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View Full Version : Does the 300 winmag have any virtues as a cast lead cartridge?



MBTcustom
12-31-2012, 09:13 PM
Hey there fellers.
I was working on a shotgun in the shop the other day, and the job was getting tedius. I set back to rest my eyes for a minute and I noticed my homemade wooden gun case leaning against the shelf where it has been for the last two years. Inside that guncase is what used to be my very most favorite rifle. A Remington 700 BDL in 300 win mag. I affectionately named this rifle "Winifred". We have had many good times together, back when I thought that blazing fast speed was the way to kill deer more effectively. This was back in 2 BC (2 years Before Castboolits.com).
I find that I miss hunting with the old girl, but at this time I wont hunt with anything but cast boolits.
I have been debating rebarreling Winifred to 458WinMag, but before I entertain that idea any further, I thought I would ere on the side of caution and see if anybody just purely loves the 300WinMag for shooting cast lead boolits, because I would feel pretty dumb if I went to all that trouble and found out something later that would make me regret it.
Thoughts?

nhrifle
12-31-2012, 09:28 PM
Goodsteel, I have never had experience with the 300 WM, so this is pure speculation on my part, and some of my speculations have been proven wrong due to ignorance, but the neck on the 300 seems a bit short compared to case in my view. In my thinking, the 300 would seem at its best shooting a long, heavy boolit, and it would seem that in order to seat the projectile properly the gas check would be below the case neck. I was taught this was a bad idea due to gas cutting and so forth.

This could be flawed logic tho, and with the right powder your rifle might be a fine shooter. Since you have the rifle, try your favorite .30 boolit in it and see what happens. I'd be interrested to hear your results.

bowenrd
12-31-2012, 10:22 PM
My Ruger M77 300WM shoots cast better than jacketed.
311284 w/gc and IMR SR 4759

waksupi
01-01-2013, 01:32 AM
Well, we know it is way over bore for cast. It is a good candidate for powders like WC860, WC 872, and heavy, heavy boolits.

MBTcustom
01-01-2013, 02:11 AM
I'm going to try it, but it seems like using a blow-torch to light a cigarette.

nhrifle
01-01-2013, 02:12 AM
Waksupi, there is a thread elsewhere on here about zinc boolits and how light they are. How bout driving one of those things over 4000 fps in the 300 WM?

waksupi
01-01-2013, 02:56 AM
Waksupi, there is a thread elsewhere on here about zinc boolits and how light they are. How bout driving one of those things over 4000 fps in the 300 WM?
You would certainly need to go to faster powders. I tried cast in my old .338 Win Mag, and just did not find happiness with cast, so got rid of it. I do know BruceB had better luck with that chambering. Being a smaller bore size, the .300 may act a bit better.

waksupi
01-01-2013, 02:59 AM
Waksupi, there is a thread elsewhere on here about zinc boolits and how light they are. How bout driving one of those things over 4000 fps in the 300 WM?
You would certainly need to go to faster powders. I tried cast in my old .338 Win Mag, and just did not find happiness with cast, so got rid of it. I do know BruceB had better luck with that chambering. I talked to Jeff Bartlett about the powders I mentioned, and he said it was impossible to put in enough to have an overload. Considering I still have over 30# of those, I wanted to use them.
Being a smaller bore size, the .300 may act a bit better. It may boil down to the twist rate.

ShooterAZ
01-01-2013, 11:01 AM
I have been casting and experimenting with my Ruger 77 300 Win lately. It shoots cast just as well if not better than jacketed. The powders I have tried so far are Red Dot, Unique, 4759, 5744. All have given very acceptable results, with velocities on par with a 30-30. I know I could push it faster, but I'm enjoying the mild loads and accuracy I'm getting. One load really stood out, 18 gr Unique with the Lee C170F, crazy accurate!

gutpile
01-01-2013, 11:32 AM
i think(speculation and some experience) 200 -250 grain bullets and one of the 50 cal surplus powders with a magnum primer would be the way to go..........cheap powder and you got a ton of case volume the 25-06 has been sucessfull with cast, yours by comparison is just on steroids....should be a push and not a whack on recoil,...i bet you have a 26 in barrel that helps too...and 5744 may be and option too....but just my 2 cents

