Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters What's so special about the 300 H&H?

Other than nostalgia aspect. What is so special about the 300 H&H? Cartridge shape appears to be somewhat inefficient although in a bolt action functioning might be a little better. Balistics across most bullet weights appear to be somewhere between the 30:06 and 300 Win Mag or 300 WSM. Just asking. Thanks in advance.

Factory ballistics are deceiving. The .300 H&H case has just about exactly the same powder capacity as the .300 WSM, so can be handloaded to match it.

s for inefficiency, a well-known gunsmith did an experiment a few years ago, chambering a barrel for the .300 H&H and then running a bunch of pressure tests with a strain gauge, using various powders and bullets. Then he rechambered the barrel for the .300 WSM and ran the same tests, using the same powders and bullets. Velocities and pressures were essentially identical, as were deviations.

It also does indeed feed more slickly than any other .300 magnum in a bolt action. So aside from nostalgia, it's a very good cartridge.

And, it has a belt.

like a proper magnum....


Ingwe

Uh-oh somebodies gonna get pizzed off about that one....

It is just a very cool nostalgic caliber. It may not be the biggest or the fastest but it is the oldest and most pleasant to shoot. Besides, it is something different that not everyone has.

Back awhile ago I had a 300 Win Mag, a 300H&H,and a 300 Weatherby....all at the same times...Please don't ask why....

I noticed then that the H&H round was easily the milder recoiling,and was very accurate out to 600 yards,more so than the other two that both wore custom barrels,so there was no issue with any of these rifles being at any disadvantage, one over the other.The more I shot the H&H and the other two,the more this became apparent.

At the same time I noted the velocities with 180 gr bullets and the H&H gave around 3090,the Winchester about 3100 or a bit over,and the Weatherby about 3150-3200.There was not much difference here, either as to trajectory,since out to 600 yards they all seemed to me very much the same.Because of their greater capacity the Win and Weatherby are both capable of more vel,but still they are all very close to one another unless you really stomp on the accelerator.

Of course being a younger shooter at the time my addled brain could not accept that the H&H lagged only fractionally behind the other two,and I went on to do a lot of hunting with the 300 Win Mag and the Weatherby.

But over time I came to appreciate the H&H round for its' effortless feeding in the rifles I had,it's great accuracy and better manners.As JB alludes to, I remember chronographing a bunch of 300H&H ammo one day,all handloads,and ran a 10 shot string where velocity never varied more than 10 fps.LR shootes have since educated me that this is very important,what they strive for,in shooting very long distances to prevent vertical dispersion.I never got the same results from the Weatherby nor the 300 Winchester.This may be why I always got such good results from the H&H round.

Also as JB points out above, 300H&H and the 300WSM are much the same near as I can tell and remind me of Danny DeVito and Arnold Shwarzenagger in the movie "Twins".... very much the same thing in a different shaped package.

It also does indeed feed more slickly than any other .300 magnum in a bolt action. So aside from nostalgia, it's a very good cartridge.[/quote]

To say why bother with the 300 H&H is like no different than asking why bother with the 7x57mm Mauser. Nostalgia, field performance, wanting to shoot a cartridge with a history... It's just a hunter's personal preference over more modern cartridges.

Good! I don't shoot anything that doesn't have one....jorge

One thing that's going on here that not many "modern" shooters realize (or accept) is that for a cartridge to still be around so long after it was introduced means that it WORKS.

I have long since been convinced that most humans do not learn from history. Most are convinced that anything that happened before their lifetime (or even the past 10 years) is simply irrelevant. Which is why we have many shooters who wonder why anybody would hunt with an out-dated cartridge like the 7x57 or .300 H&H.

Part of this , of course, is the fault of the modern shooting press, which spreads the word about the vast superiority of anything new. This isn't to say there aren't some definite improvements in modern products, but to claim, for instance, that somehow the .300 WSM is a vastly better hunting round than the .300 H&H based on theoretical advantages in case shape is a prime example of advertising hype, a kind of modern brain-washing.

Thanks JB...

I used the .300 H&H for years, it was my favorite ever elk cartridge. For whatever reason, real world performance seemed far better than the paper statistics showed.
I used a .300 Win Mag. for more years on elk, but the H&H was way cooler...


Ingwe

Someone wrote one time that other than the 222/223 style cartridges there really hasn't been much cartridge advancement at all since the 270Win was introduced.

I tend to agree.

.

In a very different context recently I heard this described as "chronological snobbery." I'm hanging on to that term.

Well said and true IMHO

What's so special about the .300 H&H?

Nowadays, not much other than the fact it just works. And has since 1925.

Truly, the modern Super Ultra Super Short Blah Blah cartridges have left me cold. Mebbe I'm just getting immune to advertising in my GOF phase...

Now... what is available in an over the counter rifle? Ruger 1S, CZ and a few pre 64's? Of course there is the "build" concept too.

+1,000,000

All this applies to the .300 Weatherby, which was introduced in 1944, I believe. The Weatherby is definitely not a "new" cartridge. I like it better because it's easier to find cases and ammo and, after all, it's more powerful. The H&H is said to feed easily but I've never had the slightest problem with a .300 Weatherby feeding, or a 30-06 or .458, for that matter. I suspect (never loaded for it, though) that the .300 H&H case stretches easily. Case life may be shorter.

+1

This .300 H&H belongs to a friend of mine:



Cheers!
-Bob F.