300 rum vs 300wby mag

[Hired Gun]

I have found happiness with every Weatherby rifle I have worked with. My favorite model is the Accumark. I have worked with the Sendero SFII in 300RUM and once it was brought up to the same specs it cost about the same as an Accumark. They both shoot comparable for accuracy. The Accumark is a little lighter and well suited to hunting where the Sendero seems more at home on the bench. My personal load is the 200grain Accubond at 3100 fps. It shoots sub MOA to at least 500 yards pretty consitantly. It will go faster but at 3100 my brass lasts forever. I tagged my cow elk yesterday with a 479 yard shot out the window of my van with a single shot. I would be happy with either caliber. I just ended up with my 300Wby first and see no reason to change ever.

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[drbobc]

Well I think you have hit the nail on the head. It is what you start with that basically dictates what you like. I actually started nit with weatherbys but had a gap where I did not have much time for firearms and had a wife that refused them to be in the house despite my saying that our sons needed experience with firerarms to at least know what not to do. When I got back into forearms, the first weapon I got was a 257 weatherby magnum and now have quite a few of them. Sure I have a couple remingtons one being a 220 swift and the other a 22-250. I might replace the 22-250 with a weatherby soon as a friend is trying to sell me a old classic one. So I am hooked on Weatherbys and soon hope to have one of all current calibers and a few of the not-so-current ones. I enjoy collecting the rifles and have made quite a few friends in doing so. What more can one ask?

bob chronister

 

[roshjohn]

First lets kill one myth right now...brass prices. 300 wby brass is CHEAPER than RUM brass. Sinclair sells Rem brass in both. Cost: 300 wby...74.55/100. 300 RUM.....92.45/100. Now if you plan on beating the crap out of your brass, then use the remmy brass in either and throw them away after a couple of firings. I've been there and done that. Max velocity is ALWAYS fun. If you want to keep things at realistic velocitys, buy GOOD brass. 300 WBY Norma 134.85/100. WAY better brass than remmy brass. 300 RUM, You may be stuck for a while....I know Nostler is making them, but, availabillity is poor as of now. I have no experiance with that brand of brass. I have herd that is not as good as the norma/lapua brass. As far as cost. It looks like the other calibers that Nostler is making is comparible in price to Norma.

Accuracy.....Belt.....Sholder design. ALL HOGWASH. Check the 1K results. Hardly anyone out there using a 300 RUM. There are quite a few 300 wby's, and a bunch more 300 improved (AI, BAER, Spencer,.ect...). And they win!!! My point is that the belt has nothing to do with anything once your brass has been fired, assuming you know what you are doing at the reloading bench. Even at that, I have won matches using new brass. And, that being said, and the inexperienced loader over sizes his RUM brass and pushes the sholder back to far, you have headspace problems. Push the sholder back too far on a belted case and....yep...you still have the belt to headspace off of, keeping things safe. I will admit that one of the reasons the 300 RUM isn't prominant in 1 K benchrest is the lack of QUALITY brass. I think it can be just as accurate as the wby/AI/ sized cases. BUT....Compeditors are now leaning to the 300 WSM. They are finding that they just don't need that much case capacity for thier use....but we are talking LR HUNTING here, so lots of boiler room is good. But as for the 300 RUM....mayby to much of a good thing.

Now, based on capacity alone...all else being equal, the 300 RUM will be a touch faster. As far as free bore, I know that WBY factory rifles have some, but I admit I don't know about the other gun manufacturers out there. I shoot all custom stuff in 300 WBY, and don't use ANY free bore. A little less speed....a whole lot more accurate. But, watch for high PSI...it will come SOONER w/o freebore.

Good luck, and know this.....If your biggest wory in life is haveing to choose between these two choices, then life IS GOOD!!! No bad choice.

Hey 4xforfun..

What custom work have you done to your 300 wby? Did you install a new barrell to get rid of the freebore?

