Thread: The gentlemen’s caliber

Eeewww! Poo For Free! You won't find one in our safes.

Originally Posted by Flyblown

Couple of final things I’d add about the .243 Win. Firstly, I’ve never loaded it hot for deer. My 100gr ProHunters have always been in the 2800-2850fps range, whereas a lot of the factory 100gr ammo is running around 3000fps, and some reloaders will try and push it faster. It’s not necessary for it to be screaming fast, for a traditional cup and core soft point to work effectively, you want a good balance of penetration and fragmentation.

What is says on the packet does not normally match up with speed results any rifle I've tested. Generally in the same region you mention with your load.

Originally Posted by gadgetman

Eeewww! Poo For Free! You won't find one in our safes. What is says on the packet does not normally match up with speed results any rifle I've tested. Generally in the same region you mention with your load.

Maybe, maybe not, what I forgot to mention was that my current 243 is only a 20 inch barrel, all the previous ones were 22 inch (I think) and a lot of the factory ammo is tested in 24 inch. So what I should have said is just because it's "only" 2800fps doesn't mean you need to try and load it hot to catch up to the magic 3000 number that gets touted around as some kind of minimum requirement.

Interesting what you say though. The last time I drop tested factory ammo in mine was with Hornady Whitetail / Interlocks and even with the 20 inch barrel the ballistics had it running at about 2920fps according to my notebook here. And I'm pretty surely that was supposed to be running at about 3000? Put it this way whilst the drop test is one way of testing your velocity versus what you put in Strelock, not perfect by any means, it was a bit faster than I expected. Personally I have quite a deep distrust of chronographs, especially cheap ones.

I'm gonna assume that you belong to that club that some are suggesting needs to be locked away in a dark recess of the forum...

I saw the thread title and thought this was about .270win, I'll shut the foor on my way out



Just kidding I own a 243 as well, seems I own all the unpopular non trendy calibers

@Flyblown I wasn’t expecting such a beautiful type up. It was a privilege to hear about the intertwined history of your family and the .243
(And I did go flick the jug on and make a cuppa)
I guess what it comes down is precision and shot placement. Something that would be best obtained in the open, whereas for bush stalking, like you said a .308 would probably be a more fitting cartridge?
I love the idea that the 243 has the same case capacity as the 308 also just pushing a smaller pill. They seem to be the ultimate pair, almost a complete cabinet within themselves

the non trendy calibers just seem to stay while others enjoy the cat walk for a little while

Originally Posted by dannyb

I saw the thread title and thought this was about .270win, I'll shut the foor on my way out



Just kidding I own a 243 as well, seems I own all the unpopular non trendy calibers

Then the title would have been “the gentlewomens caliber”

When I saw this thread visions of Kenyan safaris where a gentlemans rifles (including a double of course) were carried by his gun bearer(s) and weres in a proper flanged calibre, with a 7x57 for smaller game including elephant.
Oh how wrong I was.

Originally Posted by sako75

@gimp what was the old RATGB saying???

Was ?? still is !!
Ear Burrowing Rat Gun

Originally Posted by jakewire

Was ?? still is !!
Ear Burrowing Rat Gun

Would love to know the origin of that name.

I have a 243. Only got it because it was the only left hand rifle they had. No regrets.
I shoots like a laser. I'd use it more but I need to get it suppressed now I'm hunting with a dog.
On that note, would cutting the barrel down to 18 inches from 22 inches be ok?? 90 percent of my shots would be under 100 metres. Never shot past 300.

Originally Posted by Chur Bay

I have a 243. Only got it because it was the only left hand rifle they had. No regrets.
I shoots like a laser. I'd use it more but I need to get it suppressed now I'm hunting with a dog.
On that note, would cutting the barrel down to 18 inches from 22 inches be ok?? 90 percent of my shots would be under 100 metres. Never shot past 300.

Run mine at 18", use quicker burning powder like 2206. Only use 80-85gr projectiles, max range I get shots at is approx. 250 metres.

Originally Posted by Flyblown

Would love to know the origin of that name.

Probably the forum before the forum before this one
TJ will be able put you straight , I suspect he still looks about though maybe under an different pseudonym here.

Originally Posted by Sako851

I love the idea that the 243 has the same case capacity as the 308 also just pushing a smaller pill. They seem to be the ultimate pair, almost a complete cabinet within themselves

I have Brno ZKK 601s in 243 and 308, both the same year. Not exactly a pair though as the 308 has a synthetic stock and standard trigger, while the 243 is wood stock and set trigger.
I still felt there was a gap, so have now bought a 260, not a Brno though. I think I'll skip the 7mm member of the 308 family as I don't live in Auckland...

