Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Express Rifles and Big Bores Only The big 40+ calibers. What's your favorite?

If anyone is seeking a pretty nice left handed Model 70 Classic 300 Win Mag to start a build with, there's one on consignment at Burdett and Son in Texas.

Odonata,

Your post about the No. 1 404J brought a smile to my face. I was fortunate some years ago, to put in a bid on the Ruger auction on such a rifle which had never left the factory, thinking I would never get it. For some reason I wound up with the rifle and have enjoyed it as 404J is my favorite large medium. Haven’t hunted with it as that’s reserved for a Win pre-64 M-70 404J, with an outstanding piece of walnut, built by a now departed classical GS.

Back to your original matter of a .4xx cartridge rifle - starting with a Ruger Hawkeye 375 Ruger was my eventual solution. Because of my preference for a 0.423” bore, I modified the 375 Ruger case by necking it up to that diameter and had my Hawkeye African rebored. Ballistically a great cartridge. It worked well in a Rimrock synthetic stock but split at the wrist on the first shot when I put it back in the OEM African walnut stock.

Fortunately the wood stock was salvaged with proper repair, steel rod on the grip and proper bedding. That stock now is on a Hawkeye 375 Ruger barreled action.

For 404 fans, a modern version of the 404J is the 404-375 Ruger. Standard length action, available cases, 400 grain bullets ar 2350+ with RL-17 duplicates 416 Rigby & Remington and matches modern versions of the 404J. A perfect blend of a classical bore in a modern case seems to check off all the boxes.

BTW, based on the results of the Hawkeye African experiment, a Hawkeye Alaskan in 404-375 Ruger stands near it in the rack. The 20” barrel gives up a few fps in MV, but it’s weather resistance, agility, ease of carry make it my ideal version of a brown bear cartridge for AK. It would probably work on moose just as well, and in a pinch with proper solids, would work for pachyderms.

Because of this thread, my appreciation for the 458 Win Mag has definitely grown. I sent B&S in TX an email. Let the scavenger hunt continue! Thanks for the tip.


There's so many interesting threads here that sort of fizzle out with no epilogue that leave me wondering how it all ended. Did anything come from all of the banter? So I thought some of the people involved might enjoy finding out if any of their sage advice (or testy opinions) had actually been put to good use. Stay tuned to find out whose favorite caliber is going to win in the end because they're all still in the running!

Based on availability of LH rifles, the laws of probability favor my next acquisition being a .375 H&H or a .375 Ruger. But I want to be patient & give the .4** calibers a chance to make an unexpected appearance.

Odonata,

As epilogue to provide closure on one option, the Hawkeye African 404-375 Ruger has taken a Cape buffalo along with some plains game in Africa. That receiver is now the basis for a 458 WM+ inspired by Sir Ron’s thread - while the barrel sits on the workbench, awaiting a new host - and took a tuskless elephant this past July. That configuration is specialized in that role and was not built as a walk-around medium but rather as a heavier big-bore DGR.

Meanwhile, it’s little brother, the Hawkeye Alaskan 404-375 Ruger sits in the safe waiting to see if a bucket list brown bear ever becomes a reality and it’s called back into duty. At this point I’m pretty picky about a brown bear outfitter - probably Grizzly Skins of AK - so don’t know if that’ll ever come to pass. The SS short-barrel Alaskan was purposely rebored to 0.423” for the 2nd brown bear AK mission. In its prior guise as a 375 Ruger, it took a brown bear at 17 yds with a Barnes 300 grain TSX, so now being capable of shooting a 400 grain 0.423” at 2300+ fps it’s more of an already good thing. Proven power in a small package.

Seems you have a host of good possibilities, so making a decision and carrying it out might be your pending task. Good luck.

I see you really like the Ruger #1 in 405win. My dad liked them to but wanted a little more pop. He had it chambered for a case 3/4 inch longer.
It will push a 300 grain bullet at 2670 and a 400 grain Woodliegh at 2385. All custom but fun to shoot and with a brake recoil is surprisingly easy.

Thanks! I like involved projects that require time & effort so this has been fun. It's interesting to go to a place like GunBroker and start applying filters. There's a lot of rifles, so I just look at the bolt actions and tens of thousands of choices disappear. Then I look at only left-hand models and another huge chunk vanishes. Only calibers .400 or larger? We're down into the single digits. Eliminate the push feeds and a lot of times I'm looking at zero choices left. If anything miraculously remains, then I still have to apply the final four criteria: Do I like it, do I want it, can I afford it & is it in a desirable caliber? Of the final four criteria, three of them are under my control. But for an auction, the "can I afford it" criterion is set by my (sometimes wealthy / sometimes crazy) competition. It can be challenging...


