It is. It's called 7.62 NATO but it ain't necessarily gonna be cheaper there than30-06. In fact some European countries restrict the sale of active military caliber ammo to civilians.
starting out with hunting
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It is. It's called 7.62 NATO but it ain't necessarily gonna be cheaper there than30-06. In fact some European countries restrict the sale of active military caliber ammo to civilians.
Agree with you silentpaddler, .308 & .270 WIN both great calibres for all round shooting,only draw back with .270 is poor bullet weight choice if you are planning on
re-loading. If i was buying a new rifle or changing calibre i would be looking at 6.5 Swedish or 6.5/284 Norma (particularly the latter) the downrange ballistics and super high
BC'S on all bullet weights up to 140 grains make it an absolute winner, that is why most of the 1,000yd boys are using them.
first, I should start with, I am a hunter and I hunt for 100% of my meat for me and my family each year. not buying meat now from any store for the last 17 years.
bu I am knew here and this is my first post, and I hope you find it help full.
there are a lot of choices out there, but I do get this questions a lot. my answer always starts with a qestion and that is this.
1. are you going to buy more then one gun?
2. if you are planing on only buying one gun?
3. what is your normal shooting range 50 yards, 100, 200,,, 500, or a 1000+shot?
I would ask what are you going to hunt for, but you have already answered that with Moose and deer.
with that said the single best choice for you is a 30-06 as it is the most all around effective killing round of all rounds, out to 500 yards.
Now if you need to shoot longer distances then 500 yards/meters 30-06 starts really dying off. not going to be your choice of round.
only at that point would I look at the 270, It can kill anything that 30-06 can but on larger animals, your shooting placement is very important or you will spend a long time looking for that animal.
Now if you say you were thinking of buying two hunting guns I would would pick a 243 and 300 win mag.
the 243 for smaller animals and the 300 for larger animals and long range shooting.
hope this helps
ODP
bu I am knew here and this is my first post, and I hope you find it help full.
there are a lot of choices out there, but I do get this questions a lot. my answer always starts with a qestion and that is this.
1. are you going to buy more then one gun?
2. if you are planing on only buying one gun?
3. what is your normal shooting range 50 yards, 100, 200,,, 500, or a 1000+shot?
I would ask what are you going to hunt for, but you have already answered that with Moose and deer.
with that said the single best choice for you is a 30-06 as it is the most all around effective killing round of all rounds, out to 500 yards.
Now if you need to shoot longer distances then 500 yards/meters 30-06 starts really dying off. not going to be your choice of round.
only at that point would I look at the 270, It can kill anything that 30-06 can but on larger animals, your shooting placement is very important or you will spend a long time looking for that animal.
Now if you say you were thinking of buying two hunting guns I would would pick a 243 and 300 win mag.
the 243 for smaller animals and the 300 for larger animals and long range shooting.
hope this helps
ODP
A CZ550 in .30-06 will technically last you a lifetime. But all hunters like goodies so in the end you want something else just for the sake of it
When it comes to ammo, .30-06 is the most widely used caliber in germany allong with the 8*57IS and 9,3*62mm.
.308 is nice too, slightly more docile to shoot.
.270 is nice but the bare minimum for a strong boar.
I hunt in Rhineland-Pfaltz as well and also with the .30-06 as a general weapon and the 8*57IS for bloodtracking (nachsuche).
I have a strong personal liking for the full-copper bullits like the barnes TTSX, Hornady GMX and Lapua Naturalis but pretty much all available bullits do the trick.
The barnes TTSX has many incarnations and is sold under a lot of names by other ammo manufacturers.
Great ways to get into hunting is to help out in the late winter with all the fixing of highseats, sawing and thinning of trees and brush in the field.
Going along as a beater on driven-hunts helps a lot as well.
Good luck and Waindmannsheil!
In general the shooting distances in Germany aren't that long.
200m is considered a long distance shot.
Average in Germany is sub 100m with the most in between 50-75m.
A lot of it has to do with hunting a feedstations on Wildboar and the copious amounts of sloe-brush where WB's like to flee into when their hit.
Not much fun tracking a boar through blackthorn...