 

[drbobc]

Amen! So much has been written about choosing rifles and calibers that it makes me ill! There are people who swear by rifles and calibers and others who swear at them. I have shoot nearly every rifle imaginable between a 22 and a 30-338 or 30-378 and a few larger yet! I remember vividly buying a 6.5 Gibbs made on a 6.5 Ariska! No matter what I would do, after about 5 shots, the peep sight would fall off! I used loc-tite and almost had the bloody sight welded on the rifle. Problem was I was using a slow burning powder in a rifle with a sub-20 inch barrel. Good thing I was not wearing false teeth becuase I would have lost all of them. reason for the problem -- I was young and taugjht myself handloading and the literature at the time was very scarce. In retrospect, I wish there had been somone around the small town in Pa. that I grew up in that could explain this issue to me. Would have saved me a lot of hassle and eliminated the hatred I developed for Gibbs wildcats. When the Ackley lines started to be available I stayed away from them. Too bad since they are in fact ideal choices. So the moral here is the following: Use what you have properly and the world usually is a good place. Push things inappropriately and you can be in trouble. As to the 300 Wby, it is arguably one of the most popular rifles of all time. Perhaps not as great as the 30-06 / 308 but it has not been a military caliber either. I know for a fact you can find ammo for it nearly everywhere including remote regions of Africa. This is not true of the 300 rum.

 

[4xforfun]

Hey 4xforfun..

What custom work have you done to your 300 wby? Did you install a new barrell to get rid of the freebore?

I have 2 300 WBY's...one for hunting and one for competition.

Comp gun....300 WBY, .330 neck, BAT 1.55 round model M , Clay Spencer 1-10 twist finished at 30", fluted to with in an inch of it's life, Shehane MBR Tracker, Juel Trigger, Bat 20MOA rings. Fit and chamberd by Mr. Spencer.

Hunting gun. Remington Sendaro (one of the first off the line back in the mid 1990s). Action squared up, Skim bedded over the aluminum block for a perfect fit, Clay Spencer 1-10 twist 30 inch 300 WBY, .330 neck, Remington Varment contour......NO BRAKE. Work done by Mr Spencer. Timney trigger, Ken Ferral 20 MOA basses, Leupold Mk 4 rings.

I will go out on a limb and say that my hunting gun is as accurate (or really close, anyway) as the Comp gun.....just can't shoot it as fast or as long before it heats up. Of course it kicks a bunch more, and that doesn't help much. I have shot a zillion targets at long range in perfect conditions (at midnight...zero wind, zero mirage....PERFECT). It has shot a lot of sub 1/4 min groups at distance. I will say without any hesitation that it is a SUB 1/2 min gun.....every day!! I shot it only once in a registered 1000 yard match (shootoff), in less than good conditions, and shot a 5 inch group, which won!!! It's just that the Lack of weight and stock design limit it's potential.

Oh ya...Freebore......I don't need no stinken' freebore...

Guns are throated for Berger VLD bullets to touch the lands and have none of the bullet in the case area. The 300 has a very long neck, and I can controle neck tension with different bushings. OAL on my match gun is 3.790...Loaded to 3.810 (twenty thou jam). My hunting gun is slightly shorter, but long enough that when I am at the lands, I can't fit the rounds into the mag. The gun shoots just about as good with them seated deep enough to fit in the mag well.

Leupold 8.5-25 on the match gun, Nightforce 8-32 NSX on hunting gun.

Hunting gun shoots Moly, Match gun shoots uncoated bullets.

I use Norma brass, But am looking closely at the RWS 375 H&H brass we got with the new gun last week. I don't know if I am that crazy about the whole fire forming deal.....I go through that with my Dasher.....I just HATE the thought of shooting 100 shots worth of bullets, powder, BBL life, primers, TIME, ect...... just to have a little better brass. Like I said, I just started with them....mayby they are a BUNCH better.

In talking with some of the guys I compeat with, and if I was to do this whole thing on a 300 RUM, I would use the Nostler Brass, although it is a little scarce right now. I would do everything else the same.

 

[roshjohn]

I have 2 300 WBY's...one for hunting and one for competition.

Comp gun....300 BY, .330 neck, BAT 1.55 round model M , Clay Spencer 1-10 twist finished at 30", fluted to with in an inch of it's life, Shane BR Tracker, Jule Trigger, Bat MAO rings. Fit and chambered by Mr. Spencer.

Hunting gun. Remington Sandro (one of the first off the line back in the mid S). Action squared up, Skim bedded over the aluminum block for a perfect fit, Clay Spencer 1-10 twist 30 inch 300 BY, .330 neck, Remington Varmint contour......NO BRAKE. Work done by Mr Spencer. Romney trigger, Ken Feral 20 MAO basses, Leupold Mk 4 rings.

