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taylorce1
01-02-2017, 03:46 PM
Sorry but I need to ask some questions now. What are you shooting from a .308 case that is so bad recoiling?
Load testing sub 6lb custom rifles in .308 and 7mm-08 with heavy bullets 160+ in 7mm and 180+ in .308. Even a superlight .243 Win with 105+ grain bullets while not brutal, is quite a bit more than most people would expect. The rifles weren't so bad to shoot with the brakes installed, but they weren't exactly fun to shoot from a bench to develop loads without a brake. The .30-30 is okay to shoot as long as you're standing up shooting off hand, but the stock doesn't lend itself to bench work for load workup and sighting in a new aperture sight.


375 h&h is a totally different animal than a 338-378 wby. The 338-378 is a high energy, fast moving cartridge. The 375 h&h is heavy deep penetrating, slower moving cartridge. 338-378 shooting a 225-250 g bullet is designed to dump energy on impact. The h&h is made to push that heavy (300g) bullet as deep as it can, boring a big hole through bone, muscle and hide. Hence the missing backside of a deer when hit with a 338-378. I have never seen the 338 version, but I have experience with a 30-378 wby and it absolutely wrecked a mulie buck at 400 yards, close to a 6" exit on the far shoulder. No good meat on the right side ahead or the ribcage. That rifle now has a different owner.


A .375 H&H pushing a 235 grain bullet at 3000 fps isn't exactly a slow moving cartridge. Just because the H&H is over 100 years old doesn't mean that new bullets and powders don't allow you to change things up a little from launching 270+ grain bullets at moderate speeds. I've never used a .338-378 either but I've shot some other large capacity .338 & .375 cartridges.

Like I said if you're destroying a lot of meat with a big magnum cartridge you are using the wrong bullet. I've seen the whole offside of a deer ruined by a 168 grain Berger VLD out of a .280 at 400 yards as well and there wasn't an exit. From the front shoulder to the last rib on the off side was bloodshot and full of bullet fragments. I've also used successfully a 70 grain Nosler BT to take deer and pronghorn, it's a varmint bullet but slowed down it acts like a normal cup-n-core hunting bullet. Understanding how your bullet choice works on game is very important.

However, we aren't discussing supersized magnum cartridges. We are talking about the .338-06 and .35 Whelen! These aren't common cartridges so the OP will be better off reloading for these instead of relying on factory ammunition. So since the OP will more than likely be reloading for either of these if he chooses one, he can load them from mild to wild and I'm guessing he'll wind up somewhere in between. I'm betting he'll find a load that'll work just fine on a white tail and it won't damage the animal as badly as some smaller cartridges can.

schnyd112
01-02-2017, 11:18 PM
Thanks for the clarification. I asked because we used to take kids, new to hunting and without much guidance, out for mulies. Most we met while helping out with hunter safety. We had a .243 but it was too small for some of the bigger kids to shoot so we had them use a 7-08 with 140's. It probably weighs closer to 9lbs ready to hunt though.

I have never shot an h&h, but my experience with them is from when I was a kid and grandpa had one. He shot big bullets and never hunted with it. He always hunted with a .264 wm that we called the terminator.

toddcdozer
01-03-2017, 01:56 AM
Never claimed the monster cartridges wouldn't kill anything, I claim there is no deaderer. For a goal of whitetail, I don't understand the appeal.

Sure running around the frat house killing flies with a hammer is fun, but are you still going to use the hammer if the fly lands on your head?
Perhaps a cartridge that can be used for something else as well, and be enjoyed. Can a 300gr bullet be used for rock chucks? Yes. Can you kill flies with a hammer? Yes.You have a valid point. Of course as dense as I am a hammer to the head would be no big deal.
I run an Edge on everything for the following reasons.
1. I like it.
2. I am very familiar with it(Beware the man with just one gun he probably knows how to use it)
3. I have thousands of 300 SMKs.
4. Sh1t happens.
5 Deer MOVE while bullet is in flight. Dense people calc shots wrong. Wind switches. Rangefinders hit 64 yds in front or behind the deer. I forget to enter temp or air density or don't read the wind as well as I could.
6. Deer just decide they don't wanna die until they say so.
7. Scopes track WRONG that 1 time.
8. The planets aren't aligned.
9. I just plain mess up.
10. Scope is knocked off, action screw gets loose, I get excited and jerk trigger or about 3 million other things.

