.308 vs .30-06 – Best for Big Game? BALLISTIC GEL TEST

welcome to cartridge talks in this episode my good friend Ryan muckenhern and I Mark Portman are comparing via iconic 30.6 against the also iconic 308 who will ran Supreme to an end to find out roll Tate [Music] a few caveats before we begin we've established an eight pound base weight for these rifles to be able to compare them against one another obviously they're different rifles so we have to maintain some sort of consistency there we're also using box posted velocities grain weights and Ballistic coefficients so when we do our shooting no variance between the rifles show us up we're shooting into Perma gel although an imperfect Medium as you say Ryan it is consistent so it allows us to get a clear look at what's happening to the bullet shot now without further Ado let's head down to the range first up out of the good old 30-06 we have Federal's 180 grain power shocks they're going to have an impact velocity at 100 yards of 24.70 let's send it down range and see how it does all right not surprising solid performance here we're looking at 23 and 3 8 inches of penetration textbook mushrooming the bullet is inverted upon its stop but uh all together I'd say that's a dead deer all right up to bat here with the 308 we're going to start with Federal's Power Shock 150 grain at a launch velocity of 2820 feet per second and then at block impact velocity of 25 32. all right shot out let's assess this block typical mushroom performance what we expect out of a cup and core it's like about 16 and a quarter inches of penetration on that all right next up we have Federal's 180 grain trophy copper it's going to have an impact velocity of 25 30 at 100 yards if I'm a betting man I'm gonna say that we get better penetration but textbook expansion let's press the trigger and see how it does all right well if anything was on the line I would have won that that an impressive 40 inches of penetration I mean we're talking nearly double than the traditional cup and core they both did great but I gotta give it to the copper in this instance textbook expansion bullet has nearly 100 weight retention tons of penetration did a great job all right next down the tube is going to be the federal trophy copper 165 grain projectile now you know I'm a big fan of copper because of its penetrative capabilities I predict this is going to drive deeper shot out with the trophy copper assessing this block incredible penetration 33 and 5 8 inches of penetration characteristic textbook copper performance beautiful first up on the docket we're going to examine shootability what yeah it's a made-up term but it'll make sense here a minute when we're looking at the 30.6 and considering an 8 pound rifle base weight it's going to generate 22.66 foot pounds of recoil energy the 308 is going to generate 16.65 foot-pounds considerably less making it more controllable shootable shootable yeah okay same thing got a more shootable rifle is one that you'll shoot more often and likely get more efficient and proficient with winner in this department 308. so the 308 is the more shootable rifle but you have to have something to shoot through it I think it's time to talk about accessibility yes accessibility how often and regular can you find ammunition for either one of these two rifles so we pulled the six major U.S ammunition manufacturers that's Federal Nosler Hornady Barnes Winchester and Remington and looking at all of their Factory chamberings their offerings at press time here they come up with 96 unique loadings for the 308 94 unique loadings for the 30 odd 6. pretty narrow margin but still a margin yeah and as Slim as that margin is those two put 308 up one in the accessibility category barely all right shootability and accessibility aside what are these two capable of what can they do you mean how versatile are they in fact well let's look at some figures to help get us the answer to that question with the 30.6 you're looking at 42 unique bullet Styles now we're talking bullet Styles we're talking the traditional cup of core an all copper a match profile things of that nature right when it comes to weight we're looking at bullets from 125 grains all the way up to 220. now looking at the 308 you're looking at 48 unique bullet styles with a weight range of 110 grains all the way up to 220. once again the 308 it's the winner now we've talked about a few things that we'll say are happening at the gun itself but what's happening at distance Ryan we're talking d d drop and drift so as mentioned before we're going to be using the Box posted figures for calculating all of our ballistic information which we provided this lovely graphic and using our environmentals here at Vortex they are as follows going to the 500 yard line with a 10 mile an hour full value in we're going to see that we need 11.66 MOA of vertical correction and 5.73 MOA for that windage correction we compare and contrast that to the 30 out 6 which is actually firing a 180 