I will go out on a limb and say that my hunting gun is as accurate (or really close, anyway) as the Comp gun.....just can't soot it as fast or as long before it heats up. Of course it kicks a bunch more, and that doesn't help much. I have shot a zillion targets at long range in perfect conditions (at midnight...zero wind, zero mirage....PERFECT). It has shot a lot of sub 1/4 min groups at distance. I will say without any hesitation that it is a SUB 1/2 min gun.....every day!! I shot it only once in a registered 1000 yard match (shoot off), in less than good conditions, and shot a 5 inch group, which won!!! It's just that the Lack of weight and stock design limit it's potential.

Oh ya...Freebore......I don't need no stink en' freebore...

Guns are throated for Berger VLAD bullets to touch the lands and have none of the bullet in the case area. The 300 has a very long neck, and I can control neck tension with different bushings. AOL on my match gun is 3.790...Loaded to 3.810 (twenty thou jam). My hunting gun is slightly shorter, but long enough that when I am at the lands, I can't fit the rounds into the mag. The gun shoots just about as good with them seated deep enough to fit in the mag well.

Leupold 8.5-25 on the match gun, Night force 8-32 NSC on hunting gun.

Hunting gun shoots Molly, Match gun shoots uncoated bullets.

I use Norma brass, But am looking closely at the RAWS 375 H&H brass we got with the new gun last week. I don't know if I am that crazy about the whole fire forming deal.....I go through that with my Dasher.....I just HATE the thought of shooting 100 shots worth of bullets, powder, BBL life, primers, TIME, ect...... just to have a little better brass. Like I said, I just started with them....mayby they are a BUNCH better.

In talking with some of the guys I compete with, and if I was to do this whole thing on a 300 RUM, I would use the Nestler Brass, although it is a little scarce right now. I would do everything else the same.

Thanks for the reply 4x4....
I'm looking for a long range hunting rifle and I'm stuck between a factory 300 Weatherby Mark V ($1900 in Canada) or a custom built rifle 300RUM( $3600). This tread and your reply has cleared up alot for me, leaning towards the custom but the 6 to8 month waiting period is going to kill me .

Anyways Thanks again

 

[4xforfun]

Kind of off topic.....But

roshjohn posted, using the quote option which reprinted my post , but now about 10% of the words are mis-spelled. Hell, completely changed or missing.

I see that I had a spelling error..... compeat.....which turned to compete (the correct spelling). But a bunch of the post isn't even close!!! Look at the description of my bench gun.


WHAT UP??

 

[roshjohn]

Sorry 4x4 its my fault, when I pushed spell check it automatically goes to change instead of ignore .

 

[Lightvarmint]

Hello guys,

Gee, I always thought the Weatherby double radius was a method Roy used to remind the shooter just how accurate the cartridge was........ Specifically, a ragged hole showing just two bullet radii or arcs. At least that is what I think of when I am tune loads for my 338/378 and the 30/378. Very accurate hot rods those two.............. Both are in excess of 30" w/ 1.25" striaght tapers with fluting and one muzzle brake per barrel.

In all fairness, I think if Lapua made 300 or .338 RUM brass that it would be a good platform form some serious experiments for 1K shooters shooting lighter weight high BC bullets. Specifically, the .338 necked down to .30. Until some really good brass is available, you probably won't see it in any significant numbers.

Anyway, lots of good information here. Keep up the SOY point battle and congratulations in advance.

Lightvarmint

 

[Casscade]

First lets kill one myth right now...brass prices. 300 wby brass is CHEAPER than RUM brass. Sinclair sells Rem brass in both. Cost: 300 wby...74.55/100. 300 RUM.....92.45/100. Now if you plan on beating the crap out of your brass, then use the remmy brass in either and throw them away after a couple of firings. I've been there and done that. Max velocity is ALWAYS fun. If you want to keep things at realistic velocitys, buy GOOD brass. 300 WBY Norma 134.85/100. WAY better brass than remmy brass. 300 RUM, You may be stuck for a while....I know Nostler is making them, but, availabillity is poor as of now. I have no experiance with that brand of brass. I have herd that is not as good as the norma/lapua brass. As far as cost. It looks like the other calibers that Nostler is making is comparible in price to Norma.

