7mm magnum or 338 lapua

Northtogladwin

Sergeant of the Hide
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Minuteman
Apr 28, 2020
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I want a magnum caliber but sont want to get into the chytac or something crazy. Something I can find factory ammo for at local places and want to use it for maybe hunting but also long range. I want a magnum big caliber but what would you choose
 
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Everyone I've talked to said to get away from the belted magnum. That said, I shoot the 7mm remington magnum and just ordered a .300 winchester magnum. The plan is to shoot out the barrels and then rebarrel to .300 prc.
 
Buy one of each.
I have a stock(ish) Winchester model 70 in 7mag and a custom 338 Lapua Mag. I generally shoot the 7mag more than the 338 due to the cost of reloading. There have only been a handful of times where I was happy to have the 338 over the 7mag. I don't hesitate taking the 7mag hunting but wouldn't even consider the 338 due to the weight.
 
I love the 7 Rem Mag. Much more than my .338 Lapua. I’m getting excellent groups (0.18-0.20 MOA) out of my current load of 195 EOLs over Retumbo. 28 inch barrel at 2880 fps. Just picked up 2000 190 LR hybrids to try out. If I could go back in time I’d have never got into the .338 Lapua, or the 28 Nosler for that matter, and have just stuck with the 7RM.
 
300PRC
somewhere in the middle of splash
tons of high BC 30 cal bullets
same action length as 7RM
same price to shoot as a 7RM
way better factory options for hunting and factory and more to come I'm sure. I don't see 7RM expanding into match factory ammo
 
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If it was me, and I was looking for a long range rig, I'd likely look at something like the 7mm-300 Norma Improved. Easier on the shoulder than a 338 LM, with all of that 7mm ballistic goodness.

That said, something like a 338 LM Improved running 300 gr Bergers has the oomph to put a seriously hard whack on something from a long way out.
 
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I want a magnum caliber but sont want to get into the chytac or something crazy. Something I can find factory ammo for at local places and want to use it for maybe hunting but also long range. I want a magnum big caliber but what would you choose
.535 and .588 bolt faces are available for the Mausingfield, just sayin...

I’ll edit and elaborate on this too. Using a Mausingfield with the two magnum bolt faces will allow you to run both a 7mm magnum cartridge and a large magnum .338 caliber something-or-other, or even 300 Norma. Just those two bolt faces will allow you to buy pre-fit barrels in, just off the top of my head: 6.5 PRC, 7 SAUM(modern, no-belt cartridge), 300 PRC(modern, no-belt cartridge), 300 Norma, .338 Norma, .338 Lapua. I know there are more(lots more), these are just what we’re clanging around in my head.

Aaaand, if you were to purchase a .473 bolt head the possibilities are close to limitless. If you’re already selling a couple of rifles to fund this you might as well go balls out
 
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If you are not reloading .338 lapua is going to be expensive. If you do reload, .338 lapua is still going to be expensive.

7mm magnum is a powerful enough round to take down any large game in North America. It will be more affordable across the board reloading or not.
 
I'd definitely say to look into the .300 PRC as the posters above have suggested.
Factory ammo is starting to be readily available and you get most of the range of the .338 and plenty of energy for almost anything you'll run into.