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Hey fellas,
Currebtly looking into calibres for a long range rig I wana invest in for my next rifle. Have settled on the 7mm rem mag and 300 wsm........ But can't decide between the 2. Rifle wise I'm looking at Browning X bolt hells canyon, Howa Stainless, maybe a Sako but they're pricey, or maybe even a Sauer. Hunt deer predominantly but yeah, any extra info or advice would be awesome!
6.5 Creedmore ,long range ??
Remmag easy bro kicks ass
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7mm the wsm will suffer from throat erosion faster. i use my 7mm for long range and its great
X bolts are hard to modify not a lot of aftermarket parts available for them triggers/stocks etc and if re-barrel is a possibility in the future I'm not sure if anyone in NZ does X bolts according to my friend who owns one.
happy to be corrected if I'm wrong going of advice I received when I looked at buying one.
I will never buy anything with wsm in its name again. they just dont last in my experiance. 7mm rem mag is hard to beat
I just went down a similar path. Ended up with a rem mag. Nice to shoot for a magnum and ballistically superior. The WSM will have more energy on impact with more recoil but suffer more for wind drift etc.
Rem 700LR. 7mmRM Minox 5-25 scope.
dead hare at near on a km.
As others have said - out of the two you mention 7mmRM would be better for "long range" .... but begs the question - what is it you want to achieve when you say "long range" ? & are you going to hand load ?
If the set up is to be primarily hunting rather than gong shooting , then what ranges & types of hunting do you want to use it for ?
The reason I say this is the weight & size of rifle is also worth considering carefully. If you want a genuine all rounder covering bush to open tops then I'd be taking a close look at other 7's like 284, SAUM & 280AI.
They will get close to RM speeds @ 2900+ fps, but in a much lighter and compact set up. Downsides - you have to handload & you drop 50 -100 fps on the RM. And realistically on animals you're probably talking 800 yrds (my rule of thumb based on 1800 fps terminal velocity), rather than 1000 yds with RemMag.
But 800 yards is a farkn long way !
Just doing up some load development on a guys xblot H C S at the moment. In 7mm rem mag. Seems to be nice to shoot. I know of a bunch of 300wsm that eject into the scope windage turret and dent brass and mark scope. At the ranges you should be hunting with one of these wind, trajectory energy will be not bugger all between them. Mug behind the rifle will have more impact calling wind.
This is good advice i reckon, you definitely need to be honest with yourself about what 'long range' is for you in a hunting situation. IE in most steap as public land, often a 400-500 yard shot could take you half a day to get over to recover it. Whereas if you are hunting private land that is well tracked giving easy access on quads etc to recover, then if conditions are favourable (wind) and if you have the right hardware and skill level then 1000 plus yards shots are certainly possible.Quote:
Originally Posted by chainsaw
Like many on this forum, i have several different rifles that are best suited to various hunting situations or areas. Im a bit of a 7mm slut, just in 7mm alone i have several.
A 15" barreled 7mm08 bushpig which im happy with to 400 yards.
A 17" barreled 284win running 162's which im happy with to 700 yards, both obviously suppressed and still a bit shorter than the factory barrel length.
Then i have a 22" barreled 7mm SAUM running 162's at 3k (basically a 7mm Rem mag but a short action version). This rifle is super light weight, bare rifle just under 5.5 lbs, all up scoped ready to shoot its 7lbs, very light for a 1000 yd capable rifle. This is my choice if i was climbing high in the mountains.
Then for the real long range stuff or windy days, either on day hunts in the front country or on private land with easier access for recovery of animals, where i have more options for taking shots out round 1000 yards plus i have just built a 26" barreled 28 Nosler running the 7mm 195gr bergers at close on 3100 fps. This has a big 27x scope, longer heavier barrel etc. It weighs a good chunk more than my 7mm SAUM, but it sure has the legs.
Do i need all of those? NO, but its fun and what i choose to spend my money on. In reality i could probably replace all of them with a Tikka T3 in 7mm Rem Mag and call it done, and thats the moral of my story right there ;-) Just dont tell my wife that.
Tikka's shoot lights out, you wont have to do anything to it, other than lighten the tigger as low as it will go (can do it yourself with T3's easy as). You can use factory ammo initially if you dont already handload - Cant do that with a 284 or 7mm SAUM really. Then if you do handload you can step up to heavier higher BC pills, my father in law is just in the process of trying the 175 eldx in his.
T3 7RM is just easy!
Bloody good Info guys cheers, thanks for and you'll have to excuse my incompetence with not know how to reply to your individual comments haha! Short answer to all is I shot my mates 338 lapua magnum on the w/e, my first go on it and first long range (in my experience) and dropped a deer at 700 yards. He's got a nice setup but he's spent some good coin on it. I'd love to have something similar without cutting my gut bag open to fork out for it hence the hells canyon option that would have my calibre, fluted barrel, muzzle brake etc as a good bench mark. I have a Howa 308 currently that I want to retire as my bush rifle and have a designated open tops long range capable rig, something I can comfortably make the same 700 yard shot like in the w/e. And yeah I'd love to handload some stage in the near future but for now it'd be factory loads. Cheers again for all your advice, keep it coming!
