How about 6.5 Grendel? Pretty good ballistics compared to the 5.56, 6.8 Spc, 8mm kurtz and 7.62x39 and there are already ammo makers jumping on the bandwagon, Hornady and PPU to name a couple. I think the .280 British was way ahead of the curve but politics won out, however I think the Grendel could be a step in the right direction but I doubt we will ever see a major change in the standard infantry issue away from 5.56 at least not in the foreseeable future the cost would just be too much.
Thoughts on 8 mm Kurtz, 7.62 x 39, and 6.8 mm.
- Thread starter A Guy Out West
- Start date
I'm sure you're correct on the disincentives to moving away from the 5.56 dimensioned round and the associated NATO weapons platforms built around it such as the US M4 / M16.
This is one reason why the Grendel lost out to the 6.8mm SPC as a 'second string' cartridge for specialist / special forces use. The Grendel is a developed 6.5mm PPC which in turn is based on the 7.62X39mm / .220 Russian case. Its case-head / rim dia is as large as the M4 / M16 bolt can handle and still have some metal left to provide locking lugs. However, it leaves the base of the lugs so thin, that the bolt has a relatively low life in round-count terms before fatigue cracking sets in. This means that military users either have to restrict the weapons to specialist users only and/or institute a round-count recording system with automatic bolt replacement at x,000 rounds. This is pretty anathema military outfits for obvious reliability in the field / logistics reasons.
The 6.8 SPC's case-head falls between that of the 5.56 and 7.62X39mm 'families' and leaves enough 'meat' in the bolt-face to avoid this issue. A rebated rim Grendel was tried too to answer this issue, but I believe it didn't provide the 100% reliable feed in any and every condition needed by military special forces. As it is though, the 6.8 SPC has now been officially withdrawn by the US Army as an approved cartridge now that its involvement in Iraq / Afghanistan has finished, no doubt on logistics and costs grounds. Basically, NATO is little further forward today in having a effective assault rifle cartridge than it was 70 years ago in the dying days of World War 2 and still has to catch up with German and Swiss work done between the wars in the 1930s, never mind the 1940s' Soviet developments and British War Office 'Ideal Calibre Panel' work in the later 40s, early 50s.
When you consider the SA80 'family' was going to do 'everything' and result in a single cartridge needed .......... and the British Army now has to account for 9mm Para'; 5.56X45mm (in two forms); 7.62X51mm (in at least two forms); .338 Lapua Magnum; .50 BMG. All that's been achieved is to withdraw the Sterling submachine gun or a modern equivalent.
brock and norris
Well-Known Member
I have built both the 8mm Kurtz and the the 280 british for sporting rifles and both performed very well indeed, efficient ,effective mild and very accurate , yours respectfully Mike Norris Brock and Norris
7x33 invented in the '40s by the Fins - fabulous round
Norman Clark showed me a lovely 308X1.5" lightweight sporter he built on an M1895 'small ring' Mauser action many years back to see if he could make the deer legal ME and whether it would work out well as a combined fox and medium deer rifle. It did on both counts and it's one that he's unlikely to part with.
I'd have said the 8mm Kurz and later 7.62X39mm Soviet M43 are a bit light power-wise by comparison. I did a lot of work with 7.62X39 in a Cz527 Carbine some years back which was fun and accurate enough for general purpose range work out to 500 yards on full-size NRA targets, but doesn't really fit any particular competition discipline well. It could be loaded to 1,700 ft/lb ME (barely!) with a few powders and with the usual 123gn bullet weight struggled to meet the Scottish 2,500 fps MV requirement for roe.
If you put the 280/30 (7X43mm) alongside the 6BR case, there is nothing much between them, so a 7mmBR is in effect a modernised version of this cartridge with less body taper and a steeper shoulder angle. Going up a step, a 7X47 Lapua wildcat would easily outperform the 280/30 and it's a little surprising that while the F-Class / BR / US 'Precision Rifle' ('tactical' as we'd call it) people have run around putting huge efforts into the 6X47L and 6mm Hornady Creedmoor wildcat versions of these two 6.5mm factory cartridges, nobody I've heard of to date has considered what a sweet small varmint / deer cartridge these small sevens would make. A quick play with QuickLOAD shows that there would be no trouble in achieving 1,700 ft/lb from a 140gn bullet in a 20-inch barrel with tens of powders.
