Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game 7mm or 300 win mag

If I were to own just one rifle for all the hoofed critters I'll ever hunt, it'd be a 7mm rem mag. There's a great selection of .284 boolits out there.

More 1000 yard benchest matches are won with 300win mag over 7mm mag 10 to 1!! I would go with 300win..

RL....

In 20yrs shooting and loading for the 7RM there were very few loads that wood approach 2900fps, one was a rediculous amount of H-450, Hornaday 175gr SP in a Federal case. This was not a hunting load but just me experimenting, this is one cartridge I overloaded many times as I was trying to achieve velocities in reload manuals in the day. When i first got a chronegraph I run a factory factory load, 175gr, accross it and the speed was 2730 fps. I was shocked, a good 120fps of what Remington quoted. a factory 3006 180gr runs 2680fps. hand loading will bring the best of the two out for sure. I eventually loaded the 7 with 175gr barnes FXB, 63gr H4831 fpr a velocity of 2775fps- agood hunting load. The 7 has been sold off and now the 3006 replaces it for a light all-round rifle. A 180gr TSX, 57gr H4350, gets 2750fps, again its a good hunting load. On my ballistic program the results yield not a dimes worth of advantage over the 7RM load. Ishot a moose with the06 last fall and I,m sure it did not know if it was a 28 or 30 that hit it. With the lighter bullets the 7 will out shine the 3006 in trajectory. For me , EVEN DEER HUNTING THERE IS ALWAYS THE G-BEAR THREAT.

I have no dog in a fight here for a debate on this. I'll only share my experience. I can say without hesitation that sub 30 caliber rifles simply do not provide a blood trail that those 30 caliber and over do. There has to be a minimum someplace. From what I have seen with lots of NA hunting along with many years of work with African animals that minimum line is at .308 diameter.

Over my career 30 caliber magums have been by a large margin the most popular hunting rifle in my camps. For a good reason too! They likely out number all other cartridges combined! 30 caliber magnums can really do just about anything you want against big game. Flat shooting, light bullets or heavy bullets, and a level of versatility that I don't think is matched by any other cartrige today.

If you reload, the 300 magnums are a very special line of cartridges. Having reloaded ammo for many of them. The 300 win mag would be my last choice for me as a reloader. That short case and neck does not offer the same flexibility the other 300 mags do. The 300 Weatherby with that bigger case and that prefect long neck is a handloaders dream. You can seat and grip any bullet you choose with that long neck.
Add to that a 165gr TSX at about 3600fps and what more would you want in a single choice for all around big game. Load the same bullet to 2900 and it's a dead ringer for a 30/06 with minimal recoil.

JJ: All absolutely true! I've generally noticed the big 30's to chop bigger holes in animals and to give meaningful velocities to heavy bullets and go fast with lighter ones as well,all of which adds up to a very versatile package for a big swath of game animals.

It's equally true that the extra performance of the big 30's comes at the expense of (somewhat) more recoil and a (somewhat)heavier rifle. If this fills the bill, great.I used them a lot when I was younger,and while I still CAN, I generally don't, cause I prefer a lighter rifle that kicks a bit less,but shoots as flat.No doubt,though, the big 30's occupy a sweet spot in the caliber lineup.My impression has been they should be lumped in with the 338 class of cartridge rather than anything smaller.

I vote for the 7mm Rem Mag.

They are both fully capable for the task at hand and the 7mm kicks less. Less is better, as long as I'm not under gunning myself for what I'm after.

You'll probably think I have a warped perspective:

For a combination deer/elk cartridge I prefer the .338 win mag. The 7mm Rem and .300 Win will kill elk fine and I like both, I just think their higher velocity blows up too much meat at the ranges I usually kill deer. I don't have any of the 3 right now. My past 7mm mag (and 7mm STW) and .300 win mag rifles have been set up for elk, which are big enough that some meat loss still leaves me with plenty to eat (maybe more than I can finish before it locker burns and is lost anyway), and long range coyote shooting where the bigger the splat the better I like it.

.338 does a job on elk, and because of both harder, and slower, bullets, doesn't seem to mess up deer as bad, it's more like a big .308 with heavy bullets than a fast magnum.

If you're shooting really far so the bullets have slowed down, then the 7mm and .300 are real fine deer cartridges, I just don't shoot that far that often.

Tom

Ayup, and the 9.3x62, 64 and 74 also fit in here and these four with GOOD handloads are MY favourites for hunting both Elk and Deer here in BC. As Furprick says, G-bears are ALWAYS a consideration and your modern liberal G-bear is as rapacious as ANY other liberal-leftie, so.......

Would love to see a 300 Weatherby that shoots a 165 grain bullet at 3600fps.Can't see that speed but...........been wrong before..

Between the two I choose to go 7 each and every time. I've seen a lot of elk taken with each, and I find no diff between the two in how they take those big critters down.

Deer and lopes I can take out with about anything so I really only think about how things will work out on elk.

For me the 7 is a fair bit more user friendly and as I try to run 1K rounds a year through it that is semi important to me. But then again theres been years from the sunny slopes of yesterday past when I did that with my 340 as well....<g>

If I want a bigger round than a big 7 I go to my 340 or my 375 Wby. Then I'll have a bigger blood trail than either the big 7 or the 300's.

