Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 7mm-08 Questions

+1

DF

Yep.

I think we can all agree on this great photo.

+1 also.


Okie John

Yup…..great photo

Great photo! Treasured memory.

Good advice ^^^^

I’d say shoot the rifle and hunt with it a few times and your desire for a 308 will probably go away. I built my mom a 21” barreled 7/08 for her trip to africa. Loaded it with 140TTSX over varget and she smacked the hell out of several animals including gemsbok, kudu and a big zebra. My buddy has a browning micro medallion and I load 140BT’s for him and it’s always been very effective on whitetail deer. I finally found a little SS M7 here in the fire and loaded hornady 139 boat tails and some RL15 and was very impressed by it. Once I shoot up my current 139’s I’ve already got a load worked up with 120TTSX’s and I’ll probably just use them from here on out. Not that I think the 139’s aren’t adequate. At the mild velocity they are going they’ve plowed through everything I’ve pointed them at and left very good blood trails. I’ve killed more big game species with a 308 than any other caliber but I don’t thing I can tell any difference between it and a 7/08. They both work very very well when pointed correctly.

My first experience with a 7-08 was a long time ago. While on a TPW Park Hunt just north of San Antonio, 2 young men mebbe late teens or early 20's showed up with one each of the just hit the market only a month earlier caliber, and using dead stock RP factory ammo. They proceeded to harvest what ever they wanted in that section of the Park that had no limits on EXO's or Hogs ....but what still sticks most in my memory most from back then was they were Kosher Jewish ... and were cleaning out all the hogs with DRT shots in response to the Park Rangers strong admonition about having too many hogs in the Park and the young'uns were giving the hogs away. I had never seen a 7-08's performance before but they made a memory of the close to long for me 3-400 yard shots or any distance 1 round DRT shots ...and used me and my partner to load their critters in their pickup so they could stay Kosher. We hoisted "our" hogs up a tree for a "refrigerator" as we were gonna take a couple to take home 8 or 10 days later, along with our WTail's and any EXO's we scored. My first Axis came from that trip.

OK I got a 2nd ?? I came into a a very nicely restored M70 Fwt in 7x57 a couple years ago and only shoot it sparingly in place of my beloved 270's and am toying with the idea of dropping the barreled action into a M70 factory composite stock and preserve the FWT 's nice wood stock? ....or do I sell the 7x57 to get the kind of 7-08 performance ya'll have described from a NIB 7-08 that has just been expressed for me in max max loading better built 120's & 130 gr's and not use the heavier 140grain bullets I'm running now in the 7x57, So My ? is what weight bullets can I use to get the MV closer to a 7-08's range of speed and still get the DRT performance on WT's, hogs and EXO's ?

3rd ? I just bought my first 6.5CM last week , and have a wide selection of bullets left over from several previous 6.5s that have have been sold off ...So...Same ? as above ....only what max weight bullets are going to perform comparable to a 7-08 in the bullet range's from the above posts ?

Same range of critters are on the menu...just the hogs could be 150-200lbs + where I've hunted most recently. Last hog taken last January was at about 200+ yards was bang flop from a 270 in 140's and weighed a little over 200lbs. on the Park's scale. I shoot mostly 140's these days in a 270.
Ron

If you have to second guess buying any 7mm08 in a good platform, you need whooped upside your head.

I picked up a 7-08 model 7 a few years ago. Had that god awful poorly balanced wood stock and the 18 inch barrel. I put a predator stock on it and it balanced pretty good but I picked up a stainless 22 inch Mountain rifle barrel and a chrome moly 22 inch Mountain rifle barrel in 308 planning to re barrel the rifle when I decided which caliber I wanted. Well the short 18 incher shoots just fine and I have left it on for the duration. H414 and the 145 gr. Speer BTSP are working great and getting over 2700 fps. My summer load for hog hunting is a mild charge of I4350 pushing a 140 gr. Partiton to around 2600fps. I scoped it with an old Weaver 3 power equipped with a post reticle. So far everything I have pointed it at out to 250 yards has gone down quickly. I find myself picking this rifle for too many hunts making my other rifles jealous.

I'd bought a 7-08 if the store had had one for sale at the same price as the T/C CM I bought. I've been told couple times recently if I sell/trade the M70 FWT 7x57 I can get into an upper grade 7-08 pretty easily. CM's OTH allow me to burn up most or all of the K of 6.5 bullets sitting on the shelf when the cherry condition 6.5 x55 Tikka T3 did not and thats why it's out on Consignment...but I also think I'll look for another 7Rmg again too.

A friend I know who teaches Long Range Shooting at his 800 yard Range, and still competes in LR Matches said recently he's just bought his 16 year son a 7-08, so I understand the bonus the 7-08 allows..and why it is so tempting to up grade into a 7-08 from the 7x57. OTOH I get told the 7x57 is just as functional as a 7-08 so I'll keep it and use my 270's until I stumble into a steal of a deal ...which is what I've done for the last 5-6 years I've had the M70 FWT 7x57. At my age I'm getting ready for a couple years worth of the non stop Last Hurrah.
Ron

That says it all right there. Sounds like a damn lot of second guessing going on in sacron's case..