grain soft point in this case slightly heavier projectile negligible elevation increase 11.68 but notable windage decrease 4.72 we shave off over a full minute of angle there I think looking at that we actually have to give this one to the 30 out of six it firing a heavier projectile did almost exactly the same in vertical correction but actually beat out the windage correction requirement pretty impressive 30 out six all right enough of the charts and figures I'm tired of looking at paper ballistics here let's get terminal mark let's look at the gel Boardman in front of us we have the gelatin they tell the tale of terminal performance don't they an incredible tongue twister very much so I barely got it out wow so I was shooting the 150 grain Power Shock from federal yeah the 308 Winchester I ended up with 16 and a quarter inches of overall penetration pretty characteristic mushroom performance in the bullet here this is exactly what we're expecting decent wound cavity not a lot of secondary fragmentation I'd call this pretty tax book I would as well now I was shooting the 180 grain Power Shock out of the 30 odd six I got 23 and 3 8 inches of penetration a little bit more I feel like the permanent wound channel is actually a little bit bigger than the 308 like you said character mushroom characteristic mushrooming of this bullet a little bit of material loss along the way but overall did pretty good and I'd say if we had stepped the 308 up to 180 grain or we had dropped the 30 out six down to a 150. I don't think we'd see a huge disparity in in performance here I I still think the 308 would have fallen behind the Optics in overall penetrating capability and and probably wound cavity diameter and you know tissue disruption and all that it'd be an interesting experiment but I do agree I think when you make some of those changes you're kind of trading one for another and it comes out in the wash yep I still think in terminal performance the 30 odd six takes at home winner now we didn't just fire one style of projectile in fact we fired two this test was the common cup and core but we also did a copper evaluation first try let's check out the blocks well all right copper copper everywhere but not a bullet to see at least in my gel block there is something curiously absent Ryan where's your bullet wait a minute what is that behind your ear oh my gosh it's a perfectly preserved 180 grain trophy Copper from Federal holy buckets we've got a complete pass-through Ryan so we're going to save 40 inches of penetration and it really was that on the button if you watch the video I mean she just kind of peeks out plops down but it was a complete pass-through yours looks perfectly preserved in the gel still pretty good we got 33 and 5 8 inch of penetration you see it way down here kind of took a little dive but again look at what copper does it penetrates like crazy this is exactly what we've come to expect from it this is why I'm such a huge fan of copper it does Drive what was the grain weight of your bowl 165 on 165. so not as heavy but not too different at the same time no they both did great I'm excited but one did better it's true hot six takes it on this one all right Ryan let's tally the vote and no cheating okay so uh shootability 308 accessibility 308 versatility 308 drop and drift odd six terminal performance at six that's three to two favor in 308. uh I see what you're saying there but like the 30.6 is more it's like more 308 how does the 308 win well it makes sense in a stands to reason the 308 was designed to replace the 30 odd 6 as a military cartridge yeah I guess it would go hand in hand that we would see it outpace it in some respects not all respects some respects uh on the commercial market so as a honey cartridge they're almost identical right 308 has a couple of attributes a couple of merits put a few extra feathers in its cap the 30 odd six I'm still gonna give it to a raw horsepower this is something we should expect too it's a larger case it has more powder volume we're going to see more out of the odd six maybe it's a better choice if you're chasing slightly larger game exactly and it can shoot the bigger bullets faster yep absolutely Ryan both of these cartridges are fantastic options from the battlefield to the back 40 to the back country and Beyond they are the perfect choice they do everything really well that concludes this episode of cartridge talks where the 30.6 did better but somehow came out worse if you find this information valuable or useful but want to know more tune into the Vortex Nation Podcast where Ryan and I dive deeper into the gel and explore everything that happened here a bit further if you have questions or comments hit us in the comments we want to hear from you

Channel: Vortex Nation

Views: 48,137

Keywords: Vortex Optics, Vortex, Vortex Nation, Vortex Nation Podcast, Podcast, Optics, Vortex Podcast

Id: FKpua2zeyPI

Length: 11min 49sec (709 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 09 2023