Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles 300 Win Mag, the ultimate cartridge?

the 300 whiiny is a great round, i am having mine rechambered to 300 dakota for just a tad more umph, other than that no flies on the whinnie.........blake

I would not say "ultimate," but I would agree with you that the .300WM is an outstanding cartridge, and so the .338WM.

You won't go wrong with the .300WM, which as very popular in Alaska for good reasons.

Cast my vote for the 300 Winnie as well, although I prefer the 300 Weatherby, but that is just a personal preference. Early on in my hunting/shooting life, I read Elgin Gate's accomplishments around the world with the 300 Weatherby and decided it was for me. Since then, I've also been fortunate to hunt africa as well as the good ol' USA and elsewhere with my 300 Weatherby and it's definetly my "one gun" cartridge and for those who prefer the Winnie or the H&H that's fine too. Hell of a cartridge. jorge

Ditto on the .300 Winny. Until Steve Timm turned me on to the magic of the .280AI, the .300 was my favorite. What it'll (I.E sudden devastation) do to a whitetail deer with 165 grain bullets has to be seen to be believed.

Good Shooting,
HBB

I've owned and shot a Rem 700 in 300 Winny for 13 years now. It started as a brand new regular BDL, then I had it nickel plated, then it went into an HS Sporter stock, then it had a stainless factory barrel screwed into it. It's had the bottom metal replaced with a silver set, has a stainless mag box, even has a stainless factory trigger. The only things original are the receiver, bolt and spring and follower. It's worn a Redfield Tracker 3-9X, then an Elite 3000 3-9X, now a Leupold VariX-II 3-9 in Dual Dovetails. I've taken more game with it than all my other rifles combined. It just plain does the job well. From 200 gr Grand Slams at 2950 to 168 AMax's at 3250, it shoots well. Pretty hard to beat IMHO. I've gotten away from it in the last couple years, but I'm thinking of going back to it...someone else said it a while back..."once you have a good 300 Mag of whatever stripe, it's pretty hard to justify anything else"....

Dogcatcher223-

It would be really hard to go wrong with a .300 Win Mag. In my opinion it is a great choice for a one-gun battery for Colorado. There will be quite a bit of overlap in capability between the .300 Win Mag and your current .30-06 and .338 Win Mag, but it my well end up being your favorite cartridge.

All I can add is a ditto to the recommendation not to go too light. The .300 Win. Mag. can be superbly accurate out to as far as you care to shoot but you don't want to handicap it with a rifle that is painful to shoot.

8 1/2 pounds is just about perfect for the .300 Win. Mag, certainly I wouldn't want to regularly shoot one that weighed less than 8 lbs.

Dog,
how long a barrel are you going for? I am planning on having my 358 norma mag rebarreled to a 300wm. It is a heavy rifle way over 10lbs loaded w/scope so I end up not using it at all. I have a sheilen number 5 contour barrel on it now and I was thinking about keeping the same contour and going to a 26" stainless barrel. BTW it has a elkridge thumbhole lamiate stock on it to add to the weight. Since I am thinking antelope, deer, and maybe elk at longer range out near craig the weight will not be so much of an issue as it it in the mountains. lol. For mountain hunting I have my 338wm and my 35 whelen. BTW Jim the 338wm weights less than 8lbs, but someone had it magnaported before I aquired it so it doesn't hurt. tom

I have carried an -06 of one sort or another most of my adult life until my wife "needed" a new rifle. I shortened my old Tikka up for her and then I "needed" a new rifle. I got a 300 Winnie in the Browning Eclipse M1000. It weighs 9-14 stripped naked. Probably about 11-8 good to go. It has the BOSS brake on it, but I put up the CR BOSS when I am hunting.

I am amazed at the consistency of the thing. 180 gr Partitions at 3140 fps and 168 TSX's at 3050 go basically into the same group at 300 yards. Kills like a lightning bolt at 0-300 yards, deer and moose. Never had to track anything. They die on the way to the ground. Love it!

Ultimate????? Don't know about that. Ultimate is what you like the best, works best for you, and you can shoot all day with. The weight of my rifle doesn't bother me, because I am the strong silent type -- strong smelling from the sweat of carrying an 11 pound rifle, and silent, cause I am trying to catch my breath. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

My most spectacular kill ever was on an elk with a 300win, sure the shot was 30yds but it was impressive. The best part of it was I as 16 and it was the second elk I ever killed and I dropped her about 10 from a road. Hell the 300win is a great round no doubt about it. However when I finally purchased my hunting rifle I got a 300wby.