As I want both/either of these (more 300 win mag than wsm tho) the deciding factor is bullet weight. When reading up on the same choice one comment I thought was pretty valid. I cant for the life of me find it again but it went along the lines of bullet weights. If the majority of your shooting uses 165grs or less than stick with the 7mm.
likewise if the majority use 180gr or bigger go with the 300. The 7mm actually does really well and it seems to take a bigger bullet in the 300 to catch up to SD, BC etc.
For the users that actually have them i'll happily listen to any experience they have.
This takes no account of recoil, ammo availability, preference is just bloody wanting one etc. Id like both.
One thing over the 300wsm. There is probably more choice of factory ammo for the 7mm and the win mag than the wsm.
last thing. My mate Jas and his friend Phil use 300wsm's. Love them to bits with the short action and absolutely hammers things a long way away.
I am also a 7mm slut.
Lots of 7,s in the cabinet.
3 are RM, custom 700, sako 75 and a tikka. All shoot equally very well out to 1000m . All do 3/4 moa with individual handloads and are all within 75fps of each other in comparable projectiles.
The first 2 cost 5k each to set up
The tikka cost 2k with scope and is the one i reach for when headin up the hills.
Adding to the Tikka and 7mm fire, I bought a second hand Tikka 7mm rem mag that came with a T2 brake for $1k, added a VX5-HD and a Stug stock. I do handload but shooting sub MOA pretty easily. With all of that I have a super light rifle that handles and shoots very well with some great glass on top. I use this whenever I head above the bush line. The brake is not so friendly for shooting without ear protection so reserved for longer shots where time is available.
Gotta love those Tikka's they seem to shoot well in all calibers.
Just my two cents, the 7mm rem is a belted magnum versus the 300wsm which is a rimmed cartridge. The 7mm rem is a long action versus the 300wsm which is a short, is that a consideration. Downrange the 300wsm hits hard closer and downrange while the 7mm rem flies faster and flatter. So I suppose its what you what to with it. My choice between the two would probably lean towards the 300wsm. But I made a compromise and I'm rebarreling my Tikka t3 270wsm to 6.5wsm to take advantage of some of the better bc bullets out there. Either way a new caliber is always fun so I'm sure you will be happy either way.
An old farts view is that the 308 kills better than a 7-08 'cos of the bigger hole. My experience is the same with the 7RM v 300 (albeit limited with the 7RM) - bigger, mushier, bleedier, deaderer.
For the few clicks of extra elevation and windage its not worth worrying about at "normal" (6-700 yards) long range is it?
I would get the 7mm RM. Personally not a fan of the short magnums.
IMO what you gain, (slightly less weight, and only in an action that IS length specific i.e sako), it not worth the reduced barrel life, expensive brass, less common ammo, not as capable of running heavy pills etc.
I would personally go the 7mm, and id also choose a regular .300wm over the WSM.
The belt can be completely ignored for reloading purposes.
It all depends on what you want to do with it, long range hunting or steel?. Considering what projectiles, velocity needed for energy transfer for a given maximum distance and will it in the magazine?. Had a Tikka and Browning A-bolt 300wsm, back then 400m-600m was a long range shot in those days and I only had a rangefinder that went to 400m and had no Ballistic apps so did it old school and had to validate ever drop in 25m increments out to 600m.
If i had to do it all over again 7mm rem mag for ease available components and rifle resale.
That's why my mate jas went away from the 7mm and got a 300wsm. He was happy with the performance but not the long bolt throw.Quote:
Originally Posted by ohearchai
It's tough having to choose one or the other so have both, I have a 7mm Mag and had a 300 WSM and liked them both. They both kill well, the 300 has more up close energy and I think hits harder than the 7mm Mag but in saying that nothing really argues with the 7mm Mag. The 300 WSM kicks harder which makes the 7mm an easier caliber to master. Both are very good at what they were designed to do.
I don't think killing power is an issue with either cartridge and if it lives in NZ then you should be able to kill it with a 7mmRM at reasonable hunting ranges.
To get the 30cal shooting the same BC projectile at the same velocity (160gn 7mm roughly equates to 200gn 30cal) you are in for much heavier recoil. If you can live with that the 30cal magnums are great.
As a Tikka owner, the short action cartridges hold no real advantage over the traditional 300WM (which would be my pick of the 30s) but I would be more than happy carrying either 7mm or 300.
How will it suffer more from wind drift?Quote:
Originally Posted by stagstalker