Any use .338 Winchester for long range?

[gabriellapua]

I walked into a good deal on a Tikka T3 light in .338Win the other day and threw my 16 power HST on it.
i haven’t shot it yet but decided to try some 250gr SMK’s in it for the first load and charged them with the book max of R-19
its mostly factory except it has been glass bed and a break put on it.
i have had 5 other 338LM’s and have loaded thousands of rounds for that cartridge and have killed well past 1K with it.
(Not bragging) but this is my very first .338WIn.
the Tikka has a 24 in factory barrel with a 10’ twist and the book said it can fetch 2700FPS so I hope to get that.
my question is this, do you use the .338WIN for LR hunting or just a short to medium ranger? , how do you like it? I guess I want to hear what your personal limits or recommendations might be with it.
thanks!
ps......it’s been quite a while since my last post so I don’t know if I am in the appropriate forum so I understand if admin pulls it.

 

[diverdon]

My nephew is playing with one but he only gets 2500 fps before pressure. Still he puts them in a small circle out to 800. His range only goes to 800 so he does not know how far he could get with it.

 

[gabriellapua]

I went out today to get the rifle on paper and need to do some more tweaking on the hand loads. Best I was able to get was 1MOA @100 yards 3shot group and I know Tikkas usually do better than that.
If I can get something “heavy” to run 1/2MOA or better then
it might replace my .338LM for bear hunting off the TW200.

 

[gregsjt]

I'm curious

Sent from my SM-T580 using Tapatalk

 

[BurnOut]

Funny that you ask this... I am in the process of working the bugs out of a 338WM build right now. Mine has a 26" barrel, and the first trip to the range was quite disappointing... 4+ MOA groups at 100 yards. Unacceptable.

I tightened up the scope ring clamp screws in case that was the problem, and the next range trip I'll be taking an additional scope to swap in place at the range in case there's a repeat performance of the large groups... no reason to call the gun smith until I can eliminate the optic as the source of the problem. I also plan to take a chrono to see if my loads are anywhere near the speeds indicated by Nosler (https://load-data.nosler.com/load-da...ster-magnum/ ); I should be seeing near 2800 FPS using a 250 gr projectile and 71.5 gr of H4831SC.

The long and short of it is that yes, I intend to use the 338 WM as a long-range capable hunting round, but I'm having trouble so far.

 

[mercracing]

Tag. Looking forward to rereading this when I’m done with my 338WM.

 

[stello1001]

OP, is yours a magnum? Or is it just a 338 Winchester???

 

[slm9s]

I'm pretty sure the only 338 win is the 338 win magnum...

 

[sandwarrior]

The cartridge has enough pop to get a good high BC bullet out there. It's more of a case of "all other things considered", i.e. twist barrel, stock etc.
One moa accuracy though is good enough to at least get you out to 1k and hitting a sizeable piece of steel.

 

[gphil]

I have been shooting my 338 win mag at distance for awhile with good results, I am currently using a 250 grain berger elite hunter with 70 grains H4350 and I am getting 2836fps, I have also got 76grains of H4831 to 2812fps with the 250 grain elite hunter, but I havent played with it as much, I might be able to get a higher velocity with h4831. 73 grains of RL 19 gave me around 2830fps with the 250 EH. I think the Badlands precision 240gr super bulldozer and the hornady 230 grain eld x would be good bullets for the win mag, and I would like to even try the 270 grain eldx for curiosity sake. use my load data with discretion. these were all out of a factory rem 700 with a 26 inch barrel.

 

[sandwarrior]

gphil,

What twist?

 

[gphil]

I have in my shooting app that it is a 1 in 10 twist, its a factory 26 inch Remington sporter contour

 

[VDVSNIPER]

I shoot a .338 win mag of a Sako m995/trg-s. I have got best results in my rifle with nosler accubonds 225gr (BC of .550), 70gr of H4350, and CCI 250. This load in my gun gets it out at right around 2780fps. At 950 yards I need 8mils, and at 1270 yards I need 13 mils. I just tried out the new hornady precision hunter factory ammo (BC of .616) that get me at 2820fps and at the same target of 950 yards I only need 6.5 mils of adjustment. I will be trying to duplicate this factory load since it shoots so well in my rifle.