Accuracy.....Belt.....Sholder design. ALL HOGWASH. Check the 1K results. Hardly anyone out there using a 300 RUM. There are quite a few 300 wby's, and a bunch more 300 improved (AI, BAER, Spencer,.ect...). And they win!!! My point is that the belt has nothing to do with anything once your brass has been fired, assuming you know what you are doing at the reloading bench. Even at that, I have won matches using new brass. And, that being said, and the inexperienced loader over sizes his RUM brass and pushes the sholder back to far, you have headspace problems. Push the sholder back too far on a belted case and....yep...you still have the belt to headspace off of, keeping things safe. I will admit that one of the reasons the 300 RUM isn't prominant in 1 K benchrest is the lack of QUALITY brass. I think it can be just as accurate as the wby/AI/ sized cases. BUT....Compeditors are now leaning to the 300 WSM. They are finding that they just don't need that much case capacity for thier use....but we are talking LR HUNTING here, so lots of boiler room is good. But as for the 300 RUM....mayby to much of a good thing.

Now, based on capacity alone...all else being equal, the 300 RUM will be a touch faster. As far as free bore, I know that WBY factory rifles have some, but I admit I don't know about the other gun manufacturers out there. I shoot all custom stuff in 300 WBY, and don't use ANY free bore. A little less speed....a whole lot more accurate. But, watch for high PSI...it will come SOONER w/o freebore.

Good luck, and know this.....If your biggest wory in life is haveing to choose between these two choices, then life IS GOOD!!! No bad choice.

Thank You, could not have put it any better.

 

[Long Time Long Ranger]

I have built and shot bunches of both. The difference is about a hundred fps. The wby can be shot without a brake which is important for some. Got to have a brake on the ultra so expect a big boom. Both are very accurate hunting rifles and have equal effects on game. Is a hundred fps worth the noisy brake. I own at least three of each and like both. Basically the ultra shoots a lot more powder for a little bit of velocity gain. The 300 and 340 wby are two of the best hunting cartridges ever produced and you could not go wrong with either. If I had to choose one rifle to hunt everything with of these three it would by far be the 340 wby.

 

[MuleHunter]

I know i am getting into this discussion late but, although the original question was about comparing the 300 RUM and the 300 WBY, he asked about a mid range cartridge for elk and bear. My question is, have you considered the 7WSM or 7 RUM. A 180gr Berger can be pushed 2950fps+ quite easily with a ballistic coefficient of .684. IMO 'midrange' would be about 300-600yds. The 7 is very flat at those ranges, and accurate, and has comparable energy to the 300's due to its high BC, coupled with less powder and less recoil, and more energy at longer ranges (800yds+). Also the 7 has proved its accuracy capability in the 1000yd F class game (both 7wsm and .284w). Winchester brass isn't incredible by any means but people have got 5" groups at 1000yds with them and there is more than enough energy for elk at the 'midrange'. JMHO.

 

[hapycapy]

I know i am getting into this discussion late but, although the original question was about comparing the 300 RUM and the 300 WBY, he asked about a mid range cartridge for elk and bear. My question is, have you considered the 7WSM or 7 RUM. A 180gr Berger can be pushed 2950fps+ quite easily with a ballistic coefficient of .684. IMO 'midrange' would be about 300-600yds. The 7 is very flat at those ranges, and accurate, and has comparable energy to the 300's due to its high BC, coupled with less powder and less recoil, and more energy at longer ranges (800yds+). Also the 7 has proved its accuracy capability in the 1000yd F class game (both 7wsm and .284w). Winchester brass isn't incredible by any means but people have got 5" groups at 1000yds with them and there is more than enough energy for elk at the 'midrange'. JMHO.

Thanks for your HO mulehunter, thank everyone who helped me with my question, I just paid for my new 300 Weatherby Mag. sent it back to factory for the accubrake to be put on it. Now I have to decide what kind of glass to top it with. I would be happy to hear some HO on that too!

 

[MuleHunter]

Hawke Frontier 4-16x42mm SF Rifle Scope

Bushnell Elite 4200 6-24x50mm Tactical Rifle Scope

http://www.vortexoptics.com/ (click on rifle scopes, click on Viper 6.5-20x50)

My buddy has the bushnell, its a solid well rounded scope with good glass. I have a Leupold vx III LR thats pretty good too. The Hawke and the Vortex i have no personal experience with but have heard good things about both. Of course you could always go with Nightforce or US Optics. I am going with the Nightforce NXS on my current build.