Reasons shooting a 338 will fix these issues.

1. Wind resistance.
2. POWER
3. LOTS OF POWER
4. Easier to load for than smaller higher velocity rigs.
5. CONFIDENCE

I hunt on the plains. We get over 100 tags a yr. Our average shot distance is a ludicrous number. Like 743 for the last 3 yrs. Yeah I can stalk and kill a deer on the ground in 6" grass with a bow, but I enjoy LR hunting and where I hunt it is very effective and less disruptive to the herd than walking around spreading scent everywhere.

A 338 FIXES errors, bad luck and deer being deer.

When we shoot a deer with a 338 we listen for the pop and if we hear it we KNOW its uhhhhh DEAD. Deer are pretty easy to recover here as there is nowhere for them to hide and we very rarely lose one....ohhhh and we shoot them with 338 300gr SMKs.

Yeah it may be ludicrous but I have seen too many OOOOPS issues arise out past 500 yds. I want to KNOW that a solid body hit will result in a dead critter. Does it bloodshot some meat. Yep. Do you know how much meat comes off of 100 deer? A BUNCH. I don't like wounded critters suffering and until a good cup and core, higher BC bullet is built in the 375 in large quantities by Berger, Sierra or Hornady, I will continue to smash flies with a hammer.

I had 2 deer this yr take a step during TOF. Shooting a 6.5 Creed both required a quick follow up, thank God I was on an AR. Though both outcomes were OK I have gone back to the 338 and will retire the Creed to coyotes, porcupines and such.

You can't kill a deer TOO DEAD, you can wound them all day long at long range no matter how good you and your equipment is. Deer move, wind blows, stuff happens. I don't mind missing but If I hit I want it to be as destructive as humanely possible.

On a side note I have found the 338 to kill better than the 50BMG unless you can hit really solid bone, even then the 338 will hang in there.

h. dumpty
01-11-2017, 09:01 AM
Sigh...to all of the people arguing about the 338, you all are morons! There is no perfect round that can do everything. When there is a perfect round, ill be sure to post it here so the keyboard commandos can shut up.

Now for the OP.
IMO the 280ai is a fun round, just having to fireform is a slight drawback.
The 338-06, I call it the Poormans lapua. Though I've never seen one that can't shoot well.
The Whelen. I have very little experience with, so I can give no input onto it.
Now between the 3 rounds listed, I would go with the 338-06 just for sheer ease of reloading (not having to fireform)

yobuck
01-11-2017, 11:29 AM
Sigh...to all of the people arguing about the 338, you all are morons! There is no perfect round that can do everything. When there is a perfect round, ill be sure to post it here so the keyboard commandos can shut up.

Now for the OP.
IMO the 280ai is a fun round, just having to fireform is a slight drawback.
The 338-06, I call it the Poormans lapua. Though I've never seen one that can't shoot well.
The Whelen. I have very little experience with, so I can give no input onto it.
Now between the 3 rounds listed, I would go with the 338-06 just for sheer ease of reloading (not having to fireform)

Unfortunatly, conversations gradually get sidetracked from the original question as they have here.
Fact is I doubt there are any real morons here, and beyond that I think everybody realizes it dosent take a magnum cartridge to kill a deer.
As for why people choose to hunt in the manner in which they do would be easy to answer.
That would be because they can, and further more one way might have more appeal to them than another way.
A person wouldn't have to venture miles out into the Atlantic ocean to catch a fish either.
But if you had the opportunity to do that, you just might find you like it better than sitting on a bucket next to a canal or stream someplace watching a bobber. So we tend to do whats available for us to do, and adjust around that with the equiptment we use.
So if you happen to have very steep mountainous terrain available, with wide valleys with another steep mountain on the other side, it would only be a natural thing for someone to want to shoot way over there at targets on that mountain.
And in the process of doing that, one would soon learn that larger cartridges are much better for doing that than smaller ones are.
Whats the (remaining) energy of a given cartridge at that distance is what becomes important, as well as how accurately can we get it there.
Darkker can in fact shoot his 308 across those valleys. But he also knows full well his chances of doing that (accurately) aren't very good.
It would be sorta like taking that cane pole you use while sitting on the bucket, out into the ocean.

10gaugemag
01-22-2017, 10:26 AM
6.5-06