Well friends, unfortunately my Ruger built 338 Mega won't arrive until Monday. As I found out today, apparently UPS doesn't deliver in my area on Saturdays. So I will post updates with pictures Monday evening.
338 Mega
- Thread starter Idaho Trecker
- Start date
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As promised here are some pictures of the Ruger 338 Mega that I received today. Have put around 40-50 shots through it so far on new virgin brass. Just playing around with it as I fire form them seeing what it likes and what it's capabilities are before I start final load development on once fired brass. Below are pictures from this afternoon of the rifle at my range and a picture of a 100 yard 3-shot group that I fired with it shooting 270 grain ELD-X bullets at an average velocity of 2,776 FPS. As good as this grouping is and most others were similar to this one with the 270's, I had it almost shooting 3-shot little bughole groups with the 250 Berger's at a velocity of 2,840 FPS. Will continue to update my results after each day that I have a chance to test more loads.
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Where can I buy a tapered expander to go from 30 cal to 338 cal?
I have Sinclair and Wilson expander mandrel dies. And I will have to say that the Wilson is much higher quality in my opinion by far.
elkaholic
Well-Known Member
Nice! Keep the data coming
I am at my range fire forming more loads as I type this sir. Will be working on it and reporting my results each evening.
elkaholic
Well-Known Member
I was just at Chris' and the Bergara 338 Mega is shooting bugholes too!
I have a couple of neck up expander mandrels from PMA tool but i don't see a .308 to .338.
As promised I'm gonna continue to update throughout the first 338 Mega load development process. I finished fire forming 100 pieces of brass this afternoon. As of today I was shooting 64-65 grains of N550 with 250 Bergers. I also tried 2 different neck tensions (.364 and .366 bushings). It seemed as though the .366 bushing gave me around 2" groups at 300 yards and the .364" bushings gave me around 3" groups at 300 yards with this new brass. I'm posting a picture below of both my 300 yard targets: the left one (red/white) is with .366" neck bushing neck tension, the one on the right (red/black) is with the .364" neck bushing. Today I was currently getting 2,700 fps with 64.0 grains of N550 and 2,750 fps with 65.0 grains. I shot a pressure test and encountered stiff bolt lift at 69.0 grains for a max speed of 2,893 fps. My once fired brass is in the tumbler as I write this and hoping to start load development either tomorrow or Thursday afternoon.
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What cases do you fire form them from?
They are made by ADG for Rich Sherman. They either say 7mm Mega or 300 Mega on the head stamp. Then you have to mandrel them up to .338 diameter. They come with a 35 degree shoulder and once fired it sharpens up to a 40 degree.
elkaholic
Well-Known Member
Christianson hit around 2920 with 250's before pressure with a 26" barrel, I believe. He ran one up to 3002 but said it was too hot! I think he figured 2920 was his safe spot?
What are they similar to meaning the case?
elkaholic
Well-Known Member
Its a somewhat elongated wsm case with a 40 degree shoulder, low body taper and long neck. It has identical capacity as the 7 PRC in the 7 version at 84 grains and the 338 holds around 87 because of the neck diameter. OAL of the case is 2.150"
