Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Would you chose the rifle or the cartridge?

Let's say one was shopping for a Wincheser M70 Featherweight in .308 Win (or substitute your favorites) and you could only find M70 Featherweights in .25-06 or 6.5 CM or .243. Pretty much anything but the cartridge you want.

Would you buy the rifle you want in a similar cartridge (ie 6.5CM)?
Would you buy the cartridge you want in another brand of rifle?

Depends on what I planned to do with it. If the cartridge the rifle is chambered for can accomplish the use I intended for the rifle and ammo in that chambering was fairly available, I would do it. I would be less inclined to pay a premium for a rifle chambered for something other than my preferred cartridge though.

Obviously you are wanting a brand spanking new rifle. Why not a used 308 featherweight? Pre 64, XTR feathereweight and classic featherweight is what I'd be searching for. Not the new Browning. This is really not that hard. If I absolutely needed/wanted a 308w and I could not find (as strange as that sounds) the one I wanted, I'd buy a Tikka instead of the Browning. With that being said, there are PLENTY of great used rifles out there right now.

Nope. I'd either wait until I found the rifle I wanted in the cartridge I wanted. However, if I just wanted another rifle I'd get one of a different manufacturer in 308win. Every one makes the 308win.

This is me as well. I'm not looking for a new rifle at this time but I'm always looking if ya know what I mean. It was just a random thought I had. Then I thought it might be a good conversation topic

A M70 XTR Featherweight in .308 was my first rifle back in 1986. I've also had the thought if I had just stuck with that instead of trading or buying new rifles over the years I could have afforded a lot more hunting

if i was shopping for a featherweight and couldn't find a 308... i would consider a 30-06, 7-08, 7x57, 280 Rem or a 270 Win before the other 3 you mentioned... YMMV...

Yep

From the original three alternatives you mentioned, I would wait for a 308.

308 winchester is a must-have rifle. Shoot lots kind of rifle with little recoil. Affordable to feed, range rubbish brass everywhere, usually free or about $23-$24 per 100.

I'd rather have a ruger 308 over most other 308's. I shoot mostly 200 grain loads here in Alaska and like that 1:10 rifling ruger uses.

Over a decade ago, I had 200 grain partitions and 200 grain accubonds key holing a target at 25 yards, from a 1:12 barrel on a savage 99. I believe most model 70 308's are 1:12 twist, a no-go in my world.

Just adds to the versatility of the 308 winchester, that nice ruger rifling.

My standard ruger american is at the gunsmith right now, getting open sights and barrel chopped to 20". Need it to fit in a vertical scabbard underneath the handle bar of my dog sled, so 40 inches max length. Don't really want anything shorter than 20" though:

For what it is worth it took me over twenty years to find a good Brno model 21 in 7x64 Brenneke with round bolt handle.


Good luck convincing me it wasn't worth the effort.

A true Loony would simply build what is wanted, with a cartridge they designed, shooting bullets designed for the application.

I would make the rifle a higher priority than the cartridges, since there is so much redundancy/overlap within the spectrum of cartridges, particularly so within the spectrum of medium game cartridges.

What I want is almost certainly going to be different from what you want, so advice is given from the user's perspective and is seldom objective, as it is biased by the advice giver's experience.

If you're going to hunt medium game with your new rifle and don't have a preference about what cartridge that it is chambered for, it is hard to go wrong with popular cartridges like the 243, 6.5 CM, 270, 308, or 30-06. Cream rises to the top and popular cartridges are popular because they have proven themselves. As has often been said on this site, proper placement of a properly constructed bullet is far more important than the cartridge's head stamp.

I'm a tinker and since tinkers must tinker, very few of my shooting rifles are still in their cataloged configurations. I change stocks to better fit me physically and barrels to better balance the package or to make them handier.

No hard and fast rule here for me. Usually I just see some rifle that trips my trigger and if the chambering is something that interests me, or I think I have a use for,I get it. Sometimes I see a cartridge I really like and, if the rifle’s not a no go for some reason, I get it.

These days I’m trying to trim down the herd and it takes something of real interest. I am much less inclined to tinker with rifles and cartridges. I am much more attracted to nice Italian shotguns. They are simpler, more elegant, don’t require optics and will be easier for my wife to cash in when I kick the bucket.

I once passed on a beautiful, reasonably priced featherweight because it was in 7x57, not 6.5x55.

If the .308 and 6.5CM were side by side on the shelf, same price, same everything, I'd take the 6.5CM.

I’d buy the wrong chambering in the right configuration and order a barrel.

It would probably depend on what I was hunting. After a lifetime of deer hunting, I haven’t seen a pinch of difference in using a .30-30 to a .300WM or even arrows in the end result. Like Horse1 suggested, just get something with a similar bolt face and swap out the barrel with a better one in the chambering of your choice time and money allowing.

I always try to buy the rifle first not the cartridge, but I do consider the cartridge as well. Just secondarily.

Always the cartridge first for me.

Build don’t buy. The longest curve for me was knowing what actually works best for me. Now I’ve gone through a heap of rifles and build what I want. I think I got lost most of the way.

This.

Since you’re looking for new have it built or just rebarreled to what you want.

I’d like a prewar factory correct M70 chambered in .300 H&H. For a new rifle, if you really want it and it just has to be chambered in 308 Win buy what you can get and rebarrel it now or down the road.