Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Is Ruger killing the 300 & 338 RCM's?

I anybody really wants a .338 RCM a local store has one on sale for $550 right now, and Montana doesn't have a sales tax.

Apparently the 270Win did a lot better.


.

When I decided to build a 338 rcm and subsequently a 6.5x338 rcm it was solely on the features of the design and expected function and performance of the 338 rcm case. In hindsight, I too ignored all the marketing jibberish. With that said, I'm very satisfied with the 338 rcm cartridge. Now, if only more powder was readily available that I could reload a little more frequently...

The only problem with the 338-06 (or the other two chamberings mentioned) is that the vast majority of hunters don't have those larger animals as an intended target regularily.

I am wanting a 338 RCM for my RH wife and boys for a Moose and Bear rifle, light and handy and Synthetic SS with sights.

Would like to find brass though.

Would have wasted a lot of money to find a LH rifle to customize it to same specs as a LH Ruger, 338 RCM.

You can't kill what that which was dead at inception.

I'm wildcatting both short and long 375 Rugers. I use the 300 RCM for the shorty's. I'm using one case taper in all of them. And this taper follows the old 8 x 68 S Schuler's.

With my taper, my 243 VampKat will feed out of a M-98 Mauser's box magazine, and is one holy terror. In a previously taken off target barrel, with 1 in 14 inch twist, at 26 inches, it does stabilize Speer 105 R.N.'s out to beyond 500 yards. My newest loads are using Hornady GMX 80 gr. Spitzers, as they are long for their weight. If this rifle barrel will stabilize 100 gr. lead cored, flat based spitzers, I will re-order a new Barrel with the 1 in 14 twist. If not, then I'll order a quicker twist.

While I'm waiting until Sept. for Neil Jones Products to return my second fitting bushing die, I bobbed off a couple of old military stepped M-98 barrels in 7 and 8 mm., and chambered them, using oversized pilots, on my PT&G wildcat reamer. When the take off Shilen barrel is done in, it will become a .277.

This 243 VampKat has 70.5 grs. of H2O to the case mouth sans meniscus. The short 8mm has about 76 grains of water. Even with my severe case taper, I can still make a 44 cal. wildcat, which is a rimless 444 Marlin on steroids, and which will feed through most bolt action's magazines. It will dish out Hornady 265 gr. Flex Tips at more velocity than they are designed to handle. And in a light rifle, more recoil than I am designed to handle.

But for the rest of you, unless you are being really anal about reliably feeding through CRF bolt magazines, once you get above the factory's 308 caliber, the stock RCM's case taper and Go gauges will work fine. These can form shoulders which will adequately head space rimless cartridges in the old 375 and 400 Whelens. But a 400 Whelen nips right at the 416 Taylors, so "short, & light", may be too much of a good thing.

I think its really dumb to cuss out this cartridge, which will, at the very least, duplicate the 9.3 x 62mm, and do it in a short action. Dave Kiff and I designed this little beast to elongate these 300 RCM's out to an honest 55mm. But with the first stage bushing and button dies, we stalled at 53.94 mm. I'm hoping my new full length chambered PT&G die blank in 270 cal. will put this in order. Obviously, above .308", the Ruger's 53mm will start to shorten up a bit.

All in all, the Rugers are better designs than either of the two rebated short magnums. Simply put, Ruger and Hornady didn't have to bullet proof their case heads using their purely rimless design. So this means that the 300 RCM case has nearly as much volume as the rebated rimmed 300 RSAUM does.

I lose two grains for my extra case taper, and about the normal amounts for necking down from a 308 neck. I'm left handed, so when I've worked up some winners, I'll have a do over with left hand bolt rifles. As I said, after re-chambering my Rem6mmBR Shilen take off barrel, the difference between the little Remington target round and my 243 VampKat, which sports 6 grains more capacity than the 240 Weatherby, is astounding.

I feel that I'm knocking on the doors of the legendary David Lloyd's 240 H & H Magnum rifles. I think that shooting the 80 gr. GMX's and mating it with my Nikon 1000 laser range finder, will let me range and smoke, Yotes and Lopes, out to about 700 meters. Without a good reflective surface, this is a good maximum range for this ambi. laser range finder.

So I will be searching for a really stiff action, with a 3 inch long magazine in a left handed bolt action rifle. It will probably be one of the newer Savages. Last but not least, the Ruger case design is made to go up to 60,000 + M.A.P. The 300 RCM's neck wall is 0.014" and going down makes them a little thicker. So Neil is setting me up to do both inside and outside neck work to keep my neck walls down to his approved 0.012". My PT&G chamber's 243 VampKat's neck diameter is .2775". F.W.I.W. The free online Powley Powder Computer which I use, goes off scale with my 243 VampKat, right in between the 85 and 87 grain bullets.

"you could effectively hunt any game in the world with a 12 gauge shotgun and a battery of rifles in 3 or 4 calibers that have existed since 1956 or before, the last 40 or 50 cartridges that have been introduced seem a bit superfluous to me."

