7.62x39 caliber. Do you use it for hunting? Range?

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smitas5

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Just because I have buckets of it and would be cheap to practice at the range, I consider this caliber, but do correct me please, or maybe other surplus ammo caliber?
What kind of hunting you do with this caliber if you do and what range can it be used for at the range?

Also what kind of rifle?

Thank you
 
Treat the 7.62x39 cartridge as a 30-30 and it will work fine. Proper hunting softpoint ammo of course. (the surplus ammo is mostly FMJ and not suitable for hunting) Good for deer and black bear at moderate ranges. Will kill larger animals but it's getting a bit marginal for those purposes.

If I was to decide I wanted to use a 7.6x39 cartridge for hunting, I would find one of the good accurate bolt actions available. They aren't as common as a .270, but they are out there.

Many military style rifles like the SKS etc are also chambered in this round, they will work fine if you use them within their accuracy parameters, but the bolt action rifles will always be more accurate.
 
This cartridge is great for less than 200m or if you are like me and use iron sights and are a bit shaky, then just 100m. Because the caliber is 7.62 it has
good weight but with the small x39 case, you don't want to try hunting at longer range. So far, I only have SKS' but I want the Zastava bolt action.
 
Well I have SKS and I was to be invited to go hunting, thats the rifle I would bring, but like you said, bolt action would be more purpose built rifle. And yes, surplus ammo is only for the range.
Interesting how would it perform, what range?
I found Zastava M85 and CZ 572 are very nice rifles, from what I read anyway, but would welcome people to share their experiences on what they shoot, how it performs in range etc. Thanks
Gatehouse said:
Treat the 7.62x39 cartridge as a 30-30 and it will work fine. Proper hunting softpoint ammo of course. (the surplus ammo is mostly FMJ and not suitable for hunting) Good for deer and black bear at moderate ranges. Will kill larger animals but it's getting a bit marginal for those purposes.

If I was to decide I wanted to use a 7.6x39 cartridge for hunting, I would find one of the good accurate bolt actions available. They aren't as common as a .270, but they are out there.

Many military style rifles like the SKS etc are also chambered in this round, they will work fine if you use them within their accuracy parameters, but the bolt action rifles will always be more accurate.
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smitas5 said:
Well I have SKS and I was to be invited to go hunting, thats the rifle I would bring, but like you said, bolt action would be more purpose built rifle. And yes, surplus ammo is only for the range.
Interesting how would it perform, what range?
I found Zastava M85 and CZ 572 are very nice rifles, from what I read anyway, but would welcome people to share their experiences on what they shoot, how it performs in range etc. Thanks
Click to expand...

I use it in my SKS it a great rifle considering in was built in 1954 love this gun, it's fun to shot I would recommend a SKS to anyone.
 
White Tail out to 100, maybe 150 yards. Good bush gun calibre, in many respects similar to 30-30, especially with good hunting ammo. I'm partial to the Hornady SST flextip rounds for x39 hunting.

Also works great for coyotes, if you're shooting them in a "problem solving" ranch shooting kind of way, but has a tendency to blow a sizable hole out the far side, so not so good if you're looking for pelts.

A few caveats:

Surplus is good for general practice, but generally less accurate than decent hunting ammo. Also, a lot of the hunting ammo out there is "hotter" than the surplus, so you will definitely need to re-zero with your hunting ammo. This can be a bit of a pain if you're going back and forth between the two on a regular basis.

The SKS works fine for what it is, and a good one can be plenty accurate for humane hunting. A bad one will be a nightmare of tweaks to get accurate enough for ethical hunting. And they're kind of heavy for lugging around as a bush gun. I've done it, and then went and bought an x39 bolt gun to shave a few pounds off what I'm carrying around.

Anyway, here are my two x39 "hunting" rifles. An SKS that I've scoped and accurized a bit. And its replacement as my go to bush gun and ranch rifle, a Zastava M85 Stutzen Stock.

sks_deer.jpg


zastava_s.jpg


And an idea of the difference you'll get in accuracy between the two. I've done better groups with both rifles, using better ammo (the Hornady SST rounds perform better with both rifles than the Dominion ammo I used here). The M85 can be a 5 shot, under 1" group with good ammo. My SKS can do 2" with the SST rounds. And that's about the general pattern across the board, I've found. The SKS group sizes will be roughly double what I get from my M85.

Not really a fair representation of what can be achieved with either gun. The Dominion ammo is roughly equivalent to surplus ammo, in terms of accuracy and consistency. Good hunting ammo just does better. And if you wanted to hand load, you could get stellar performance out of the M85, and highly respectable performance out of the SKS.

sks_v_m85_test1.jpg



In short order, there will be a couple of known x39 haters show up to explain to you all the evils of the cartridge, how it is insufficiently accurate or powerful enough, blah blah blah... They're broken records on the subject, and can be safely added to your ignore list without ever losing a single piece of useful information.
 
@grelmar - Zastava M85, how does it compare to CZ do you think? Are you able to shoot military surplus at the range with that too?
Does it make that much difference between SP and FMJ surplus?
 
smitas5 said:
@grelmar - Zastava M85, how does it compare to CZ do you think? Are you able to shoot military surplus at the range with that too?
Does it make that much difference between SP and FMJ surplus?
Click to expand...