I've been hunting with one .30-'06 or another for a half century. No, it is not too big.
In fact that load has the greatest variety of factory shells of all.
Here, I see 110 - 220 gr bullets.
Now, I shoot a Remington 700BDL.
For 200m accuracy, it likes to eat Remington 165 factory loads.
I can get hand loads of other sizes whenever I might want.
= = =
There are two other essential things that, as a hunter, you must be able to do:
1. Clean and butcher the game to make it every bit as attractive as what you might buy in a butchershop.
2. Research seasonings and preparations and cooking to present an attractive dish on your table.
In fact that load has the greatest variety of factory shells of all.
Here, I see 110 - 220 gr bullets.
Now, I shoot a Remington 700BDL.
For 200m accuracy, it likes to eat Remington 165 factory loads.
I can get hand loads of other sizes whenever I might want.
= = =
There are two other essential things that, as a hunter, you must be able to do:
1. Clean and butcher the game to make it every bit as attractive as what you might buy in a butchershop.
2. Research seasonings and preparations and cooking to present an attractive dish on your table.
Can someone enlighten me what goes through peoples' minds when they resurrect and reply to long dead threads?
In this case, eight guys have a conversation that runs for just over a week, and they dies. Five years later some random guy joins the forum, digs up the thread, posts as if he is answering the original poster's question, and then disappears never to even visit the the forum again. A month after that, someone else new comes along and answers the original persons post again. Slightly more understandable since the thread is now only 3/4 the way down the first page and not buried, (not much traffic in Fair Game), but of those original eight people, only four of them have been on the forum at all in the last six months and the OP hasn't been here in three months.
I get wanting to share knowledge, but I don't understand doing it by answering questions that are so old, asked by people who aren't around to hear the answer.
In this case, eight guys have a conversation that runs for just over a week, and they dies. Five years later some random guy joins the forum, digs up the thread, posts as if he is answering the original poster's question, and then disappears never to even visit the the forum again. A month after that, someone else new comes along and answers the original persons post again. Slightly more understandable since the thread is now only 3/4 the way down the first page and not buried, (not much traffic in Fair Game), but of those original eight people, only four of them have been on the forum at all in the last six months and the OP hasn't been here in three months.
I get wanting to share knowledge, but I don't understand doing it by answering questions that are so old, asked by people who aren't around to hear the answer.
I would add - don't become too fixated on buying a new rifle. Many hunters do not fire their rifles anywhere near enough to 'wear them out', so it is often possible to get really good second hand deals that are just as accurate as a new rifle and will give years of service. Fashions for calibres, stock materials and barrel lengths/profilea often change too, making older (but perfectly serviceable) rifles unattractive and hence very cheap.
As an example I once bought a 7x57 Parker Hale Safari with a slim barrel and walnut stock for £150. It would shoot just over an moa prone and despite the slender barrel it would group 5 shots fine before over heati g became an issue. Because it was an old fashioned calibre it had sat on the gunsmith' shelf for years while the heavy barrelled tacticool rifles flew off the shelves, but it never failed to put venison in the larder for me.
As an example I once bought a 7x57 Parker Hale Safari with a slim barrel and walnut stock for £150. It would shoot just over an moa prone and despite the slender barrel it would group 5 shots fine before over heati g became an issue. Because it was an old fashioned calibre it had sat on the gunsmith' shelf for years while the heavy barrelled tacticool rifles flew off the shelves, but it never failed to put venison in the larder for me.
I did the biology professor thing for a career over 3+ decades.
As the years went by, we'd hear tell from some "educator's educator about what we should and should not be delivering.
One point that actually made sense:
If a student asks a question, there's likely 6-8 others that want the answer but are too timid to ask.
And, just like the wood carving websites, there's new people joining all the time.
As the years went by, we'd hear tell from some "educator's educator about what we should and should not be delivering.
One point that actually made sense:
If a student asks a question, there's likely 6-8 others that want the answer but are too timid to ask.
And, just like the wood carving websites, there's new people joining all the time.
Yep, he should have started a new thread...
