou.

Glad you liked the article!

The bullet chosen would depend on the terrain. not just the animal. There are timbered around here where I'd use a deep-penetrating premium bullet (such as the 90-grain Nosler E-Tip, 95 Barnes LRX or 100 Partition) for hunting mule deer, whether "trophy" or not.

If hunting more open country, whether for mule deer or caribou (which typically live in very open country) would probably choose one of the heavier, high-BC bullets listed. Caribou aren't very hard to kill, despite usually being somewhat larger than mule deer, and it's pretty easy to get a more-or-less broadside shot. In that situtation wind-drift is far more of a factor than deep penetration.

A good all-around compromise would be the load listed for the 90-grain Swift Scirocco II.

Have you found that Scirocco to be an accurate bullet? I am thinking about ordering some for my 6 Creed.

It certainly is in this 6mm-06!

As always, it depends on whether the bullet agrees with a particular barrel.

Where is the article published?

Thanks for the answer MD. I have a couple different Nosler Partition bullet weights and a 95 grain Nosler BT and a couple of different Barnes bullets, plus some E-tips but no 100-grain Swift Scirocco II.

I'll be hunting on the open prairie this year, 2 deer tags and 2 antelope tags and was hoping to find a flat shooting wind bucking effective bullet to work for both. I was also hoping to do it with this metric.

I appreciate your comment regarding having to choose which rifle/cartridge for what hunting. It's sometimes a tough choice. Is the best choice a 6mm, 25, or 7mm or ??? And then what bullet??? And should I use a rifle that has set in my safe for too many years. I suppose I could drag out the 7mm RM and low drag bullets - I'm sure that would work, but I have not used a 6mm caliber on deer or antelope for many years because of a bullet failure way back when. (I won't start bitching about bullet failures again as I can get quite opinionated.)

Bugger,

One of the most common mistakes among hunters is blaming a cartridge or caliber for bullet failure. Both Eileen and have taken a BUNCH of big game with various 6mm rounds, especially the .243, with no problems. Had a few early on with the .243 Winchester, but not since figuring out how various bullets work.

Eileen killed her biggest-bodied whitetail buck ever with a .243 and a 100-grain Partition a few years ago. The buck appeared just at last light along the edge of some heavy riverbottom cover, and she did not want to track it into the brush. So she used the spine/shoulder shot, putting the bullet 2/3 of the way up from the bottom of the body in line with the front legs. The bullet broke both shoulders and the spine--and exited. The buck went two feet straight down.

i read the 6mm-06 article a few days ago another great article written by John, i always read his first in the magazine, its almost like opening a x-mas present as a kid. i have a couple of 6 x 284`s both of mine shoot super too .

I once had a .243 superrockchucker that I used on prairie dogs. It was devastating but in fact wasn't really much more than my 6MM Remington I built on a VZ-24 Mauser action. The rockchucker is equal to the 6MM-06 with a 25 degree shoulder angle.

With a .243, or a 6MM Rem, or a 6MM-06 I'd be using an 80 grain ttsx.....and tell your taxidermist to be ready.

I wouldn't worry about the bullets too much, a 95 grain BT or any of the other premium 100 grain bullets will do well. If longer shots are in store and your rifle is twisted right then the 115 Berger. But the 7RM as a back up with sleek 160 grain plus bullets will be the ticket for windy days.

Well, my experience with the 6mm bullet failure was with a 105 grain bullet. The game was pronghorn. That bullet [bleep] under 1/4” at aN hundred yards.
I was lying down and had a perfect rest. I shot that pronghorn six times Starting from the time he first stood up in the morning and each time the bullet landed where I wanted it to. The pronghorn had the largest horns I’ve seen. I didn’t want to destroy the hide For a shoulder mount , I aimed for the lunges. Each bullet made a pencil sized hole through the lunges.
The buck eventually fell and I had not missed the lunges even once.

I have the rack of that pronghorn overlooking my rifle work bench.

I would have dropped him right away if I had shot him in the shoulder.

So, yes I blame the bullet for not expanding, me for not testing expansion, the bulket company for not having an expanding bullet etc.

Usually, if I have a problem with a bullet, it’s that the bullet expands violently. This time the bullet did not expand. I could mention a few bullet failures, but that’s not my intent. But one of the bullets often being praised right now was a rather poor bullet when first released. I wish I would have had a camera back then. Now I carry a cell phone with camera. Back the, many people still had a rotary phone that was connected to a wall outlet.