My 405 is a Winchester 1885 Traditional Hunter with a Marble peep sight and a Montana Vintage Arms globe in the front. Mississippi has a primitive season that allows breech loaded single shots >= .35 caliber with an exposed hammer so this is one of the rifles I use (my buddies use 35 Whelen's & 45-70's). I have seven different stands I can hunt out of with short ranges where iron sights & my terrible eyes are still (relatively?) effective. The large bullet provides a bit of forgiveness if my aim isn't as precise as a scoped shot. My 400 Woodleigh Weldcores only go about 1850 fps but are more than adequate for what I've been shooting at so far. I haven't chronographed the 300gr flat points I was using yet. A couple of weeks ago, I didn't see any deer when I was carrying the 405. But I did manage to get a doe with my diminutive Browning 1885 in .44 Magnum so at least I got to enjoy eating venison this past weekend.

Odonata,
My 1895 Winchester in .405 Winchester is one of my favoRITE BIG BORES.

In addition to a lot of American game it has also made short work of a Cape buffalo.


A very handy and effective rifle/cartridge combo.

The 1895 is definitely the rifle model that most people associate with the 405 Winchester and I've been seriously tempted on more than one occasion to acquire one in that caliber. I also saw a nice one I really liked once in 30-40 Krag as well. Ever since I shot my first deer with a 303 British, I've had a nostalgic fondness for that caliber. So whenever I see an 1895 chambered in 303 like the one pictured below, I'm always tempted. Too bad that one was in Canada & would require a bit of extra effort to get it south:



I really liked what this guy did on a 30-06 Browning that had been rebored to 35 Whelen.



It's a classic rifle & that's a nice buffalo! Thanks for sharing.

I'd like to get a .400 H&H built...

Big Medicine indeed!!!

That 404 Jeffery Ruger No. 1 is special. Quite the collector item. Safe Queen investment material.
The more common and later arriving 450/400 NE 3" Ruger No. 1 would be a better hunter/shooter.
Get two of them and have a gunbearer ready at your side.

Ruger got their sequence of introduction backward.
The .400 S. Jeffery came first in 1897 in a Farquharson falling block that was the first ever "Nitro Express."
Rigby came along a few months after in late 1897 with the .450 S. Rigby, the second ever "Nitro Express" but first ever housed in a double rifle.
When the class of "Nitro Express" rifles got a name circa turn of century, those two forerunners became the 450/400 NE 3" and the 450 NE 3-1/4".

I like the thicker rim on the 450/400 NE 3".
That case was essentially the basis for the 404 Jeffery Rimless Nitro Express marketed in 1905.

450/400 NE 3": First ever fully competent NE in a single then soon after in a double.
404 Jeffery RNE: First ever really good bolt action DGR.
Get at least one of each.

Winchester 1895: I have them in plain Jane .30-06 and .405 TR commemorative.
Tempted to wildcat the former, not the latter.
Going +.40 to beat the .405 WCF, .411 Hawk has a 2.430" max brass length,
versus the .400 Whelen of Michael Petrov/G&H which ought to be kept to .30-06 max brass length of 2.494".
With bullet seating and throating to match, they can both use the same max COL limit as for the .30-06, 3.340".
The Ruger No. 1 in .405 WCF can be hotted up considerably,
almost to 450/400 NE 3" classic levels, which can also be hotted up considerably in the Ruger No.1.
If the classic .416 Rigby load is a killer-diller, match that or more with the 450/400 NE 3".

Glad to hear you are leaning toward a .458 WinMag.
It is the overall winner.
Accurate and versatile at any power level from light to heavy.
Did I ever mention that it beats the .458 Lott ?

Stop that! The purpose of this thread was for your advice to help me distill my selection down to the one perfect choice. But instead of looking for the "next rifle", I seem to keep looking for a place to put the "next gun safe" instead. Enthusiasm is contagious and I do not need any encouragement to buy extra rifles because I'll probably do it.


Before this thread, I don't think I considered the 458 Win Mag properly because I only thought of it as a heavy round with attention-getting recoil. But reading the really long 458 thread at the top of this forum and some of CZ550's (aka Bob Mitchell) blog posts about it, helped me appreciate the versatility of some of the milder loads. Unfortunately, before I had that epiphany, I did let a LH Zastava in 458 Win Mag slip past me that was affordable & might have been nice to own:




From your previous posts I got the general impression that the 458 Win Mag is both the cat's meow & the bee's knees. Which coincidentally are two criteria I always look for in a new rifle purchase. The good thing is that when I look at websites like GunBroker, the 458 Win Mag is generally available as the most common choice. For example the current selection count on GB for calibers mentioned in this thread is:

1 - 425 Express
2 - 416 Taylor
2 - 450 Rigby
2 - 505 Gibbs
5 - 404 Jeffery
13 - 458 Lott
16 - 416 Rigby
22 - 416 Rem Mag (the only LH being a Remington 700)
49 - 458 Win Mag (the only LH being a Remington 700)

So out of 112 rifles to choose from, 2 are LH and both are push feed Remington 700's with wooden stocks. The Savage 110 pictured below is another example of a LH 458 Win Mag that is coming up for auction next month. This is a pretty common result so patience is required if I'm not going to buy a custom or get a gunsmith involved in a rebarrel or rebore. But both of those are definitely viable options.

