300 PRC Sherman improved or 300 Remington Ultra Mag

[Tumbleweed]

Why don't you look into a 300 Weatherby, it will do everything that these others will do without "building" anything. You will have to load for it to obtain a sub MOA but you will for the others also. They come with first class barrels and out of the box ergo furniture. I cant touch one of them for what a build costs and if I get hard up for ammo I can buy it off the shelf.

The Weatherby is too long, that's it's downfall. And the SAAMI throat is so long that usually you can't get a bullet near the rifling. If you want to use a premium long range bullet like a Berger 215 and mag feed, you'll be jumping about 2 miles before bullets reach the rifling. Then you lose your case capacity. Bad choice in my opinion.
Take a ballistic twin like the 30 Nosler...throated correctly for a 215 Berger touching the rifling it can still easily be mag fed in a 3.7" box.
There's a pretty good consensus among wildcaters that the shorter, fatter cases are more efficient, the Weatherby certainly doesn't fit that category.

 

[bdlesh]

Do we have to have a need for a particular rifle/caliber to buy one? I have recently changed my thinking on firearms. This forum has opened my mind to acquiring guns I don't need. I wasn't a big wildcat fan until I joined here. Reading and talking to other members has opened my eyes. I am now going to build a 338 Sherman just because I can and think it will be fun to experiment with loads and dialing it in. I am by no means a gunsmith or a excellent marksman, Just someone that likes to shoot and tinker. Heck I might even build a .....dare I say it.....a creedmore. I better say a few hail Mary's now....

 

[25WSM]

Don't build that creed. You will find out that you don't need any of your other rifles. Shep

 

[BoatTail]

30 SM is 98.4 grains h20 and I havent shot a Nosler but thats what the SM does.
96.5 was the S.I. design with 375 Ruger brass
capacity is not the only thing that determines velocity either.

elkaholic,
To be clear it sounds like if you used 375 Ruger brass to make your 300 Sherman mag, the case capacity was 96.5, and if you use 300 PRC brass the resulting case capacity is 98.4. Is that correct? They must have changed something internal to the case when they started making 300 PRC as you would think they would start out with the same blank and some of the same early case forming processes.

 

[elkaholic]

elkaholic,
To be clear it sounds like if you used 375 Ruger brass to make your 300 Sherman mag, the case capacity was 96.5, and if you use 300 PRC brass the resulting case capacity is 98.4. Is that correct? They must have changed something internal to the case when they started making 300 PRC as you would think they would start out with the same blank and some of the same early case forming processes.

im not sure what they did but its tougher and has more capacity to boot! They may be double striking the case head? My SM is dimensionally larger, but not enough to make nearly 2 more grains over my old design. The SM has new throating too.

 

[.300 Dakota]

Let me back up and take back something I said that I shouldn't have. I stated the 30 Nosler didn't belong in this conversation. For whatever reason, I was thinking it had around 86 grains of water capacity. Obviously not true. The 30 Nosler is a capable cartridge in this lot, and the 28-30 Nosler as some have mentioned, even better. I will stand by my assertion that nosler caliber brass is about impossible to find, and when you do find it it's priced about double what my Dakota brass costs.

 

[elkaholic]

Let me back up and take back something I said that I shouldn't have. I stated the 30 Nosler didn't belong in this conversation. For whatever reason, I was thinking it had around 86 grains of water capacity. Obviously not true. The 30 Nosler is a capable cartridge in this lot, and the 28-30 Nosler as some have mentioned, even better. I will stand by my assertion that nosler caliber brass is about impossible to find, and when you do find it it's priced about double what my Dakota brass costs.

thats true but ADG is making Nosler brass now which changes the game!

 

[L.Sherm]

Yeah but the cats meow now is ADG, Nosler brass sucks

 

[L.Sherm]

You beat me to it Rich.

 

[elkaholic]

You beat me to it Rich.

 

[Deleted member 25294]

Freddiej.