My pet peeve is poor bullet construction. I ask, “ Why doesn’t the manufacture test their bullets?” But, I think I know the answer. The bean counters want the bullet on the market and the engineers answer to the bean counters.

Damn I love reading threads like this. Mule Deer, I've always been intrigued by the 6mm-06 or its twin, the .240 WBY. But I've been scared away by the threat of short barrel life. Do you think you can get 2000 rounds out of a barrel? That's kind of my uneducated standard. That would be a lifetime of shooting for me.
After thinking about it I can't imagine it being much worse on barrels than a .25-06.

Bugger, I had the same experience on a nice antelope buck with the 120 grain hp 25 cal Hornady. That's the only Hornady I've ever shot that didn't work like it was suppose too. Mb

Filaman,

Barrel life depends on a lot of things, including the steel, the "geometry" of shoulder and neck length, type of powder, how hot the barrel gets during range sessions--and the ratio of powder capacity to the bore size.

I figure that by dividing the bullet's cross-sectional area by approximate water capacity of the case with a bullet seated. When using bullet area I drop the decimal in front, so the cross-sectional area of, say, a 6.5mm bullet would be 547: .264/2 is .132 inch. .132 x .132 x 3.142 = .547 (actually slightly more, but that's close enough.)

To figure the bore/powder capacity ratio, I divide 547 by the water capacity of a fired case with a bullet seated. For the 6.5x55 that's about 52 grains. Divide 547 by 52 and we get 10.5.

Do the same thing with the 26 Nosler or 6.5-.300 Weatherby, both of which have about a 90-grain capacity, and result is about 6.1. Typical accurate barrel life for the 26 Nosler is 1000-1500 rounds, exactly how much depending on various other factors. Typical accurate barrel life for the 6.5x55 is 2-3 times as much.

Using this system, the 6mm-06 has a powder capacity ratio of 7.5, so barrels should last somewhat longer than 26 Nosler barrels, but not as long as 6.5x55 barrels.

I might also mention that the .240 Weatherby is not "the twin" of the 6mm-06--which the article discusses. The .240's powder capacity is somewhat less: Due to the belt, the body of the .240 case is only about .450" inch in diameter in front of the belt, rather than the .472 of the .30-06 case in front of the rim. In my water-capacity test the 6mm-06 held 64.4 grains and the .240 58.9 grains.

Looking forward to reading the article. I have been shooting a 6-06 for several years using only the 105 Berger. Worked up a load this year with the 95 LRX and looking forward to the upcoming field testing.

No failures with the Berger, just looking for some different performance characteristics. The 105 averages around 1/2 MOA, the 95 right at MOA.

I just went to Swift's website. They are only showing a 90 grain Scirocco in 6mm.

What bullet was that?

vapodog, a few years ago, I shot a doe with my .240 Wby, 80 gr. TTSX at 3,600 fps. It was a chest shot. The bullet dumped a LOT of energy on the chest wall, then penciled on thru without much internal damage.

The deer ran over 100 yds, we had to find her in the woods at night with flashlights. There were double hands full of blood clot from the superficial chest wound, blew a huge hole, but on the outside, not inside the chest cavity.

I switched to 100 gr. NPT's in that gun, found out it was the best grouping bullet of all. NPT terminal performance speaks for itself.

It seems hyper velocity with a low S.D. mono can cause unexpected results with terminal performance on larger animals, probably the cat's meow on varmints, smaller critters, etc.. That's just a series of one, but made enough of an impression that I moved on. Have posted this before.

Mono's, even at high speeds with S.D.'s. over .2 seem to do better, IME. Would appreciate input on that.

DF

Nosler Partitions or Swift A-Frames have always been a great bullet for son and i out of our 257 W.mags. and some other cartridges too including 6 mm bullets, but this year i will try some Berger hunting bullets that just might be another good bullet for a 6 mm ?

May want to check the velocity ceiling on those Bergers.

When I was working up loads for my 26 Nosler, I noticed that Berger had the top 140 gr. loads at 3,200 fps. I talked to a Berger tech and told him I could push the 140 VLD at lot faster than 3,200. He let me know they didn't recommend hunting VLD's to be shot faster than that, to use their target version with heavier jacket. I moved on to 140 NAB's, 120 TTSX and E-Tips..

Now, I'm loading the 156 EOL Berger in my 26 Nos, but not pushing them over 3K, more like 2.950, which should be OK, extremely accurate, BTW.

DF