30-06, unpopular?
- Thread starter wildfowler.250
- Start date
HonestJohn
Well-Known Member
How many rifles ‘do’ you have? It must be at least 5
Its why we have (and use) the .270 Winchester!
K
K
You’ll forever find someone who claims it can’t do anything that a .308 can do more efficiently.
That’s fine and true if you’re happy to stick to bullets below 150grain. But the .30-06 is a a far superior cartridge for longer heavier (and copper) bullets. It’s been my choice for 12 years now. Great cal.
Antonyweeks
Well-Known Member
I have this set up too. Use 54gn of N150 and get about 3000 fps out of them. Super flat and super deadly.
Scarpa
Well-Known Member
I posted this on another thread... but I love the 30-06 as my one rifle for everything. It was an easy step up from a .177 airgun (a lot of shotgun experience though).
When I got into stalking a few years ago I was in the process of moving to Austria. I wanted a rifle that was tough, pretty impervious to winter conditions, could handle everything from small deer to driven boar and it needed to have an adjustable cheek rest. I handled many at a gun show and decided to go the old fashioned route for calibre, 30-06 using lighter copper which gives a fairly flat trajectory. I had to wait a while as I got the last Alaska Sauer 101 they made. Quick release mounts for a stalking and boar scope, coated barrel and action and a grey laminated stock. Never regretted it although would have been happy with 7mm-08 too but it was not available in that rifle. It's a tack driver with 123gr Sako and 150gr TTSX. I just brought it back to the UK for a few months on a visitors permit.
When I got into stalking a few years ago I was in the process of moving to Austria. I wanted a rifle that was tough, pretty impervious to winter conditions, could handle everything from small deer to driven boar and it needed to have an adjustable cheek rest. I handled many at a gun show and decided to go the old fashioned route for calibre, 30-06 using lighter copper which gives a fairly flat trajectory. I had to wait a while as I got the last Alaska Sauer 101 they made. Quick release mounts for a stalking and boar scope, coated barrel and action and a grey laminated stock. Never regretted it although would have been happy with 7mm-08 too but it was not available in that rifle. It's a tack driver with 123gr Sako and 150gr TTSX. I just brought it back to the UK for a few months on a visitors permit.
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At least.,-MuirHow many rifles ‘do’ you have? It must be at least 5
6.5X55,All UK deer, except Sika' (yet) 30.06 up to now not blooded?
BC.
BC.
I've got almost 200 handloads to get through before I can even think about trying copper in mine
I bought a Parker Hale M81 Classic from Joe Beatham at Gunshop EB maybe now ten plus years ago. I wish I had bought one much earlier. It does everything that .270 Winchester does but without the faff of .277" bullets limiting maximum weight to 150 grains in lead and the non-availability in .277" of 150 grains in copper.
It does everything and has the advantage of bullet weights from 110 grains up to 220 grains and, now, a multitude of American non-lead bullets or loaded ammunition.
I have ordered fifty Nosler 150 grain non-lead bullets from Norman Clarke and intend these to be my bullet loaded over Staball 6.5 from now onwards which will give me a duplicate .270 Winchester 150 grain lead bullet performance but with copper bullets. As alas as said there is no copper .277" bullet available for the .270" Winchester.
In my mind - if ammunition and/or bullet supply were not an issue - there's only one better calibre in a rifle using a Mauser 98 action and that's the now obsolete 8x60S or the equally moribund wildcat 8mm-06. I liked my 8x60S but sold it some few good years ago once I got this .30-06.
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8x57
Distinguished Member
I wouldn't say that the .30-06 is unpopular here in the U.K. just that it never was as popular as some other cartridges.
My take on it is that often civilians will if legislation allows opt for a cartridge that they are familiar with or a cartridge used by their military forces. Don't forget that cheap ex-military ammunition used for target shooting and practise used to be quite common both in the U.S. and in the U.K.
The U.S. service cartridge was the .30-06 so civilian shooters in the U.S. tended to veer towards that cartridge.
Here in the U.K. we had the .303 which at one time was the accepted target rifle cartridge and was also commonly used for deer stalking with the more affluent often opting for something classic like .275 Rigby just to be different.
When in the late 60s and 70s the U.K. military converted to 7.62mm/.308w that cartridge became the go to cartridge for target shooting and also became a popular stalking round, however many stalkers opted for the .243win and one or two other more modern cartridges such as the .270win. So we sort of mostly bypassed the good old .30-06 cartridge except that is for a few connoisseurs.
That does not make it a bad calibre.
You forgot the .243 win in that ! I bet there are more .243 than any other CF cartridge rifles . Anyhow 30-06 has never made much of itself in the UK , indeed a friend within the Scottish forestry was working with the Police on a case of a 30-06 deer poacher ( turns out within a very large area there was just one held legally in a very large area) he was ruled out without being spoken to due to his high stature Not knocking 30-06 on deer but its not that popular in the UK as regards stalking , but it sure works ! 270 is without doubt the most Scottish deer rifle i suspect but i put 243win still bites at its ancles. Times are changing though with the 6.5s
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