338 Winchester Magnum Overview

buddy hey I had a subscriber actually a new subscriber asked me to do a video on the 338 Winchester Magnum and I said sure I'd be happy to because I'm a huge fan of that cartridge and actually I'm gonna post in the description a link to a video I did a while ago about the 338 Winchester Magnum some of what's in that video and some of what's in this one will be redundant but hopefully it's useful information for anybody that's interested in this particular cartridge give you something to study a little bit and then go off and do your own research with so you know I'll tell you what if you're looking to have just one cartridge for all North American game what a great choice the 338 Winchester would be let's just break it down a little bit so I'm going to ask a few questions and obviously you already know the answer but what cartridge can handle from 160 grain to 300 grain bullets that's an incredible range of bullet weights if you think about it the diversity of that's incredible what cartridge provides over 4,000 foot-pounds of energy at the muzzle and still carries 1700 foot-pounds over 700 yards not many and the 338 is easily capable of that there are some hand loads I had that we're breaking 4200 foot-pounds at the muzzle and that bumps you up you know almost to 2,000 at 700 yards and that's well beyond where 99% of people should be shooting game those shots should be 500 and under but the 338 generates enough energy to do anything you need it to do on any North American big-game within reasonable distances what cartridge when zeroed at 250 varies less than 5 inches from flat between 0 and 300 yards and what I mean by that is it doesn't go more than 5 inches total plus or minus above flat out to 300 if you zeroed it to 50 that puts you like two and a half high at 100 and right at 300 it puts you three and some low so that's where I get the five inches so in other words out to 300 just hold dead-on where you want to hit stuff and torch it and you're there and if it's zeroed that way it's only 15 low at 400 so on elk sized game or even deer sized game there's no hold over you can hold on the animal and you're still going to have loiter works impact and what cartridge also has a wide range of factory animal and reloading components readily available and reasonably priced well what I mean by reasonably priced is you know compared to some of these real niche magnums that are out there now 3378 you know 338 ultra Magdala mag those components are really expensive brass and stuff like that 338 you can still get a bag of brass the same prices all you know seven mag or 300 Win Mag and the bullets are easy to find reloading components powders that the this case likes in this case likes a variety of powders there are so many that work well in there if you're if you're that interested I could give you some of the loads I developed over the years powders and primers and all that I'd be happy to do that the other thing is factory animal readily available mostly loaded with the heavier bullets the 225 and the 250 s and that's okay because that's where this cartridge really shines I'm gonna go into that in a minute so all four of those questions they're all answered obviously by the 338 Winchester Magnum incredibly versatile incredibly flat shooting and high-energy cartridge so I want to talk a little bit about rifle selection for this cartridge that's another cool thing you can go down right now and buy a Winchester xpr with a 26 inch barrel for under 500 actually they're around 400 bucks chambered in 338 and that's going to be a great rifle mainstream manufacturers are all chambering this it's still popular enough that you can find it on the gun shelf at most major gun retailers you know it's tapering off because a lot of people are just all fired up about velocity but you can still find 330 a twin mags pretty easy barrel length I wouldn't go less than 24 there are some manufacturers that chamber these with 22 inch barrels I don't think that's smart 24 I think is ideal 26 is great also if you want to look at that bullet selection so we mentioned there this can handle from 160s to three hundreds but where this really shines where the 330 a twin mag really shines is in that - 10 - 25 up to 250 that starts to be a little bit hard on it I think the 225 grain bullets are really where this thing shines Nosler makes a 210 grain partition awesome I think 225 grain a key bond and partition awesome you start to go lower than 210 you go to the to hundreds or the 180s and you can drive them a little bit faster but the B C's aren't great and they drop off more quickly ballistically the 225 is kind of the sweet spot for the 338 Win Mag you start getting into the 250s the 300s and it's not a big enough case to drive those efficiently I don't think two 250 s are okay 300s are really pushing it for the 330 a twin mag again I think the 225 is premium selection they're hand loading for it is very easy the 338 that I've had are not picky there's a variety of powders a variety of bullets I had no problem getting multiple loads to be sub MOA out of a variety arrivals sporter weight rifles it just wasn't picky at all very easy to work with let's talk about recoil yeah there's some recoil anytime you're delivering that kind of energy you're gonna pay on the other end but honestly the recoil is no I don't really think it feels a whole lot different than a 300 Win Mag a little bit more but for me it wasn't that much different it's certainly not near the recoil of like a 3378 Weatherby or some of these other giant ultra mags so it's it's yeah you're gonna pay the price if you want to deliver heavy bullets that fast but for most guys that aren't recoil sensitive this is going to be just fine you're gonna do well with it let's see I'm just trying to think of there anything else I've shot a few big-game animals with 3:38 Yan game performance was incredible you and you're delivering that much energy things were gonna happen you're gonna create some damage and stuffs going to be in deep trouble I think a lot of guys would say oh I don't you want to use a 338 for dare I'm over gunned I don't agree at all if you have a 180 grain Accu bond or a 200 grand a Q bond or even 160 grain barns that'd be an awesome deer load flash shooting great energy on target all the way up through elk for I think this might be the quintessential elk cartridge for the Rocky Mountains honestly it's perfect for elk they're big tough animals you know what I've always said if you've watched my videos is for elk shoot the biggest cartridge that you can accurately and confidently shoot you can't deliver too much energy to those critters Phil's giant seven 800-pound animals guys I hope this is helpful in the 338 if you have any questions or comments I'm looking forward to hearing them appreciate it

Channel: Hunt Simple

Views: 49,484

Rating: 4.7927461 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: fLexmx4D1hg

Length: 8min 54sec (534 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 25 2018