But anyway, When I hunted I found a 308 W to be my most used caliber. As most of my 4 footed game was deer. For moose I used a 30-06.
A 308 is fine for wild boar too.
I did shoot longrange ( 200m and over) on a range, for fun, but I would say most of my hunts were around 100 to 150 meters.
It is vistualky imposdible to find a longer clear distance in nature. The longest, around 150 meters, were in areas where the forest has been recently harvested.
But anyway, When I hunted I found a 308 W to be my most used caliber. As most of my 4 footed game was deer. For moose I used a 30-06.
A 308 is fine for wild boar too.
I did shoot longrange ( 200m and over) on a range, for fun, but I would say most of my hunts were around 100 to 150 meters.
It is vistualky imposdible to find a longer clear distance in nature. The longest, around 150 meters, were in areas where the forest has been recently harvested.
The .308 Win (.308" bullets, same as the .30-06) is the 'get anything done' round. I've used it a lot on almost everything. While very utilitarian, a significant factor in my having used it so much has also been logistics. Since I live in the USA, I can go into any Walmart in pretty much any town in America and get however much .308 Win I need. This round is really just a shortened .30-06 that fits a short action. In rifle matches, due to the more efficient and uniform burn of the powder in the shorter case, it tends to out-perform the .30-06 in accuracy.
One of my personal favorites has always been the 6.5x55mm Swede round. In the 1990's when Sweden cleared out their reserve inventories of 6.5x55mm weapons to put their 7.62x51mm HK G3 rifles into reserve (they had recently adopted a new 5.56mm military rifle that was a modified FNC) the US got hit with a wave of cheap, very old but excellent condition, Swedish made Mauser 96 rifles in 6.5x55mm and a large amount of ammo. The cheapest I ever paid for one was $60. Many of us got in a lot of trigger time with the 6.5x55mm and a huge number of military rifles got sporterized. Just about every one of those rifles was an absolute tack driver.
You can literally kill anything this side of a T-Rex with the 6.5x55mm, the recoil won't knock the fillings out of your teeth, and 6.5mm bullets are in a ballistic sweet spot with sectional densities and ballistic coefficients which are superb. Ammunition and reloading components for it should be available in Europe (Norma brand especially), except France. The last I checked, France had some odd laws that went back almost to the dawn of the Industrial Age on what constitutes a 'military caliber', which you need special licensing for.
It's ballistic step brother (up to 140gr bullets) is the .260 Remington, which is essentially a .308 round with a 6.5mm bullet (.264") in it. It's big advantage is that it will fit into a short action and it's never been a military round. The .260 Rem can be described as the kick of a .243, the power of a .308, and the trajectory of a .300 WinMag. You can make the brass from 7mm-08 or .243 cases. You can also make it from .308 Win or military surplus 7.62x51mm NATO cases but you have to typically trim the excess thickness of the brass at the case mouth when it's fully necked down.
A close runner up to the .260 Rem is the 7mm-08. It's a .308 necked down to take a 7mm bullet (.284"). You can manufacture your own cases out of surplus military 7.62x51mm NATO brass. It uses the same diameter bullets as the 7x57mm Mauser round. You will find ammo and components a lot more available for the 7mm-08 than the .260 Rem.
Another couple of personal favorites are the .25-06 and the .270 Winchester. These are .30-06 cases that use .257" and .277" bullets.
One of my personal favorites has always been the 6.5x55mm Swede round. In the 1990's when Sweden cleared out their reserve inventories of 6.5x55mm weapons to put their 7.62x51mm HK G3 rifles into reserve (they had recently adopted a new 5.56mm military rifle that was a modified FNC) the US got hit with a wave of cheap, very old but excellent condition, Swedish made Mauser 96 rifles in 6.5x55mm and a large amount of ammo. The cheapest I ever paid for one was $60. Many of us got in a lot of trigger time with the 6.5x55mm and a huge number of military rifles got sporterized. Just about every one of those rifles was an absolute tack driver.