HangFireW8
01-01-2013, 01:34 PM
If I wanted to rebarrel a magnum action and shoot cast, I'd go to 7mm Sharpe & Hart in a heartbeat. Sharpe designed it for both cast and jacketed and Lyman tested it as the best belted magnum with cast ever. I think there's a lot to be learned if one can examine an original 7S&H Magnum reamer especially the throat/leade. Of course on a rebarrel you can pick your twist and avoid the usual 7mm ultra tight twist.

HF

ShooterAZ
01-01-2013, 02:00 PM
The one real Cast Boolit "virtue" downside for the 300 Win is the very short neck.

longbow
01-01-2013, 02:12 PM
No personal experience here other than shooting a few "J" bullet rounds through a friend's .300 Win mag.

However, I am pretty sure that Col, Harrison used .300 Win mag for PP boolit shooting. I will have to go look at my Lyman manual but it seems to me that it was .300 Win mag he used for his high velocity test of over 3000 FPS.

Regardless if my memory works or not (currently crippled a bit after New Years celebrating) paper patching should be doable and since you are a paper patcher with a favourite gun why not give it a try?

I will look later to see if the old brain is correct and post what I find... if I remember what I am looking for by then.

If PP'ing interests you then you might want to sign up for the NRA Mihec PP boolit mould here:

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?122026-Any-Interest-in-a-4-Cavity-Brass-Mihec-Paper-Patch-Mold

I am pretty sure there is load data for .300 Win in my old Lyman Cast Boolit Handbook.

Longbow

grouch
01-01-2013, 03:05 PM
Maybe you should consult Veral Smith - he favors trying for high velocity with cast boolits, and 300 win mag is probably long throated, which could be an advantage. Pure speculation, but I,d hate to spend the money rebarreling with no benefit.
Grouch

303Guy
01-01-2013, 03:33 PM
Perhaps the long throat and short neck can be put to advantage with a heavy, throat fitting boolit. I'd speculate that the large case capacity could be put to advantage with a moderate charge of pistol powder which would generate a mild pressure that remains sustained for some distance down the bore as is gradually diminishes toward the muzzle. 30-06's are reportedly very good cast boolit shooters and they have long or large throats (I think) and fast twists.

longbow
01-01-2013, 04:51 PM
Okay, I remembered to check my Lyman book and yes, Col. Harrison did use .300 Winchester to achieve velocities of over 3000 FPS with PP boolits. I have to assume these were reasonably accurate loads that functioned well or they wouldn't comment. Unfortunately, Lyman doesn't provide details of the load(s).

The book does list cast boolit loads for boolits up to 187 grs. and velocities up to about 2800 FPS for boolits of all weights but also shows the most accurate load being for the Lyman 311467 (178 grs.) at 2025 FPS.

IIRC one drawback of .300 Win is the magazine length limiting OAL so heavy boolits have to be seated deep so the heavy boolit seated out may not work in some guns. That is just my old memory at work again so may not be correct. I would bet that you could PP up to a 200 gr. boolit though if round nose without having to seat too deep.

Anyway, that's all I've got. if you want some cast boolit loads let me know and I can post. If you want the pages on paper patching (mostly for .30-06 and .308) I can scan and e-mail. Let me know.

Longbow

ShooterAZ
01-01-2013, 04:53 PM
My Ruger 77 has a long enough throat, but when I seat the boolits to where they are just short of engraving the rifling...they will no longer feed through the magazine. Not the end of the world, but an inconvenience to single load.

leadman
01-01-2013, 05:03 PM
I have used the slow powders, WC872 to be specific in the 7mm Rem mag and 300 Win mag. They are a differnet animal in these cartridges at least with jacketed. Easily pushed jacketed to over 3,000 fps. Think it might be they fact they are large cases with small caliber outlets that helps keep the pressure up.
I have shot cast in my 7RM and it did good with SR4759.