What is the recoil like in a 303 british?

bill c68

bill c68

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I have an opportunity to pick up a free .303. It is an Enfield with a Parker Hale sporter stock installed and is quite nice (I am not a milsurp fan at all)
I was thinking it might make a nice rifle for my wife to use if the recoil is tame enough.

My only issue is, to really test it, I need her to fire it and to do that properly I will likely have to chop the stock considerably. Just looking for some feedback as to how it would compare to other calibers.

Also what bullet weights are available for this caliber?
 
303

I've just started playing with the 303, but it's not a high pressure round, it just isn't that hot, even handloaded. Bullet weights go from 150g (maybe lighter, but I'm not sure) up to 215. I'm sure 150s in a PH sporter, not the worlds lightest gun, would be quite tame.
 
in a milsurp with a metal buttplate, its best described as 'brisk'
:D

in a modern gun its no worse than a .308, which would make it 'average recoil' i suppose.


TGC said:
My m 44 kicks more than my 303,
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an M44 with its tiny steel buttplate and strange stock geometry is absolutely brutal. when i put a modern ATI stock on it with a very basic recoil pad, it tamed it down considerably. i imagine a grind to fit limbsaver would make it totally comfortable.
 
Thanks guys, she has very little rifle experience, a .308 might even be a bit much for her. I do have a limbsaver her just waiting for a rifle to be installed on and I suppose I could pick up a mercury recoil reducer as well.
 
Depends on how much wood and metal bubba took off the rifle.
I have shot some .303 that were pretty nasty to shoot more then once, and others no big deal.
 
I shoot 180g .303s in my enfield and 140g in my .300WinMag Savage and find the .303 to kick more.

It all comes down to bullet weight VS velocity, and the weight of the gun really.
 
The short answer is - not very much!

From a physics point of view it will be less than a .308, but your percpetion may vary...a lot depends on rifle mass, stock design and recoil pad. I had a Mauser .30-06 that was a joy to shoot, a friend had a Mannlicher stocked Sako Forrester in .308 that I coverted but I found it very uncomfortbale to shoot as it hammered my cheek. I am tall and find shoort stocks less comfortable. I have found that adding a 1/2" of length to a shotgun stock made a huge difference in the comfort after 50 rounds of trap.

I had a bubba-ed lee enfield that I added a cheap slip-on recoil pad to and a modified cheek piece, it was fine although from the bench the toe of the recoil pad would dig into me (probably bad technique). Standing it was very comfortable.

In full military layout they are fine to shoot due to the mass.

I hunted years ago with a Parker Hale conversion and found it just fine.

FWIW 150gr bullets will produce less felt recoil. European ammo is usually loaded a bit hooter than US made stuff and when you up velocity, you up the recoil for a given bullet weight.

Don't sweat it, its not bad at all! Enjoy
 
The working pressure of the case is about 44000psi which is substantially less than 308's it is a soft recoiling cartridge with the Sporter stalk it will very manageable.
 
bill c68 said:
Thanks guys, she has very little rifle experience, a .308 might even be a bit much for her. I do have a limbsaver her just waiting for a rifle to be installed on and I suppose I could pick up a mercury recoil reducer as well.
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If the young lady is big enough to physically handle the rifle and can get a comfortable grip and cheek weld she'll probably be fine with a recoil pad. (Or a PAST recoil shield; maybe both until she's used to it.) You certainly won't have to worry about a mercury recoil reducer. A 30-06's recoil is around 20 ft.-lbs; the .308 will be around 18, the .303 also about 17-18, and a 30-30 around 15 (all depending on rifle weight). If you handload you can always load up some light loads to get her accustomed to it, esp. if she hasn't shot a centrefire before. At this time of year she'll likely be wearing heavy clothing and that will help, too.

:) Stuart
 
bill c68 said:
I do have a limbsaver her just waiting for a rifle to be installed on and I suppose I could pick up a mercury recoil reducer as well.
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dont - mercury recoil reducers are a gimmick.
in a second you will have people chiming in saying they have them and they work at reducing recoil -- of course they work: however most of that recoil reduction is simply due to the additional weight you added to the stock and not due to the mystical properties of the mercury :rolleyes:
if you add a 12oz mercury recoil reducer to a stock, you would have gotten nearly the same recoil reduction by simply putting a 12oz bag of lead shot in the stock instead, for 1/100th of the cost.

of course the companies that manufacturer the mercury recoil reducers dont want you to know this, and the people who spent $100 on one dont want to admit it either. save your money.
 
Well, you certainly have a lot of varried answers, to decide on.
Best answers are those that state that how much recoil is felt, depends to great extent on the rifle, namely how it fits, shape of the stock, etc. Something seldom mentioned is the fore stock of the rifle. With a large fore stock, considerable recoil is absorbed by the (usually) left hand, without even thinking about it!
I am always flabbergasted at how many shooters put so much emphasis on bullet weight as being related to felt recoil. The hard and cold facts are that a 150 grain factory loaded 303 (or any other calibre) will have as much felt recoil as the a factory loaded 180 grain.
The reason for this is that the lighter bullets are loaded to a higher velocity. What matters is the foot pounds of energy of each loading.
An example is a 180 grain bullet at 2700 fps will have about identical foot pounds of energy as a 150 grain bullet at 2950 fps.
Energy goes both ways, so recoil will depend on forward energy.
In the case of the 303, a 180 grain bullet at 2500 fps will have foot pounds of energy of 2498. A 150 grain bullet at 2750 fps will have a muzzle energy of 2519.
 
I will just throw in a couple of more examples here, maybe give you better idea of recoil.
Some 22 center fire shooting a 55 grain bullet at 3400 fps will have 1412 foot pounds of energy.
A 30-30, say, shooting a 170 grain bullet at 2100 fps will have 1665 pounds of energy.
 
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