New build for 1500-1760 yards.. what cartridge?

375 Cheytac or 416 Barrett?

 

Considering your action can't handle the lapua case, I think my money would be on the 28 Nosler with the heavy 195/197s. Not quite the 300 Norma but not far behind.

 

If your plans are to go out to 1760, and you have the room to go to 2000, pick a good 30 cal. I had a .300 Lapua and at the time it was a heck of a .30 cal. These days my biggest is a .300 WM. I'm happy with it for what I do. That .300 Norma sounds interesting and intriguing.

 

The 300 Norma Improved is a pretty impressive round and recoil can be dumbed down to nearly nothing with good weight on the rifle and a quality muzzle brake.

I had Peterson 300 Norma brass to start and was impressed at first, but then ended up very disappointed in the end as the cases started separating between the .200" line and half way up the body after a few firings on hot loads.

Got really lucky and found some brand new Lapua 300 Norma brass for sale in a classified add. On top of being very lucky to get the jump on the sale, I also only paid $400 shipped for the 200 Lapua pieces the guy had for sale. Great deal.

Also just got word that my second 300 NMI barreled action is finished. Excited to try the new Lapua brass in the two rifles. The new one is an all carbon fiber hunting rifle with a 26" barrel and the other Ive had for a while is a heavy ELR target rifle with 31" heavy barrel.

 

Going to try that good idea

 

Run the numbers in a ballistics calculator to see what you think is reasonable. If you want more than 1200 rounds of barrel life then its not going to be any sort of magnum.

Three of us were out shooting 1766yds at steel plates in Bend OR last weekend, one was shooting a 260 AI with the 150SMK's(~2880fps) 30" barrel, one was shooting a 7 rem mag (~2950fps) 30" barrel with the 183 SMK's and I was shooting a 284 Shehane (~2970fps) 32" barrel with the 183 SMK's. Our come ups were 64.5MOA, 56.5MOA and 56.25MOA respectively. I have 1600 rounds on my Shehane shooting F-class/Oregon Tactical division and I expect itll go to about 2000-2300 rounds before itll need a new barrel. I tried a 7 SAUM before the Shehane and it started going south at about 1100-1200 rounds, I finally replaced it at 1600 rounds as it would no longer hold 1 MOA with match bullets at 600 yds. I would expect my buddys 7 mag to go south at about 1200 rounds or maybe a little sooner, my other buddy with the 260 AI might be able to make it to 2000 rounds if he keeps shooting the velocity he is at now(pretty slow for a long barrel 260 AI). I have found the heavy 7mm bullets (180-184gr especially) will keep up with almost anything out to 1200 yds, beyond that distance the big 30's start to pull away but not by much. To be able to outperform a 7mm with a 30 cal you have to shoot a 230+gr bullet at atleast 2900fps, as a result you get to burn a bunch of powder shortening the barrel life to 1200 rounds or under and have a bunch of recoil. You can also try shooting the really big 7mm bullets 195 EOL or the 197 SMK but to get the velocity to out perform the 180-184gr bullets you have to have alot of case volume (7 SAUM with a long barrel at the very least) and as a result your back to 1200 rounds of barrel life.

The point here is just run the numbers to see what your happy with. If barrel life is a factor, (say more than 1500 rounds), then you know its going to have to burn less than about 57-58 grains of powder. If your happy with 1000-1500 rounds, then your options are pretty much limitless.....might as well build a cheytac and be done with it.....or go with whatever flavor of 30 cal uber magnum is the flavor of the month. And just in case you dont already know this....bullet drop is not an issue when choosing caliber.....its all about the wind drift.

 

Anyone consider the 33XC or 37XC. Has anyone seen a rifle cambered for either round in real life ? It sounds promising and I’d like to try it out.

 

Impressive ballistics on the XC cartridges for sure.

Another round that looks very impressive is the 338 EnABELR

 

I think all that depends on if you are shooting in any kind of significant wind or not. If you are, you won't be toting any 6.5 or 7mm cartridge. If you are, your not getting a decent percentage of shots on target. The shots that aren't on target aren't spotted by the spotter at those ranges. Even the big 30 caliber bullets are all but undetectable at a mile on a miss. The 338s are slightly detectable many times but many aren't. Just that many more of the heavy 30/338s will be on target. Anytime your trying to conserve barrel life in ELR, your setting yourself up for a poor outcome. Especially improving cartridges to get the most velocity from them. At this point, I'm kinda in the camp that thinks the 338s are a bit light for beyond the mile. With all the results of the 375s and 416s at beyond a mile out to 2 miles, the 338 is slowly getting edged out.

 

6.5 Creedmoor, things are lasers I hear.


Ray

 

Heard the same thing. Only looking for a 2 mile gun tho. That's way too much rifle for my needs.

 

30 LAPUA

 

I love the 7mm Bullets. Wondering how 375-RUM would fair, maybe use the .338-RUM Case? Poor Mans Cheytac. Just for Grins & Giggles.