Dober

Me thinks that JJ said that pre morning cup of Joe....

Dober

The difference in the properly set up Weatherby is the 26" barrel. Anyone with a 24" barrel on the 7mm or the 300mag is not getting anywhere near what they should be. The 24" barrel on a magnum is a waste of time. The best man at my wedding has this 300 Weatherby which shot 165TSX bullets at or near that 3600 mark. It's been a while since I/we chrono'd them but It was an impressive speed which stuck in my mind. I can easily call him and check on barrel length, it might be a 28" barrel as I seem to recall laughing and teasing him about his choice of barrel length on that rifle.

There is a lot of talk about this recoil stuff. The cartridge alone is not the cause of horrible recoil. Anyone of us could pick up a rifle at randon and base all like cartridges on it's recoil. That is painting with an awefully broad brush. I've shot a .308 win that was punishing with it's hard but plate and no recoil pad, a 338 that was also brutal. Yet I have shot plenty of others which fit correctly, with good recoil pads, and properly weighted for the cartridge choice. Those were as nice to shoot as any typical cartridge.

Far to much is put on Recoil in general terms. It has as much do do with the design of the firearm as it does the cartridge choice. Anyone basing a decision on recoil rumor and hearsay is making a very foolish decision.

I bought my first 7mm Rem. Mag. (Ruger M77) in 1977, and I started hunting mule deer, elk, and blacktails with it that same year. I've owned a slew of 7mm Rem. Mags. in the years since, and I've always liked that cartridge a great deal. The last one I bought was an early 700 'C' that was built in 1971, and I bought an older 700 BDL just before that to setup and give to my nephew to hunt with. However, I haven't personally hunted with a Seven-Mag for quite some time, since 1992 if I'm remembering correctly.

The reason?

I started to hunt with the 300 Win. Mag. in a very serious way starting in 1994, and I really came to like it much better than the 7mm Rem. Mag. It clobbers big stuff like elk noticeably harder than the 7mm Rem. Mag. does, plus it shoots just as flat for any hunting purpose anywhere, and by no means is it too large for anything that's deer-size. I've killed over 200 big game animals (African dik dik to Canadian moose) with various 300 Win. Mags. since 1994, and I've not missed the 7mm Rem. Mag. in the least bit.

As far as I'm concerned, the only advantage the 7mm Rem. Mag. offers is slightly less recoil. To me, that's not important. For someone else, it might be..............

AD

JJ, good post and I agree with what your saying about 30 cal mags. However, I dont think your going to get anywhere near 3600fps with a 165tsx out of a 300 Weatherby, or even a 30-378. This is per Barnes Latest(#4) data.

Wow, I'd like to see a 165 runnin' 3600 outa a wby but only from a distance.

Mark, Just spoke with Scot about his 300 weatherby to refresh my memory. He does not have a 28" barrel on that rifle, he has a 30" barrel. I knew I poked fun at him when he built that thing and now I remember why!

He said that the 165 barnes were not the "TSX" version but the blue coated bullets they made for a short time. I've never shot them but I now recall his silly long barrel and his blue bullets. He also corrected my memory on the velocity. He was getting right at 3400fps not the 3600 I stated in the earlier post. Sorry for the confusion, and thanks for you guys calling me on this correction!

He was getting 3600fps with another bullet, be he could not recall without his records in front of him regarding the load and bullet. It may have been a 130 or 150? I simply don't recall the details as I was laughing much to hard about that long barrel to focus on his ammo.

This is all ofcourse off the direct topic here. I simply cannot see any advantage of the 7mm mag over the 300 mag. Regarding some folks stating 175 grain bullets with the 7mm mag are a good option for bigger game....... well I don't see that as being a very prudent choice. The intent of the 7mag was as an extreme long range meduim game rifle. Loading extreme heavy bullets into a magnum like this is kinda like hauling firewood in a corvette. You can do it, but there are much better options.

Yepper-I can and have gotten 3600 out of a 30/378, fact is I've shot a fiar number of chucks with that load. IME 3600 out of a 300 Wby with a 165 is something one could do but I wouldn't advise it......

Dober

Jokin' with JJ aside, I like both and have or had multiple examples of both, but if the big stuff is on the menu regularly, I think I'd like the extra bullet weight afforded by the big 30's. Truth be told it's all gack, especially for deer as either is well beyond necessary, but for the bigger tougher stuff, I'd say the 30 has the edge.

A 7mm Rem Mag does not beat a .30-06 by all that much, IMHO, and I have shot 7mm Rems that kicked worse than my .300 Wthby! I think a good 180 gr bullet at 3000 - 3200 FPS beats anything out of the 7mm Rem Mag. Use a 165 gr TSX for more speed or a 200 gr bullet for more thump - either way, it beats the 7mm Rem Mag. If I wanted a flat-shooter for deer and an occasional elk, I would go with a 7mm Ultra Mag. The "regular" 7mm Rem Mag has just never excited me for some reason.

Or split the difference and go the 7 STW route.