How is the kick from a 300 vs. 338? I was shooting the 338 this weekend, and although it was bucking, it was manageable.

While the .300 Winchester Magnum is a very good cartridge it isn't the ultimate cartridge or even the ultimate .30 caliber magnum. It has a few flaws. The neck is to short so that loading the longer, heavier bullets require they be seated deeper into the case than with the .300 Weatherby or even the .30-338(which is what everyone believed Winchester would introduce as their .300 magnum. Personally I believe that the .300 Weatherby is the better cartridge due to it�s ability to use .300 H&H ammo and it�s ability to use/load heavier weight bullets. Actually I place the .300 Winchester Magnum in third place behind second place .308 Normal Magnum. Lawdog
<img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Recoil is not bad at all on the 300 Win Mag, even with lighter rifles. Forker's Ammo & Ballistics lists the 300 WinMag's relative recoil factor at 2.39 with a 30-06 at 2.19, and that is lots of bang for just a hair more recoil. It is my favorite, hands down. Accurate, versatile, not bad on recoil, great combination of bullet options with ballistics up there with anything for North American game.

Shootist - love your strong, silent type statement! Those heavy guns do shoot nice if you can get them there and the BOSS flat out works!

DJ

I really don't agree with most of the posts here. The 300 WM indeed does have flies on it and WW did not get it right or even close to right.

Just read the caution in the Nosler manuals on this cartridge. The main problem is that the magazines are too short for the cartridge. It would help if the throats were longer and of course the neck is kind of short too.

Then it's a belted case and therefore it's headspacing problems in particular trying to FL size the brass.

On the postitive side it does have a nice shoulder if you can fire form it to fit there, it's big enough and it fits into a standard action.

I have had a few of them and they kick harder than what I want to put up with for most hunting. Thus the 300 WM, for me, is a specialized cartridge. Right now I don't have one. I have a 300 H&H however.

Savage,

Clueless is the word that comes to mind..........

Tony

Tony,

Your retort seems emotional. I gave specific facts and solutions. Now just go ahead and shoot your 300 WM.

All guns good, shootem good.

<img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Savage99 admit it you are just upset that a 300wm won't fit in a 99 action <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />
tom

Savage, I think that your "facts" are partially wrong.

Bring this up in the gunwriters forum and I think that we can get to the bottom of this.

Cheers,
CL

Anybody that brings up the old wife's tale about the 300 Win's "short neck" is automatically disqualified to render any kind of cogent opinion. You can load 200gr Partitions without any difficulty and still achieve the same velocities or even a bit higher than the H&H. Further, with the advent of premiums like the A Frame, TSX, etc, you can stick with the 180s and give nothing up to a 200 or the 220. I own all three of the 300s Weatherby, H&H and Winnie and the Winnie is the most practical. jorge

Bullets heavier than 200 grains are not recommended for the .300 Win. Mag. due to its short neck.
http://www.chuckhawks.com/300Win_Mag.htm

The 300 winchester magnum is one of the few cartridges that really make the case for free boring and a longer action, with bullets seated deeply in the cartridge case it's full potential can not be realized by the limited case capacity of deep seated bullets.
http://www.gunnersden.com/index.htm.300winchester-magnum.html

To maximize powder capacity, or maybe to have it look different than the .308 Norma Magnum, the shoulder was moved far forward which created a very short neck. The neck's length is less than .308, the bullet's diameter. This is a design flaw in the eyes of many handloaders. Several decades ago, cartridge design thinking dictated that a short neck wouldn't hold the bullet straight in alignment with the axis of the bore. Today, we know otherwise. It is a rare problematic rifle chambered for the .300 that won't hold 100 yard groups to inside of 1.5 minutes of angle, or 1 1/2 inches.

This short neck creates a more serious problem, though. Since a standard length action is used, the bullet must be seated deeply for the cartridges to fit in the magazine. Most of the popular .30 caliber bullets have a long taper, or give, and a short full diameter area. With the shank of the bullet below the case neck, it cannot be adequately gripped.
http://www.gunownersalliance.com/Rabbi_0002.htm

jorge,

If you don't have a copy of Nosler #5 then I will take a photo of the 300 WM page for you.