Theres no recoil in these setups with a good muzzle brake. Why not push it faster? Less drop, wind drift and more energy down range. I have a 10.25 lbs with optics 300 norma improved that will spit 215s at 3200 fps with a mild load of n570. I can spot hits at 400 yds off the bipod no problem with my scope cranked up to 25x. I wouldn't hesitate to let my wife shoot it. That is the ultimate light weight long range setup for elk. I built a heavy norma improved for plinking. 30" barrel that spits 230 bergers at 3080 with a mild load of n570. Reticle doesn't leave the 400 yd target during recoil. And it held .3 moa vertical for 10 shots at 400 yds off the bipod. Shot 5 shots and came back a while later after the barrel cooled and shot the other 5 shots. Personally i think the norma or norma improved is the way to go. I have one piece of lapua 300 norma brass with 18 warm firings on it and the primer pocket is still tight. 14 of those firings were in a 26" barrel pushing a 230 berger at 3100 fps with retumbo. Shot great but was definitely warm as there was a noticeable bolt click. I had one piece of brass that the chargemaster drifted and dumped 3 gr more powder in than a warm load. I had to hit the bolt to open it. The primer pocket was still tight. Essentially youll never wear out Lapua 300 norma brass. Buy 100 pieces and itll last you the rest of your life.

Have you shot your 300 NM improved enough to determine barrel life?

 

[TopPin]

I would like some thoughts of The Forum on this. I'm getting ready to do a new 30 caliber Magnum rifle build. I was looking at a 30 Nosler , 30- 28 Nosler Wildcat , the 300 PRC and the 300 PRC Sherman improved . Because I thought none of them could reach the 3150 feet per second I was looking for out of 212 - 215 grain bullets, I jumped up to the 300 Remington Ultra Mag an ordered a long throated Reimer from PTG. Looking closer at the 300 PRC Sherman improved load data shows velocities of 3190 and 3200 + fps that seems to beat the 30 - 28 Nosler and rival the 300 Remington Ultra Mag. What are your guys's thoughts . Please help me understand if I'm wrong on this. I'd like a healthy discussion on this as once I build a rifle, I'll be stuck with that cartridge until I sell it or wear out the barrel. The build is on a Remington 700 action with a 28 in proof research carbon fiber Barrel I believe the twist rate is 1 + 9 or could be one an 8.5 I'll have to look.

So in my experience, you will be hard pressed to beat the performance of a RUM. It flat out puts the hurt down. You want to step into a magnum round, you dont shoot it for "barrel life". You shot a magnum for performance bottom line. You can argue thread after thread of gaining 200 rounds of barrel life. To be honest if you dont live on a range shooting 100 rounds a month out of your "hunting rifle" you wont burn the barrel out in 10 to 15 years. Nothing in the 30 cal range performs like a RUM. It is in my utmost opinion one of the best hands down magnum cartridges ever produced. Flat shooting, reliable, easy to reload, and flat knocks the lights out of game. Chase the Wildcats pay more, chase the new PRC line, and not get what a RUM produces. My 2 cents.

 

[Buttermilk]

H1000 load??

No, Retumbo.

 

[Buttermilk]

With what powder and how many grains?
I can push a 215 from my 300 Norma mag (26" barrel) to 3100 pretty easy with N570 but holy crap it takes a pile of powder, 92 grains!
I really like my 300 NM, but for sake of efficiency, if I were to do it over again I'd go 300 PRC, the Sherman version that is.

Retumbo.

92.0 gr Retumbo with the Berger 210 VLDH, F215gmm, R-P brass.

91.0 gr Retumbo with the Hornady 212 ELDX, F215gmm, R-P brass.

If I did it again, I'd do a 300 RUM all over but go with more freebore and a longer box, and a faster twist barrel (mine is 10" twist).

I'm doing a 30 Nosler in one of my XP-100's. Waiting on a reamer.