Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Old Shoulder Friendly Elk Rifle

I suspect many that bad mouth brakes have either: never experienced the benefit of one, maybe were next to one on the range and the owner didn't take in account other shooters, or didn't have proper ear protection when they shot a rifle with one.

If others are present, I make sure I am at the end of the line and always mention to other shooters that I have a brake on my .06.

When out hunting, I wear electronic muffs.I don't walk around much anymore, so I put them on when I sit down.Amazing thing is all the noises you hear in the forest. Wear them walking around and you get an idea how much noise you make that elk hear.

Yes we can all go out and buy another rifle with a more moderate cartridge, but myself, I have a few rifles that have a lot of tradition behind them. I know them, they are comfortable to carry and shoot and hit where I point them. The brake on my .06 has allowed me to keep using it.

I have .243 that was given to me by my wife's grandfather before he past , but it has 1"bull barrel, an old Bausch and Lomb 8x scope that the adjustments are all in the mount, and set triggers. If you have and can use a .243 to kill elk kudus to you. I'm just an old fart set in my ways and don't consider it an appropriate elk rifle. No offense meant.

One of my most gentle recoiling firearm is a 270 BAR.

A 6.5 x 55, 7/08, 7x57 ain’t bad either. But I only own on BAR. It’s kinda like having a break without the big noise.

This question is exactly what the 6.5 CM is the answer to... load a 120/125/130 and slay elk.

^^ this ^^ for most, but i am not there yet still shoot`n my 257 Weatherby mag. but its a heavier rifle .

There’s your solution.
I should have emphasized in my previous post that it’s all about a stout bullet. All of our blathering about cartridges really doesn’t count when it comes to the terminal performance of the bullet.

^^^^ this

Try 46.5 gr Varget under a 150 etip lit by a Fed 210. Be a shade over 2900. When you run those numbers, it is surprisingly flat. I literally had my 30-06 and 308 out yesterday AM. 58.5 gr IMR 4451 gave me a shade over 3000 with a 150 etip, my 308 gave me a shade over 2900. I'd rather shoot the 308. The 308 will be heading west in October.

My other elky rifle is a 338 Fed shooting 185 TTSX at 2700. Same recoil as my 30-06 but 1 lb lighter and a bit shorter. I'm trying to find a use for my 30-06. And struggling....

I have a 130 TTSX load for my 308. 47 gr H4895 nets me 3070 and sub-MOA with the 130. It shoots fairly flat but runs out steam fairly quick and drifts a bit in the wind. There's a pic floating around on the interweb of a whitetail shot with a 130 TTSX launched from a 30-06. Shot was straight away, bullet entered in the ham and exited through the nose. I don't recall the velocity but would suspect 3300ish. Ive not shot anything with a 130 TTSX or the 150 etip yet, mainly because I just tried them. By the end of hunting season I should know more.

I've grown to like the 308. I kind of backed into it about 10 years ago but a Kimber MT with an SHV riding on top is a solid platform for alot of NA. Especially when you're backpacking or going deep. Mine is short, light, handy, and accurate.

The other option I'd consider is a plain Jane 270 shooting the 129 LRX. I did load development for my buddies 270 last year and it's fairly tame as well, and shoots flat. My next MT will very likely be a 270. If they ever make them again......

The 6.5 Creedmoor with 127 LRX at ~2800-2850 fps works great on big critters (including larger than elk) with minimal recoil and decent ballistics.

The "light kicking" rifles/rounds I have killed elk with are the 270 Winchester, 300 Savage, 8MM Mauser (loaded to only 2400 FPS) 308 Winchester with 150 grain bullets. One that was very effective, well beyond it's stats on paper, was the 44 magnum. All my elk kills with the 44 magnums were from handguns and all but one were shot with cast bullets, with the one exception being a Hornady 265 grain bullet that was actually made for the 444 Marlin, but worked well in my 44 revolver. I have to conclude that the results from carbines would be as good or better, and a 44 from a carbine is not a hard kicker for the most part.

The hardest kicking rifles I ever killed elk with are my 416 Taylor, 45-70 (loaded to top power levels from a marlin 95) my 375H&H.
The one that has seemed to be the fastest to put elk on the ground was the 375 H&H but it's odd to me that the other that gave me the most "bang-flops" of the whole group was a 270 Winchester loaded with 150 and 160 grain bullets. (Nosler Partitions and the old thick jacketed Remington Core-Lokt from the early 70s

We have a tendency to believe power and recoil go hand in hand (for the most part that's true) and we think the harder kicking rifles and rounds will drop game faster, but over 50 years of killing game in several states and several countries has shown me that is not really true.