Quite the reverse in fact as seen in a parallel current SD thread on 'sevens' which is producing a large consensus for 280 Rem, 7X64mm or 7mm Rem Magnum.
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It is such a shame that some of your laws carry lower-end limits on velocity and ME. As a person who has hunted big game with a handgun, I know that very often, any lacking to be found is not in the size of the cartridge, but the use of it. I will take at least one deer with the 300 Blackout next fall and I doubt it I'll be sorry for the attempt.~Muir
Muir, my (very possibly incorrect) understanding of the origins of the legal situation we have in England and Wales (basically the 1966 Deer Acts) was that it was rightly decided to put a legal framework into place for shooting deer. Going back to Victorian times and early breechloading cartridges a variety of very low-power .30-cal BP and early nitro cartridges had been regarded as suitable for culling 'park deer', and then of course some people who ranged from simply careless / stupid to poachers / criminals had used whatever they happened to own on whatever was unlucky enough to cross their path.
The 'experts' (by which I assume primarily BDS, but maybe not) who were consulted on the issue pre the '65 Bill being placed before Parliament basically adopted the view that the then relatively new .243 Winchester cartridge should be the baseline that the legislation would be based upon in this respect. There was (is!) a problem in that Winchester, to put not too fine a point on it, lied about the cartridge's performance and the 1,700 ft/lb ME floor adopted wasn't actually produced in a lot of 243W loads in a typical (22-24") barrel length as opposed to some ludicrously long SAAMI spec test barrel. On the basis of the 243 being 'suitable' (I say this advisedly not being willing to get into what is really suitable or not and getting my head bit off!), 1,500 ft/lb ME would have been a more accurate minimum ME.
But then ..... even before Dunblane and the subsequent pistol 'ban', handgun hunting was never legal in the UK unlike North America, and the mere concept of bowhunting, also legal your way, would cause a lot of people here to choke on their 30yr old malt whiskies!
Meanwhile, the Scots (who have a separate legal system from the Sassenachs, its independence jealously guarded) decided for reasons that I've never seen explained to go down the same road but have a separate bunch of criteria which makes it perfectly (and sensibly) OK to shoot a roe deer with a 222 Rem rifle on the north bank of the River Tweed, whilst doing the same thing 150 yards and a rowing boat trip south would put you into a bunch of trouble, but which needs more legal velocity to shoot a red than in England making the British Empire's .303 illegal in most loadings at a stroke.
The 'experts' (by which I assume primarily BDS, but maybe not) who were consulted on the issue pre the '65 Bill being placed before Parliament basically adopted the view that the then relatively new .243 Winchester cartridge should be the baseline that the legislation would be based upon in this respect. There was (is!) a problem in that Winchester, to put not too fine a point on it, lied about the cartridge's performance and the 1,700 ft/lb ME floor adopted wasn't actually produced in a lot of 243W loads in a typical (22-24") barrel length as opposed to some ludicrously long SAAMI spec test barrel. On the basis of the 243 being 'suitable' (I say this advisedly not being willing to get into what is really suitable or not and getting my head bit off!), 1,500 ft/lb ME would have been a more accurate minimum ME.
But then ..... even before Dunblane and the subsequent pistol 'ban', handgun hunting was never legal in the UK unlike North America, and the mere concept of bowhunting, also legal your way, would cause a lot of people here to choke on their 30yr old malt whiskies!
Meanwhile, the Scots (who have a separate legal system from the Sassenachs, its independence jealously guarded) decided for reasons that I've never seen explained to go down the same road but have a separate bunch of criteria which makes it perfectly (and sensibly) OK to shoot a roe deer with a 222 Rem rifle on the north bank of the River Tweed, whilst doing the same thing 150 yards and a rowing boat trip south would put you into a bunch of trouble, but which needs more legal velocity to shoot a red than in England making the British Empire's .303 illegal in most loadings at a stroke.
