Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Africa The Poormans Africa Cartridge

Excellent choice of rifle and cartridge IMHO.

This seems to have turned into a thread about hunting Cape Buffalo but plains game can be a lot of fun. Personally, I like hunting the "piggies"!



Little ol' me. South Africa way back in 2005.
CZ 550 American in 9.3x62.
Handload: 286 gr Woodleigh Weldcore RN at 2390 fps (chronographed average).


I hope you get to make your trip to Africa. I think you'll love it!

Cheers! Bob F.

I don’t believe they are still made. I bought mine about 2012. Leupold made these new ones for a little while because there was so much demand for their older ones that had been discontinued. With patience you might find a good used one. Many folks don’t think 3X is enough. All I can say is that there was a lot going on in my mind for some of those shots. But I never once thought, oh if only I had a little more magnification.

Woodsy, I agree and thanks for the info. Brian

Bfaucet, Yes it was a plains game thread and then I think that I can be blamed for jumping to buffalo. Oops, My bad, Brian

Brian
I have only been hunting buffalo for the last 5-6 years. Previously I hunted plains game exclusively. After the first 3 trips I realized that I didn’t want to bring anything back. Foregoing taxidermy saved considerable expense which allowed me to go for longer trips. I have been around 25 times and would happily limit myself to plains game. Specifically I prefer hunting wildebeest, zebra, oryx, and really big warthogs.

I have used the 270, 280, 7RM for my light rifle cartridges. I can’t see any differences in performance . I prefer a light and short rifle so sold the 7RM. Ammunition for the 270 is readily available so I have used it on 80% of the trips. Turned my 280 into a 270.

I have tested every type of hunting bullet and prefer the “premium” types. My favorites are 129 LRX, 130 TTSX, 130 Swift AF, 130 Woodleigh, 160 NPtn, and 130 Trophy Tipped. Want to try 130 CX and 136 Federal Terminal Ascent.

Have seen many hunters use 300 W and 338W. Never observed any difference compared to the 270W.

Have been fiddling with a 6.5 RPM but prefer a 270W for African travel.

RinB,
You have good taste in bullets

Also, I have always appreciated your statement, "Perfection is..." For me it is about letting go of things, beliefs and concepts that seem important but are not, instead of adding more stuff hoping to make life better. I have sent that quote to some friends.

Cheers Brian

Brian,
I am definitely a minimalist when it comes to having lots of rifles. At one time I had actions, barrels, and stock blanks for 20+ high end custom rifles. I sold all of it and redirected my energy and resources to going hunting.

I had the need to try everything and concluded there wasn’t anything new to discover.

R

RinB, That is interesting. I get it. Brian

Fair point. I’ve got a lot of rifles any one of which would have been comfortably adequate for all of the hunting I have done except for buffalo.

Lots of folks seem intent on reinventing the wheel- or they just like to collect rifles that rarely get shot….

Says the lying covtard/libtard.....spreading lies and disinformation. You go girl!

I wondered how long it would take for my favorite troll to pollute another thread. You are SO predictable….

You poor, dumb bastid.........

Living rent free in your head is great but it’s unfortunately a garbage dump…. At least once make an on topic comment if you can- which apparently is impossible for you.

Speaking of a garbage dump, spreading lies and disinformation, while masquerading as a doctor may be your MO, but it don't fly around here. You're a fraud who cannot be taken seriously. I bet your family is real proud of you. Tell us how great that jab and all those boosters are for worldwide travelers/hunters is again, will you?

I’m a doctor, and I got Covid then I got the vaccine and then I got Covid again.

All I can tell you is that all the draconian lockdowns accomplished nothing in terms of disease prevention and I hope we never tolerate that kind of government control in our lives again.

And I would rather hunt with a 9.3x62 in Africa than be vaccinated with another Covid booster if I were given the choice.

I have more faith in the 9.3x62 because I know it works. Never ending Covid boosters and mandates.
Not so much.

Just thought someone ought to bring it all together.

In my experience there are two "poor man's" African cartridges, the .30-06 and .375 H&H. This is not just my personal experience, but the primary suggestions of the widely varied PH's I have hunted with.

Though even they sometimes disagree. Went on a month-long cull in 2007 that involved 25 hunters, and at least seven PHs. One evening the PHs started drinking beer and disagreed just as much as 24hour.argument.com....

Good stuff ruraldoc. jdollar doesn't have the balls to address it.

To get this tread back on track.....

I've been using one of the Lipsey special run Ruger 77 Africans in 9.3x62 for the past three annual trips to Botswana. It has been phenomenal. I've been using 270gr Speer Hot Cors at a little over 2400fps. I've taken a LOT of PG with 308, 30-06, 45-70, 450 Marlin, 375 Ruger and I've never seen the same visible hard impacts as I've seen with the 9.3. It just staggers animals. Normally, when you hit an impala or blue w/b they make a jump at impact. With the 9.3, they don't jump at all, they just stumble and run a few meters and are down. I've had it knock zebra to their knees on frontal chest shots. If they can struggle to their feet, they only go a few meters before tipping over too.

The 9.3x62 garnered a VERY strong reputations there with the locals over the last 100 yrs or so, where in they didn't have the luxury to muck about with anything that didn't work or wasn't effective. I've it ever came to the point of only being able to have just one rifle, it would be a 9.3x62......with a good stock pile of reloading supplies. The lack of factory ammo on the shelfs of most US stores is the big drawback here but, not so Europe or Africa.

Interesting that a .338 is no different than a .270, (agreed for smaller game as both are enough) and one of the reasons why I still use a 7x57 and .30/06 as they are the same and then we jump to 9.3 which has similar same ballistics as recommended using 250gn bullets to a .338/06 which also thrives on 250gn and more bullet weights all the way up to top end 9.3 weights and it seldom if ever gets mentioned?

Now if a .338 Winchester performs similarly to a .270 even though it brings velocity to the table and bullet weight, again, up to the equal of the 9.3 what is the missing link?

I believe there is an understated value in caliber, which means bullet upset, wound channel, an initial thump value that can be seen/observed with larger calibers over smaller, even though similar/same bullet weights and velocity and even case size and powder volume is compared.

What keeps this as an unsaid, is that you need to cross that .35 caliber barrier to see it and it is better demonstrated on slightly larger animals even though they may still be classified as medium game.

African has a lot of 4-700pound and more game that is sufficiently heavier than the deer sized animals most of us hunt, the reason why hunters are seeing a difference visually. A threshhold has been crossed ballistically that is not seen again until you get into the .416-458 cartridges which is a much larger jump but made more practical in recent years with lighter and pointier bullets in recent decades.

Just as RinB has reduced his plains game cartridges down to .270 and seen no compromise, I have buds that have gone down to .257, 2 in particular, that dropped to .25/06 and the other a .257 Weatherby using 100gn and 90gn X bullets respectively for game up to Kudu and Zebra in Namibia. One had multiple trips dropping caliber for each and the other a 6 week safari for plains game.

The cartridge debate largely, has always been hot air in support for what one has, rather than what has objectively recorded efficient performance, or we'd recognise that locals use .243's which a visitor would never consider.

The value of this thread is that contributors have taken game and are reporting on their results/findings. The value to the reader, is that they don't have to spend the money and time on research, as it is laid out plainly for those who would learn.

Great thread, well done and compliments to all.