Brass shells don't kill. Amount of powder doesn't kill. Recoil doesn't kill. Even the bullet doesn't actually kill. The bullet is the tool that makes the wound, the bullet HOLE---- and it's the bullet HOLE that kills.

A bullet that get clear through even when breaking bones and does the damage it should is the key to a killing wound and the fact is that the ones I have killed with 270s (probably about 30-35) and all fallen at the shot or within a second of so afterwards.

I have killed a good number of elk with 300 magnums, 7MM magnums and a few with a 338 mag and using good bullets all were very good for elk but the truth is that not one of them put the elk on the ground any faster then my 270s. Why? I don't actually know---- but that's what I have seen. When using what I call "so-so" bullets, or bad elk bullets, my 7 mags and all my 300s were not AS effective or satisfactory as my 270s let alone any better.

My 35 Whelen is more of a push than a snap on the shoulder. Not hard at all. Good knock down power with a 225 gr bullet loaded to max powder. 2,000 ft/lbs of energy at 300 yards. Bullet drops about 12" at 300 yards.

Consider a 7-08 pushing 120 TTSXs at 3000 or so. It's a good 300 yd round for anything in the lower 48. An M70 Featherweight would be a good option. I prefer the lighter Montana.

A few years ago I bought a 300 Savage in a 99 Savage. The most accurate hand-load matched the accuracy of the Remington factory load - that was with 130 TTSX’s. I tried a lot of loads with that rifle.
I bought a 308 since then. The most accurate load was with 130 TTSX’s. I tried quite a few loads in that rifle too.
This summer I dug out an ADL 30-06, the most accurate load I tried with that rifle was about .65 MOA, the bullet 130 TTSX’s. I didn’t try many other loads after those TTSX groups. I may be trying that bullet and rifle on whitetail in a couple months.
For years I have tended to be using a heavy for the caliber bullets, well most of the time. I’ll see how things work this year.
I wonder how the TTSX 130 grain bullet would work on elk out of an ‘06. That load had a noticeably less recoil than the 180’s I normally use. Though I find the 180’s pleasant enough.

6.5 Creedmoor shooting 130 Accubonds should work without beating you up too bad. My Creedmoor kicks only slightly harder than my.243.

Ron

The good part is I am not all "super tender just yet", ha. I can even shoot the 338 for load workup, but just get pretty sore afterward. I have long ago reached the age where I "enjoy shooting" the lighter rounds "much more now", ha. I may try to have the old Remington 78 ('06) reamed out by JES for the 338/06, just for grins. If need be, a brake on it makes more sense. I can/have/do very often just load the 300WM down to 30-06 levels. That's just for the cup n core bullets I have. All the Monos get the best the rifle will give me. I don't use any of my Centerfires for "plinking" anyhow, so no more than I shoot I'm going to be good for awhile....should be...Lord Willing!

Tikka fan here. I would take a Tikka T3 and suit it up in a caliber that works for you. A 30-06 would be plenty, the 270 would be good. You could even take the 7mm-08 and convert it to a 280 AI and be in one pretty cheap. Although I bought a Kimber Montana in 280 ai for about the same price that it would cost to make that conversion. I feel like the Tikka is very good with recoil for me. I am not recoil sensitive either and I am a pretty big guy, but the Tikka T3 I have in 300 win mag feels like light recoil than any other 300 win I have fired, much more like a .30-06. You can buy a pre-fit Limbsaver pad from Mountain Tactical and be good to go. You could also go with a .284ai and take advantage of the long magazine and chamber length that Tikka offers if that is more up your alley?

As others have mentioned, you can also tame recoil by going with a longer, lighter solid copper bullet like the TTSX.

That is too cool!

Relative to what zero?

Relative to what recoil?!

At this rate we'll have poor Jim back to a 375 H&H.....

Agreed. I own a 35 Whelen and have owned a couple more. That ain't my definition of a light recoiling rifle even with modest loads unless it weighs 10 lbs.......

Yep! Both the .35 Whelen and 9.3x62 are only "light-recoiling" compared to, say, the .340 Weatherby....