Quite true, but not as much fun. New calibers and new rifles add to the spice of life.

You could effectively hunt all the game in the world with the 8mm Lebel, but there has breally gooeen real progress since the 1800's.

I hope the 338RCM survives, it is sort of like the fate of the 350 Remington, a good hunting round is being lost to the economic fates.

Update, I just checked Graf & Sons, for the first time in a while they had the .338 RCM 225 grain SST load in stock. I paid $90.00 for two boxes shipped after adding an NRA Roundup to my order.

At this price it seems like there must be some commitment to further manufacturing of the product.

Now I have 100 brass so my rifle will never be unusable.

I think the Obama inspired expansion of the gun industry has more to do with this thread than any other factor. The manufacturers were caught by surprise when a milk cow industry became a shooting star. (Terms used in certain business models to describe growth potential, and strategies for profits.)

At some point I don't need any more power

And

A lighter rifle is not on my "must have" list

But

I did buy a 450Marlin and love it

I am bitter it did not make the cut...

So I most likely will never buy a new round that is better cause it is smaller (shorter)or fills some "Gap".

Snake

WGAFF???

With two more boxes of ammo from Graf's making 100 pieces of brass my 338 RCM Hawkeye will have along life. This winter I have got to get my reloading system set back up.

This rifle is such a nice package that it would be a shame not to hunt with it.

I bit the bullet and purchased a left hand Ruger M-77 Compact in 300 RCM caliber, from CDNN.inc, down in Abilene, TX. for about a penny less than $600. They have both calibers, and in gloss or matte finish. My piece was made in 2012. Its claw ext. had 0.022" more gap, than does its replacement which Ruger Support shipped immediately, upon our complaint. The first one dropped the fired case within the first inch of extraction. The tighter second number works just fine.

I was impressed by my wildcats using Hornady virgin brass. But now shooting the real deal, I am dumbfounded. It most certainly is a full fledged, 300 Magnum, with the factory ammo. It was accurate right out of the box. By the time the replacement claw came in, my G.S. had done a trigger job, bringing its pull down from 5.5 lbs. to 2.7 lbs.

Now I'm pushing $700 with shppg., FFL charges, and the $45 trigger job. But this is still a bargain, and the little piggie really does shoot. Note that this model is discontinued, and sports the full length Ruger M-77 gunstock. So putting in a lightweight fluted barrel of 25-26 inches for my 243 VampKat, will actually improve the aesthetics of this rifle.

This will be my first left hand donor rifle, and now I'm going to try and blood it later this month. The 243 Custom VampKat die set is still quite a ways off. And I'm not ordering a new barrel until I can load accurate ammo for my take off Shilen Target barrel, in one of my four test bed M-98s'.

All of my RCM wildcats have too short of necks. The custom forming and reloading die set is supposed to help this by letting me form cases from full length 375 Ruger or the Basic cases. Then I can put whatever length necks on them, I want.

Hornady has really eliminated most of the noxious muzzle blast of a short barreled 300 Magnum, in this 300 RCM. I suspect that cutting down this barrel to 17 or 18 inches, would raise the muzzle blast exponentially. Down to the 284 caliber, it should stay 20 inches. From 6.8mm down to the 6mm, it should grow out to 25-6 inches, in a moderately generous diameter, fluted barrel.

Ironically, this short CRF action also feeds the 6.5 Rem. Mag. and 350 Rem Mag. with aplomb. So in effect, you have four, factory cartridges, plus my 6, 7, & 8mm wildcats.

I really liked the platform they put the RCM in just wish they would have done them in 308 and 30-06. I mostly hunt with two cartridges, 30-06 and 338WM. Unless it's something big and I'm good with my 375 H&H or my 45-70. I guess I'm a little too traditional... and old.

I always thought the 338 RCM might have a chance, but the 300 was doomed at the start. I used the 338 RCM to take a book black bear and subsequently sold it to fund another purchase. That was about the time I cleaned the stable of (almost) all non-traditional chamberings.

It's a shame that the RCM's came along late in the game. The 338 is a nifty round, and at least on paper, the 300 RCM is quite possibly the best of the short fat 30 cal's - no rebated rim, and it's not so fat as to potentially cause feeding issues. And that's coming from someone whose rifle in 300 WSM is a personal favorite and also respects the design of the 300 SAUM.

I have one rifle that has a short fat cartridge. It is a 350 RM on a 600 action w/ a kevlar stock and a 1x4 scope. I built it after my first elk hunt in Colorado. I thought I needed it in the dog hair. It is accurate.

I'll keep that one, but it is probably the only short fat cartridge rifle I'll ever own. And no, I don't pick it up very often when it comes time to go hunting. RCM WSM RAUM -- no interest for me

Ruger tried to answer a problem that didn't exist. So does 90% of the schit that's on the market. The "problem" now is making $300 rifles.

Where's the 325WSM in this mess? Thought it was pretty popular for awhile, haven't heard squat for a couple of years or more. Actually, I've never even seen one.