Quite a few years back, I had an opportunity to buy a Win. Model 70 .458 WM at a good (really good) price. I thought about getting it and have regretted not buying it ever since!

It would have probably gone to a gunsmith before I even got it home…..a little cash, a .458 Lott reamer, and I’d have had the .458 I’ve dreamed of for around 40 years!

Bad decisions bring lasting regrets! 🤬 memtb

If I were to buy a big bore rifle today, I would probably buy a Ruger 375. Lighter kick for a 70 year old, lower rifle weight for carry, and possibly lower cost than some of the other brands, and it uses a Mauser style action with 3 position safety. Also I would buy the reloading dies. I would also probably buy the stainless Alaskan version for low maintenance and being water resistant. It is also a standard length action vs a longer heavier traditional magnum action.

The "trophies" I've lost at auction sites definitely outnumbers the trophies I've missed while out in the woods hunting. I sometimes look back at rifles I passed on & wonder what the hell was I thinking at that time?


When Phil Shoemaker posted about the Lipsey's APHA edition of the 416 Ruger last month, I could only sigh & wish it was a left-handed model. That would have been a nice rifle to own in that caliber or 375 Ruger. It's almost enough to make me consider shooting a right-handed rifle.

Sir Ron,

Hope I’m not selectively quoting you out of context. Merely want to emphasize my agreement with your assessment of the 2 classical Ruger #1s in 404J and 450/400 NE 3”. Both are capable of firing their respective 400 grain bullets at 2400 fps MV in the #1. While my 404J Tropical 1H does so gently - this Ruger factory-retained model has a threaded muzzle brake from its inception at manufacture - the 450/400 is both much lighter and devoid of a brake. At 2100 fps it is capable and easy in its recoil. However, at 2400 fps the 450/400 becomes a beast only hardy heavy cartridge aficionados can love.

Since the rifle looniness, “(is) all about fun and games,” as JOC so aptly put it, for the range a 450/400 @ 2050-2100 fps is a blast. But for a serious DGR, with gritting of teeth and determination to walk away from the close-up encounter with pachyderms, souping it up to 2350-2400 fps would be my choice. The penetration of the 0.400” 400 grain solid FP bullet should be spectacular, though I have not experienced it on DG.

Many choices, few truly wrong ones, all based on the rifleman’s tastes.

Good thread. I have a LH Winchester Model 70 .416 Remington. I bought it as a .375HH and shot one buffalo and a hippo with it as a 375. I bought it when the factory made LH 375s for a couple years. After 2 Safaris, I had it reworked by Mark Penrod. He restocked it in an Echols Legend stock, and rebarreled it with a 416 14" twist Kreiger barrel and put NECG sights on it. I've shot 2 buffalo with this combination. Does appear to hit a little harder. The first one I shot with a 400G TSX Barnes, and when it hit the buffalo - it sounded like it was whacked with a 2 x 4. It ran about 50 yards. The other one I shot this year - used a 325G Hammer Shock bullet. It was a frontal shot, and the buffalo jumped a little on receiving the bullet, and it the hit didn't sound as loud, but the buffalo stumbled and fell within 5 yards or so. He did the classic bellow and I shot him again for insurance. The first bullet was recovered in the rear hip. All 4 tips in the front broke off as designed, and left a flat nosed solid. We never found the second bullet. I'm not sure it's more potent as a 416 vs a 375 because it's killed everything I've shot with it. The fit of the Legend stock definitely helps mitigate the recoil. It's got slight cast off (cast on?) which seems to work well.

Thanks for the shooting reports. Good to hear the 325 grain Shock Hammer performed well. Outstanding penetration.

I think the .416 325 grain Shock Hammer and 325 grain CEB Maximus are close to ideal for the 416 Remington and Ruger. I have both loaded in the 416 Ruger for a range trial. Unfortunately that might be deferred until spring. From the testing and reports that I have seen, the Shock Hammer and Maximus should perform nearly identical. The Maximus is slightly shorter and is estimated at a bit higher bc. Both are close to 350 grain TSX length and significantly shorter than the 350 TTSX. Both of those 350's have grouped well in my rifles.

I'm not a fan of big game bullets designed to fragment and here's why:

You have no control over when those petals grenade off the fkn bullet, which is stupid. The expanded diameter could shed within mere inches of the entry wound. Then the rest of the bullet continues to penetrate through the vitals, without benefit of a controlled expansion bullet.

These trends within the shooting world, reminds me of women who think essential oils and crystals replace a fkn doctor and modern medicine.

I'll stick with heavier controlled expansion bullets like the swift a-frame and the dgx bonded.