Originally Posted by Flyblown

Ah yes @Sako 851... the .243 and me are best buddies. Go make yourself a cuppa and sit back...

Reading the above, @Sarvo nailed it with his comment "I think my shoulder shots (most time where aimed) was back a bit far". Any small calibre rifle can be very unforgiving if you don't hit 'em just right. But the bullet is really important too, it has to be the right balance of frangible with a stout base to push through. So to that end, the .243 Win needs to be used quite carefully.

Some family history. My old grandpa was a .243 Win man from his days here in the ‘50s building hydro dams. He got a Sako L57 imported when they were first released, which would have been ’57 or ’58, and used it here until he went to Canada in ’63. He learnt his NZ deer hunting from the local Forestry guys, he was a precision man through and through, head, neck, high shoulder, hilar. He took all that experience to Canada and got given quite a hard time from the big bore guys, primarily because he wandered around in bear country with a ‘pea shooter’ and an old revolver. Fair enough.

When it was me and my cuzzies’ turn in the ‘80s, there was only one option, the .243 Winchester. There were a couple of Brno ZKK601s in the family by then. We were drilled hard from the beginning on anatomy and to take your time and very carefully select the shot with the maximum probability of bang-flopping the deer. And you had to know what specifically it was that was causing the deer to collapse. This was mostly on little roe deer in little fields on the edge of woodland. Occasionally we’d find some fallow, and once or twice a year we’d go chase lowland reds down in Devon. You didn’t want a runner because you couldn’t afford the deer to make it onto someone else’s land. We use sticks a fair bit, but practiced mostly sitting, using the sling to steady the aim. A forward point of aim, put it into the chest in line with the front leg, either in the shoulder or just below. Runners just weren’t an issue.

A lot of our learning flew right in the face of English tradition. I remember getting a really hard time shooting roe in the high shoulder by local stalkers, who preferred the heart shot in the crease. They were always prattling on about meat damage, but so often they’d go high and get the rear lungs, and the deer would be off on a half-marathon. It wasn’t my place as a pimply squirt to tell them they were doing it wrong, so I left that to the old man…

We always used a 100gr+ soft point bullet. The most popular my early days, simply because there was a massive stash of them in the shed, was the Speer 105gr round nose, which wasn’t loaded particularly fast but smacked deer into the next life with no fuss or bother whatsoever. Later we used Sierra ProHunters and over time, these took over. When I moved to South Africa I bought a CZ in .243 and proceeded to upset lots of Afrikaners by shooting dozens of biltong boks in the neck with my little rifle, they were all into much heavier bullets and bigger bangsticks and quite a lot of unnecessary drama. I was treated with disdain being a Soutie, probably because I pinched their girlfriends more than my choice of cartridge.

In the US, I was with my cuzzies for the most part, and they came from the same school as me, so all good. They moved onto fast twist .243s quite a few years ago for their coyote shooting, 105gr A-Max and now ELD-M. They do some fully hard case winter shooting with those rifles and bullets, 600m+ no sweat.

Contrary to a lot of internet forum nonsense that gets written by blokes who copy what someone else said, the .243 Winchester was designed to shoot 100gr bullets from the get go. It was released in 1955 with the 1:10” twist, with two bullet weights, 100gr for deer sized game, and 80gr for varmints. Winchester basically pinched the idea from Warren Page, who had touted his .240 Super Pouper wildcat to them as a deer cartridge, with the option of going lighter for varmints. Winchester faked a lack interest, but decided to build a deer / varmint 6mm cartridge anyway, without telling him, which he never forgave them for. Page also went to his mates at Remington and they picked up on it, but decided it would sell better as a varmint cartridge first and foremost with the option of being able to take a deer. So they released the .244 Remington in the same year, but with the 1:12” twist and 70gr and 90gr bullets.

The market judged the .244 Rem harshly, and it got comprehensively out sold by the .243 Win, and as you probably know Remington changed the .244 to a 1:10” twist and renamed it the 6mm Remington. From day one, the .243 Winchester was a deer cartridge – read any of the books from that era and it is made plain that the varmint aspect of the rifle was quite minimally used, as most yankee doodles went with the super-fast .224s for fluffy varmints, .220 Swift, .22-250, later the .223. They didn’t really see the need for using twice the powder for the same outcome, which was aerial splattery.

