Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting 7x57 on WT's & exotics

I'm gonna put the super clean 1 owner early 1970's M70 pushfeed Fwt + a pair of 270's and a Tikka Swede to work this fall and hope to have more than just Texas sized WT's to use it on. I bought the rifle some years ago 'cause it is super clean and I'd had a 257 Roberts just like it when they 1st came out and almost wore the barrel plumb smooth. Got a couple different bullet weights to think about and am asking ya'lls thoughts about a One Bullet for everthing ? or some lwt weight 120's for practice & switch to the 140's & 150's . Got 120gr'ers, up thru 150's & 154's to work with and even some Speer 160's I'd bought for hogs up close.
Ron

I used the 160 grain Speer Hotcor's, the 150 grain Ballistic Tips and 140 grain Nosler Partitions extensively in my 7x57. All great bullets at 7x57 speeds. Other honorable mentions were the 150 and 160 grain Sierra Gamekings.

I have a deer load of 120gr NBTs for deer and 160gr NPs for moose for mine.

Haven't shot a deer with it yet, but did get a small bull with it last year in NFLD.

For a few years I loaded the 150gn Sierra BT over H4350 for around 2770fps. Then I switched to the 140gn Partition and now the 140gn Woodleigh.

However, I'm loading the 150gn Ballistic Tip in my 7x64 and it seems to be a super tough bullet. It ploughs through everything (pigs and fallow deer) leaving a nice large exit hole.

But then the 140gn Accubond in my 280 is a great bullet too.

Hard to narrow it down just to one bullet, but 140gn Partition or Accubond if you want premium or 150gn Ballistic Tip if you want cup and core.......which will behave like a premium anyhow.

This year will be the 1st time I'll get to hunt, or be able to take the time to load my own ammo again in the last 6 or 7 years. All of the inventory of stuff is leftovers albeit from when I was very active and was buying reloading supplies regularly from the usual online retail outlets, + here or on a Texas based forum. So I've got mebbe a K + of bullets in each of the remaining 3 calibers and enough brass for now,, of each caliber of the now down to 3 calibers - 6.5x55, 7x57 & 270. Only thing I'm beginning to regret was dumping at way toooo cheap an unfired Wby SS 7Rmg, and a Leo scoped CZ 550 9.3x62 I'd sold to a neighbor right before we moved to "central East Texas" 100+ miles S'East of Dallas almost 7 years ago.

So it looks like I'll start with the bottom end weight wise of each caliber and work up to the median average of the best accuracy + on game performance potential & fastest bullet weight wise before I start seriously replenishing stuff. We got LOTS of "practice critters" aka pine forests full of Hog's & WT Deer too inside the City Limits, but the Sheriff frowns on shooting them in your front yard... too much noise it seems.
Ron

I would say that you should try differnet weight and see for best accuracy.
It is a classic cartridge and is highly underated. At the turn of the 20th century it was a favorite for smaller African plains game.

My pushfeed Featherweight liked the 139 Hornady Interlock and Speer's 145 BTSPs well enough, pushing them with H4350 or 760. I have little doubt yours would like them, too.

The only bullet my 7x57 didn't shoot well was the 140 grain PSPCL.

I'm envious as I have owned/shot/loaded for 2 Mod 70 fwts (PF) one Mod 700 Classic and one 1895 7x57s. The "only one" I could get to shoot was the old 1895! ha I mean nothing under 1 3/4-2". the only load the 1895 liked was the S&B 173gr factory load. It was easy MOA. I did load for my boss's son's Mod 700 classic 7x57 ( 1984) using the Speer 130 BT it was very accurate, but his spoiled 9yr old son couldn't shoot as well as my boss felt he could, so the rifle got blamed. My experience with .280 , 280AI, 7-08, and the 7mm Mags were quite excellent ( with only a rare rifle that was finicky) I like the history/stories of the old War Horse, guess I'm just jinxed. ha My experience with Texas deer makes me think the 120-140 softer bullets would be about right in the 7x57, or a round nose 154 maybe. For all I know. I did load, use the 120 Barnes X (in 7mm RM) and 139 Hornady sp, 150 NBT & PT, 139 SST (7-08 to 280AI) on deer/exotics.

My 7x57 is a VZ24 with a Douglas 9 twist. It shoots everything well, but it really likes 140 gr. BT's and H414 with magnum primers. It also likes R19 and 150 gr. BT's. The 140's will do 2850fps and the 150's at 2750 or so.

My current 7x57 ( aka .275 Rigby( like the 150 NBT just fine and it has been used repeatedly on deer and exotics up to #300 Aoudad.

Couple pics....
















It will kill pigs too...

140s dont exactly bounce off😁

140s or 150s. Stick to one bullet. No reason not to.

I'm going to be loading 160 NPs in mine.

The 140 grain AB would seem like a good all-around choice for medium game.

Ingwe,

I love that rifle. I would have snapped one up in a heartbeat, but the Ruger importer here wouldn't bring any into Australia.

I’ve taken several bucks with my M70 classic featherweight. I’ve used the PPU Thunder factory loads and 140gr TSX. Haven’t caught a bullet using either and both had excellent accuracy.

Pick a bullet in the 140-160 grain range and go kill WT and exotics.

And the Sako importer here won't import a 85 Bavarian rifle in .223 in either 8 or 12 twist...they all go to you folks I guess. find me one and I'll trade!

And for the OP, my previous 7x57 was a Win M70 Fwt. It killed deer, exotics, and a pile of African game...

Mule deer







Exotic deer...


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A little African....