You can literally kill anything this side of a T-Rex with the 6.5x55mm, the recoil won't knock the fillings out of your teeth, and 6.5mm bullets are in a ballistic sweet spot with sectional densities and ballistic coefficients which are superb. Ammunition and reloading components for it should be available in Europe (Norma brand especially), except France. The last I checked, France had some odd laws that went back almost to the dawn of the Industrial Age on what constitutes a 'military caliber', which you need special licensing for.
It's ballistic step brother (up to 140gr bullets) is the .260 Remington, which is essentially a .308 round with a 6.5mm bullet (.264") in it. It's big advantage is that it will fit into a short action and it's never been a military round. The .260 Rem can be described as the kick of a .243, the power of a .308, and the trajectory of a .300 WinMag. You can make the brass from 7mm-08 or .243 cases. You can also make it from .308 Win or military surplus 7.62x51mm NATO cases but you have to typically trim the excess thickness of the brass at the case mouth when it's fully necked down.
A close runner up to the .260 Rem is the 7mm-08. It's a .308 necked down to take a 7mm bullet (.284"). You can manufacture your own cases out of surplus military 7.62x51mm NATO brass. It uses the same diameter bullets as the 7x57mm Mauser round. You will find ammo and components a lot more available for the 7mm-08 than the .260 Rem.
Another couple of personal favorites are the .25-06 and the .270 Winchester. These are .30-06 cases that use .257" and .277" bullets.
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I belonged to the regiment that tested and recommended ( in 1979-1980) the best of the various .223 carbines the Swedish Army was interested in. Was due to my shooting experience quite involved.
M16, Ak-47, Galil, HK 33, FN and a South African one (firgot name).
We recommended the Galil, but for political reason the idiots chose the FN which had to be redesigned to rectify the problems we discovered.
I recall that the Heckler und Koch came second but fell on the ease of detailed cleaning in winter conditions.
Overall we in fact recommended that the aK4 (Swedish madeHk G4 ) was kept as it was (and still is) superior in every aspect excpt the number of rounds per kilogram.
M16, Ak-47, Galil, HK 33, FN and a South African one (firgot name).
We recommended the Galil, but for political reason the idiots chose the FN which had to be redesigned to rectify the problems we discovered.
I recall that the Heckler und Koch came second but fell on the ease of detailed cleaning in winter conditions.
Overall we in fact recommended that the aK4 (Swedish madeHk G4 ) was kept as it was (and still is) superior in every aspect excpt the number of rounds per kilogram.
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Mrostov has nailed it really
Other than to say to all those out there thinking of getting into it .....
It can be very expensive if you don't use some self discipline
I have none so own .....
.22 LR - rabbit
.233 - target and ?
6.5 x 55 swede target and AOLQ
30 06 target and AOLQ and boar
It was a toss up between 7mm win mag and 30 06. I went with 30 06 because I have a switch barrel and a 2nd hand barrel came up
I suppose for the UK and probably most stuff in Europe you could get away with just 30 06 (if you have no fillings) or 6.5 x 55 swede (which is just a sweetie)
It is not the rifles that are the expensive bits - its the glass that goes with em !
Other than to say to all those out there thinking of getting into it .....
It can be very expensive if you don't use some self discipline
I have none so own .....
.22 LR - rabbit
.233 - target and ?
6.5 x 55 swede target and AOLQ
30 06 target and AOLQ and boar
It was a toss up between 7mm win mag and 30 06. I went with 30 06 because I have a switch barrel and a 2nd hand barrel came up
I suppose for the UK and probably most stuff in Europe you could get away with just 30 06 (if you have no fillings) or 6.5 x 55 swede (which is just a sweetie)
It is not the rifles that are the expensive bits - its the glass that goes with em !
In the early 1980's the US state of Alaska got similar results when they decided to test all of the military style rifles available on the US civilian market at the time to see which would be best to outfit the state troopers (highway patrol) as an extra weapon in their vehicle. This was before civilian police forces in the USA really started getting militarized.
They did the test outside of Fairbanks in the winter. The central climate zone of Alaska has some of the wildest temperature variances between winter and summer. In the winter it typically bottoms out at about -25*F (about -31*C) but it can get much colder, sometimes down to -60*F to -70*F. In the summer it normally tops out at 70*F but temperatures up to 90*F are not unknown.