I was working on a .25 caliber cartridge for the AR platform back in the 1990s, based on the 7.62x39 case, then changed to the .30 Remington. The non-comms at FT Bragg were working a 6mm and a 6.5, and went to Remington, which is just on the other side of the state (North Carolina). Remington said they would make a .277 bullet for the .30 Remington and that became the 6.8 SPC.
There is no best assault rifle cartridge, because each army has its own uses for cartridges, and weapons. If you have a lot of bodies to throw away and less heavy equipment, a PPsh-41, MP-44 or AK-47 is a good choice for troops making short run mass charges. If you need to reach out and deliver more force at 400+ yards, you need more accuracy from the cartridge and the rifles, more training of your soldiers. The 6.8 or 6.5 with a 100 to 120-gr bullet with give you that, and impact up close like the AK-47.
The 7x43 would be, like the 6.8 SPC, a good compromise between an 8mm Kurz and a .30-06, doing all the 7.62x39 will do, and more, but limiting infantry ability to stand off the enemy like the M16 other high-velocity rifles can do.
The M16 is a battle rifle - downsized, but still a battle rifle, and not enough bullet weight for one-shot up close stopping. The shorter M4 neuters it quite a bit. Some experts think the .30-06, 8x57IS, and 7.62x51 NATO are "overkill" for modern warfare, but in real use, infantry will tell you that the ability to punch through vehicles and cover, and to drop 2, 3, 4, and 5 charging enemy with a single round negated the superior numbers and high firepower of charging troops in the Russian front of WWII, in Korea and in Vietnam. The M1, M14, FAL, and HK G3, in the hands of trained and disciplined marksmen, can defeat overwhelming numbers of opponents. So, I think armies need more than one cartridge and rifle.
There is no best assault rifle cartridge, because each army has its own uses for cartridges, and weapons. If you have a lot of bodies to throw away and less heavy equipment, a PPsh-41, MP-44 or AK-47 is a good choice for troops making short run mass charges. If you need to reach out and deliver more force at 400+ yards, you need more accuracy from the cartridge and the rifles, more training of your soldiers. The 6.8 or 6.5 with a 100 to 120-gr bullet with give you that, and impact up close like the AK-47.
The 7x43 would be, like the 6.8 SPC, a good compromise between an 8mm Kurz and a .30-06, doing all the 7.62x39 will do, and more, but limiting infantry ability to stand off the enemy like the M16 other high-velocity rifles can do.
The M16 is a battle rifle - downsized, but still a battle rifle, and not enough bullet weight for one-shot up close stopping. The shorter M4 neuters it quite a bit. Some experts think the .30-06, 8x57IS, and 7.62x51 NATO are "overkill" for modern warfare, but in real use, infantry will tell you that the ability to punch through vehicles and cover, and to drop 2, 3, 4, and 5 charging enemy with a single round negated the superior numbers and high firepower of charging troops in the Russian front of WWII, in Korea and in Vietnam. The M1, M14, FAL, and HK G3, in the hands of trained and disciplined marksmen, can defeat overwhelming numbers of opponents. So, I think armies need more than one cartridge and rifle.
8x57
Distinguished Member
Laurie the story that I've often heard or repeated was that it was actually their lordships in the upper house who set the required energy limits at committee stage when the original deer act was being considered. Also as a baseline they used the .240 H&H cartridge (.240 Apex) which some of the landed gentry may have been more familiar with rather than the new fangled Yankee cartridge (.243win).
I'm not exactly sure how true this story is but it would certainly explain a few things and make you wonder if while long well accepted as a baseline cartridge for larger deer in England & Wales whether technically the .243win was ever actually deer legal (E&W).
Laurie the story that I've often heard or repeated was that it was actually their lordships in the upper house who set the required energy limits at committee stage when the original deer act was being considered. Also as a baseline they used the .240 H&H cartridge (.240 Apex) which some of the landed gentry may have been more familiar with rather than the new fangled Yankee cartridge (.243win).
I'm not exactly sure how true this story is but it would certainly explain a few things and make you wonder if while long well accepted as a baseline cartridge for larger deer in England & Wales whether technically the .243win was ever actually deer legal (E&W).
That sounds entirely likely on the first point. Ha,ha! on the second.
If only they'd used the 244 H&H Magnum as a baseline 
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