The original 100gr bullets readily stabilsed in 1:10” twist barrels. These were the flat-based Western Super-X, Western being a subsidiary of Winchester. They were slightly shorter than similar bullets today. The reason a lot of guys complain that 100gr bullets aren’t that great in their 1:10” twist rifles is because today’s 6mm 100gr bullets tend to be slightly longer and are pushing the limits of stability, especially the boat-tails. Use a flat-based 100gr bullet, traditional soft point, it should be fine. Sierra ProHunters, Speer round nose, Hornday round nose and Interlocks etc have been deadly accurate in all my .243s.

I use my .243 Win for red deer more than any of my other rifles. Just like the old man taught, its precision shots for CNS, no off hand snap shots. It’s not a good choice for off-hand snap shots, that’s what I use my .308 for. I shoot prone, taking reds and fallow with base of skull / atlas vertebrae shots if they are at rest out to say 200m, high shoulder shots if they are browsing but still, hilar shots if they are a bit further away. The maximum effective range is around about 350m for a yearling red or fallow, that’s right on the limit and not a shot I’d take unless it was dead still and there was a good reason. But once you know your drops inside out, and you’ve proven to yourself that you and the bullet will do comfy sub-MOA and the windage is good, a frangible bullet like the ProHunter will deal to a deer no worries.

The reason I like the .243 Win so much is because of the mild manners. You don’t need a 150gr bullet to kill a deer with any of my preferred shots, what you need is precision. A lot of the country I shoot is steep and all over the place, so a good rest can be hard to come by and I don’t want to have to worry about recoil, I want to shoot with light hands.

But you can bet your last dollar that if you hit a red deer broadside high through the rear lungs with a .243 Win, you’re gonna get a long runner. But that’s the same for pretty much any calibre / cartridge. Just consult the YouTube List of FuckUps for all the little deer that run away when shot high and too far back…

Couple of final things I’d add about the .243 Win. Firstly, I’ve never loaded it hot for deer. My 100gr ProHunters have always been in the 2800-2850fps range, whereas a lot of the factory 100gr ammo is running around 3000fps, and some reloaders will try and push it faster. It’s not necessary for it to be screaming fast, for a traditional cup and core soft point to work effectively, you want a good balance of penetration and fragmentation.

Secondly, I never use a “hard” bullet in .243 Win. I rely on the fragmentation to create a wide radius of wounding with the maximum chance of hitting CNS and pulmonary arteries. I’ve never had a ProHunter “blow up” on a shoulder blade, its spot on for our deer. But if the shooter demands a good blood trail then you’ll need a rethink, because at 150-300m you’ll be lucky if the 6mm ProHunter exits. I almost always find the base up against the opposite side hide having passed through both shoulders and jellified the front lungs, pulmonary veins and nerve plexus, the latter being what puts them done so fast. Hit that, it’s done in a heartbeat. So the way I look at it, why need a blood trail? Just aim to put them on the deck. Once the confidence is there, the incidence of long runners is very low, and if one does run, it’ll be spewing bright red frothy lung blood from its nose.

Lastly, I use 75gr V-Max for head shooting goats, and they are loaded hot for fast, flat shooting. Enough said about the terminal effects of them the better – horror movie stuff.

So yeah, I’m a big fan. That comes from experience I guess, I know its capabilities but also its limits. It’s by no means infallible, and shot placement is critical. The naysayers generally develop their opinion from trying to shoot them behind the shoulder, that’s been my experience of the pushback.

Try 80gr TTSX and see if you "need" a big pill. Bet you don't. Flattens stags. Brutal performer.

Originally Posted by Sarvo

Was not my fav that was for sure
But I think it was me and not the caliber - as my mate shot 2-3000 Deer in Ruahine with one and was on his 3rd barrel
I think my shoulder shots (most time where aimed) was back a bit far - but I lost Deer after Deer with it - more smaller frame animals than the likes of Stags

Met Jim Warren and Chris Satherley at Mokai Base when they were possuming. OF course Warren was the 243 man and Satherley the triple deuce. Never met Sturgeon though he used the 243 with 85gr Sierra. His book is a classic. Was in his old country where he went trout fishing 1x 2 weeks ago. But it was silly steep where we were. Was up Coromandel last Novemeber but did not have time to meet him. The boss Henry Dorian was not a fan of the 243. A man of very fixed views.