In a nutshell the 5.56mm AR-15, 5.56mm Ruger Mini-14, and 7.62mm NATO M-14 all froze up. The 7.62mm NATO FN FAL lasted a bit longer.
The 5.56mm FNC was disqualified because they had to adjust the gas port setting to accommodate the very cold weather.
The 7.62mm NATO HK91 (US civilian semi-auto only version of the HK G3) was disqualified when the pivoting charging handle broke off at the pivot pin in the extreme cold.
The three winners were all AK variants. All three functioned without jamming or adjustment in all weather conditions, ice on the weapon, etc. These were the 5.56mm and 7.62mm NATO versions of the Galil and the 5.56mm Valmet.
The US military still issues the .30-06 M1 Garand to the Eskimo Scouts. The Canadian equivalent, the Canadian Rangers, still gets issued the .303cal Lee Enfield.
I had a friend who was in the Canadian Army and he hated the M-16's they were issued and hated even more the polymer Thermold magazines. The M-16 isn't nearly as cold weather resistant as their older FN FAL rifles. The feed lips on the polymer magazines would snap off in the extreme cold inside your magazine pouches and spill out the ammo.
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Interesting! I was not aware of that test, done basically at the same time. Our temp range is normally about between -40C and +25 C, so similar.
I recall that the main problems were that the plastic parts snapped in cold weather.
Also misfires due to difficulty in cleaning,
I wouldn't think the cold weather problems would be quite the same for police units as they would for military units. Military (specifically infantry) would have their weapons out in the cold on a long term basis; hence they'd be out long enough for the cold to freeze either the parts or the action. On the other hand police weapons would be in the warm patrol vehicle with the officer until stepping out for a limited time.
True, unless the police is outside patrolling heavily armed ( think G8 meetings and such).
During my life, I have encountered a few times an interesting problem with going inside a warm house and tent then outside into the cold, where the gun freezed so the mechanics went solid.
it was a good indication the gun needed cleaning and lubricating with wintergrade lubricants.
In out test the largest problem was breakage of the plastic when hit on trees or close combat training.
During my life, I have encountered a few times an interesting problem with going inside a warm house and tent then outside into the cold, where the gun freezed so the mechanics went solid.
it was a good indication the gun needed cleaning and lubricating with wintergrade lubricants.
In out test the largest problem was breakage of the plastic when hit on trees or close combat training.
Actually, in most cases when operating in extremely cold weather you want your weapon to stay in the cold.
Extreme variations of temperature between the metal of the weapon and the outside environment can cause things like condensation or even melt any snow landing on the weapon, which can freeze into ice, jamming the firearm. In conditions like that, ice can form astonishingly fast.
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My own personal experience with firearms in extremely cold weather is that I would prefer a manually operated action. If I were to use a semi-auto I'd prefer an AK. I've thrown AK's into snowbanks and mud, yet nothing ever seems to jam them. The only AK jam I've ever had was from faulty ammo. A piece of primer pocket blew back into the firing pin hole, jamming the firing pin.
Normally bolt actions rule in the far north. However, it's not that uncommon to see lever actions like the BLR (Browning Lever Action) or semi-autos like the Ruger Mini-14. A 5.56mm can easily drop a caribou.
One of the more impressive shots I've seen I actually saw on a documentary. It was an Inuit native using a BLR to kill a whale from shore. There was an absolute geyser of blood. The rest of the group traveling with him managed to get ropes on it and drag it up onto the ice.
Evidently, the trick to hunting a whale with a rifle is to shoot it after it inhales so it doesn't sink.
Normally bolt actions rule in the far north. However, it's not that uncommon to see lever actions like the BLR (Browning Lever Action) or semi-autos like the Ruger Mini-14. A 5.56mm can easily drop a caribou.
One of the more impressive shots I've seen I actually saw on a documentary. It was an Inuit native using a BLR to kill a whale from shore. There was an absolute geyser of blood. The rest of the group traveling with him managed to get ropes on it and drag it up onto the ice.
Evidently, the trick to hunting a whale with a rifle is to shoot it after it inhales so it doesn't sink.
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