Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Am I Overthinking My Elk Rifle?

So a 90# kid or recoil shy women shouldn't hunt elk until they can shoot some macho mag that many think are needed for elk?

ok, my opinion explanation was poor....

IMO, a 243 used within the limits of its range (fairly short) is fine. the example Shrike cited above was of a fool bragging about 600 yard shots on elk with a .243.

I'm pretty sure neither a 90# kid, a woman, an old man, a young man, or a marine sniper ought to be flinging projectiles from a .243 at elk at that distance.

No macho mag required, unless you want to be able to shoot effectively at longer range. My back wall is 300 yards with the 358. If I were toting a .243, it'd be much, much less.

Did you watch John Burns' video ?

no, I did not watch the video, but watching it wouldnt change my opinion.

I'm of the opinion that too much can happen in the span of 600 yards for shooting at an elk. wind drift.... animal takes a step, lost projectile speed, bullet doesnt perform, sun gets your eyes, sh%t happens.

an expert (aka.... not me) with a great rifle/load combo can make shots like that, and Burns is definately an expert.

I'm just not a fan of wounding game, and at 600 yards... the potential to wound (and only wound) game is pretty good, so I'd discourage it, as I am here.

Some might be okay with wounding game. Not me. I've wounded game before and it sickens me to think back on it, but think back on it... I do.

Burns didn't shoot it, his client did. I don't think she was any kind of an expert. But to be honest with you I wouldn't shoot that far with any caliber/cartridge simply cause I don't practice at that distance.
As far wounding game, plenty of game is wounded on the opposite end of the spectrum... using more gun than they can handle.
I think with the premium bullets available plenty of elk have been cleanly killed with the 243.

agreed on all that.

I wonder how many "long range hunting videos" get made, then deleted because they show an animal walking off in a hurry bleeding from a shot to the gut or arse?

my frustration with a thread like that one is it more or less encourages would be elk hunters to use a cartridge that most would consider marginal.

Burns is more or less a professional on making long shots. I get that. I'm not, and most of the folks on this forum arent either.

Reading that thread might make the average reader think the .243 is the ideal round to use for charging pachyderms in Africa "all hail the .243".

dont get me wrong, its a great round. Most of my family uses .243's on Tx whitetails.

Its just not what I'd encourage them to take an animal that is roughly 6x the size of the whitetails we have here in Tx.

I wonder how many have been wounded that you never hear about?

I hate it when someone clumps most of us together. You don't know what "most" of us are capable of. I get that you can't shoot long distance, but don't be saying most of us can't either. That's just bs...

I wouldn't consider it an ideal elk cartridge either.
As much as I like my 243 for deer if I was going to hunt elk I'd go a little bigger.
But you hear more and more of folks from all kinds of skill levels killing elk with a 243.

I've never shot past 200yds. so I don't know what I'd shoot like at 600yds but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express once

my apologies to anyone whom I might have offended, by wrongly stating that you cant make consistent kill shots on elk at 600+ yards with a .243

Can you "consistently" do it with any other cartridge??

I've done some practice at 400 yards, once, and I was very surprised at how much my groups opened up between 300-400 yards. Next time, I'll try to stay in a Holiday Inn Express the night before.

nope, and point well taken!

Dam, the natives are restless.

jswbga, I would agree with you that the 243 is not an elk rifle at 600 YDS in MOST people's hands, along with the 338, 300's etc.

curiosity (and perhaps, a bit of bitterness) got the best of me, so I used Hornadys Ballistics calculator using the following assumptions:

.243 cal
105 Berger with BC of 0.532
and a 3050fps launch velocity.
200 yard zero (probably not correct in Burns instance, but I had to assume something...)

all you need to hit right at 600 yards is no wind, and a 60" holdover. Just 5 feet worth.

At 900 yards, it's a 189" holdover. A mere 15.75 feet....

I'm not trying to bash the .243 so much in this instance, as I am the willingness to wound but never find the animal (or more likely.... a tree/rock several feet away...).

Not quite sure if youre asking a question or making a statement. But Burns builds those rifles for the task at hand, theyre not your off the rack rifle. Theres no "hold over" ya lazer the yardage then turn the dail on the scope to the yardage.
Its specialized equipment so to speak, for me anyway.

Like I said it wouldn't matter what caliber or cartridge I was shooting,i wouldnt take a 600yd shot im just not confident shooting at that distance.

Evidently elk can be killed at 680+ yds., Johns video proves that, at least to me.

I think I just got called a "naive idiot". I guess if the shoe fits and what not.



While we disagree on some points I do respect how you have stated your thoughts in this thread. Makes for interesting and thought provoking discussions.

John,

How do you decide what is "too far"? (here I'm being genuine, not a smart arse)

I know there is a ton of math involved in accounting for the elevation, wind, etc.

Is there a multi-nomial equation where you input wind speed, angle, elevation and distance? (and whatever other factors I'm not even aware of...)?

I assume you (or Berger...) have done some terminal ballistic testing to see what is the minimum impact velocity for these bullets.

Or is it a flat personal judgement call?

The Partitions I fling out of my BLR drop below 1800 fps at around 300 yards. That, plus my inability to hit reliably beyond that distance, make 300 yards my "back wall" with that gun.

I have a prairie dog gun that I can hit farther out (savage BVSS in 25-06). Since terminal ballistics aren't a big concern on a 3" thick prairie dog, I'm a bit more brave when using it.... I just don't use it on elk (mostly because I'd need a dedicated mule to carry the darned thing, at ~12# or so....)

I'm curious how you set your own back wall for a particular gun/load?

I watched your videos, and it sure looks like getting closer would be a helluva challenge with nil ground cover, so I understand the temptation to shoot from neighboring zip codes....

shane

For what it's worth, the 243 AI shooting a 105 AMAX or Berger at 3100 FPS matches almost exactly the 7mm Mag with a 162 AMAX at 3000 FPS for flight path out to 700, and the differnece at 1000 is still minute of elk.

I have both, the 243 kicks less and everything dies. The 7 Mag is for when the future MRS is using the 243 and I don't want to rethink drop tables.

I think it's funny that some people are telling John what not to shoot with a rifle that probably has 100 kills on it when the tellers haven't even tried the round for the purpose stated.

I never get to hunt as much as I like, and admit to asking a lot of dumb questions, and the occasional ill-conceived observation.

But I pretty much take what John Burns, John Barsness and Boxer state on faith, and it has panned out tremendously for me.