My neighbor and I went to the range today!!!!!

[DalesCarpentry]

My neighbor and I went to the range today. He is going on a Elk hunt in about a month out west somewhere. He is going with a friend and I don't remember the state right now. He bought a 7MM MAG. for the hunt and is taking a 280 as a back up. I don't think he was real happy when I told him his new Remington 700 7MM MAG was only at most 300 FPS faster than his 280 was. I went on to let him know that they are nearly the same rifle. I have to say that after today I have remembered why I am a big fan of of the 308 family. If you are only going to shoot a few rounds ( like 10 or so ) in a day with the above rifles you will most likely be fine but we fired many more than that today and found it uncomfortable before long. I have to say it is not as bad as my 300 Win. Mag. was but I just don't like to be beat up at the range or anytime I am shooting. We were shooting his hand loads out of the 7MM Mag. They were 175 grain bullets and we have it zeroed in at 200 yards. The 280 was a Rugger Mauser action. This was the first time I have ever shot a Rugger much less a Mauser action. I have to say the recoil was more on the Rugger. I think this is because of the new R3 recoil pad on the 700 REM. He does have a problem ejecting empties once the rifle warms up it is hard to pull back on the bolt to eject them. I have a light bulb going off right now saying the loads might have been to hot but he did tell me about this before we fired one round of his hand loads. He did experience this with factory Winchester loads. After some range time and I had a real hard time ejecting some empties I told him he needs to send this back to Remington because this is not normal. I told him I don't think it would affect his hunt unless he needs a quick follow up shot. He agreed he would send it back after his hunt. Dale

[Buckfever]

Tell him to try and put some Fltz on the bolt and cycle it until the Flitz turns dark.  Then reapeat once more.  It should be about 100 cycles total.  This will polish up the race ways and smooth out the bolt operation.  Sometimes this is all that needs to be done.  Flitz is a rubbing compound in a grey and blue tube.  Marine dealers or Midway and such have it.  If this doesn't help repeat process.  After 200 cycles if he sees no difference he is got other problems.  How close is his bolt handle to the rear rim of the scope when he works it?  A nother area to check.  I had both these problems on two different guns.  Flitz made one super smooth and went up to Medium scope mounts fixed the other one.   Just thought I would tell him this because he can do both at home without creating any problems.

Buckfever

[DalesCarpentry]

I never thought about Flitz. I will tell him about it. I did check the bolt handle against the scope though. Thanks Dale

[WyoStillhunter]

Ah yes, the Chrony strikes again!  "The truth shall set you free."

The difference in MV and trajectory between 280 Rem. and 7mm Mag., 30-06 and 300 Win. Mag., etc. is real and always in favor of the magnum on paper.  BUT...when you factor in the many variables connected with a specific rifle-, ammo-, and shooter-combination the PRACTICAL difference in the field pales to insignificance in most (not all) cases.

I have to admit that my accuracy is inversely proportional to the power of the cartridge.  I shoot my .223 and 257 Roberts better than my 6.5X55, the 6.5X55 better than the .280 Mtn. Rifle or the 30-06, and all of them a little better than the 35 Whelen.  I'm a fair shot with the Whelen, my favorite for elk, but I shoot better and better as I go down the power ladder.

In my case, giving up a few hundred fps, and the perceived recoil that goes with it, is more than a fair trade in field performance.