The biggest thing with shooting surplus out of a bolt gun is to try and avoid the lacquer coated rounds as they can melt and stick inside your chamber. Stick to copper washed or brass and you'll be fine.

Myself I avoid anything corrosive in a bolt gun like that, but that's more personal preference/laziness in cleaning. You can certainly do it, and cleaning a bolt action is quite simple compared to the sks, it just makes me feel better if I don't.
 
I nailed a nice 4 pt. buck with my SKS. I was using 123 gr. Speer PSP and all it took was one shot through the heart. He went about 2 yds. and dropped. Within it's limitations, I think it's a perfectly fine cartridge for game like deer and maybe bigger.
 
I've been playing with the idea of getting a CZ 527 in 7.62X39, since I very much like the FS I have in .223. If they made a FS version for the X39, I'd already have one. I'm not a fan of Zastava rifles, only because the lines of their stocks don't appeal to me, but, there's no arguing with the value they represent; the 9.3X62 I fired with Previ factory ammo shot like a house on fire, despite the hideous stock. I'm not a fan of SKS carbines for use as hunting rifles.

With bullet weights of 125 to 150 grs, the 7.62X39 is a viable game cartridge, but its small powder capacity, that makes it such an appealing choice for chambering in small action rifles, results in diminished returns if heavier bullets are considered. Bullet construction should be considered, to ensure that terminal performance is consistent with 7.62X39 impact velocities, that are significantly lower than when the same weight of bullet is fired in a .308, a .30/06, or a .300 magnum.
 
smitas5 said:
@grelmar - Zastava M85, how does it compare to CZ do you think? Are you able to shoot military surplus at the range with that too?
Does it make that much difference between SP and FMJ surplus?
Click to expand...

The CZ is a better rifle, no question. Fit and finish and how smooth the action is. Don't own one, but have shot a couple, and they're just an all around sweet rifle. But you won't notice any big difference in accuracy. And a CZ will cost you twice as much - which was the deciding factor for me. Not that I don't have expensive guns, just that $1K seemed a bit stiff for a bush/ranch gun that's going to get heavily abused.

I've shot surplus with my M85, and it makes for stiffer extraction. The lacquered cases really grab onto the chamber. My M85 has the improved extractor and firing pin and spring kit (it came pre-installed when I bought it), the ones from CanAm don't have that, but the parts are fairly available and not expensive.

Surplus ammo will have a harder primer, which is the reason for the upgrade to the firing pin/spring. Just gives it a bit more "oomph" to ensure reliable firing. There's also a way (apparently, haven't done this myself) of adjusting the amount the pin protrudes on firing, which should also solve the problem.

The beefier extractor is more of a preventative maintenance thing. The stock extractors have been known to snap over time if you're firing a lot of lacquered/surplus ammo.

The differences between surplus ammo and commercial soft-point are:

Commercial ammo is hotter. Point of Impact will be anywhere from 3" to 6" high at 100m, depending on the brand.

Commercial ammo is more consistent. Surplus ammo was loaded to fairly broad tolerances, back in the day. Bullet weight and powder weight can vary as much as 2% each in the same spam can, which when added together can make pretty big differences.

Commercial ammo tends to be brass cased. Which makes it easier to extract. Oddly, my favourite x39 hunting ammo is the Hornady SST ammo, which is lacquered steel cased. Steel v. Brass does not affect accuracy - just how smoothly it extracts. This is not an issue in a semi auto, which cycles rapidly enough to pull the steel cased ammo before it has begun to cool, which is really what's creating the stickiness. No matter how fast you might be with a bolt, a steel case will have begun to cool by the time you work the bolt to do the extraction.

Corrosive ammo isn't the end of the world for any gun, you just have to practice regular cleaning - the rifle will need to be cleaned the same day you fire it if you're using corrosive. And bolt guns are a LOT easier to clean than semi-auto gas guns (and the SKS is pretty simple to clean anyway), so it doesn't phase me in the least.

The best thing about surplus ammo: When .22 was in short supply, I'd just load up my SKS with surplus, and pop gophers with that, the ammo was cheap enough to do it.

Cheers.
 
I've seen some posts asking about availability of the Howa Mini, but nobody seems to have it in stock currently? :confused:

edit - that said, I'm not seeing it listed with a 7.62x39 option, just .223 and .204.
 
@ grelmar - so buying one of those CZ or Zastava and shooting military surplus, then just taking it to the hunt isnot an option right? Since different ammo will be hitting the target at different hights...
SKS is good fun at certain range 25-100, but after that eyes just not good enough, scope is needed and scopes don't really play nice with SKS from what I heard.
CZ vs Zastava- yes the looks and the quality plays important role, but one thing I was reading that CZ has issues firing military surplus. Is that the same upgrade needed for CZ too? I assume you were talking about Zastava firing pin upgrade right?
 
I recently got a brand new SKS and so far have 1500 rounds for it, well 1485 now. I had no use for one, didn't want one, then my good friend Robert Nicholson explained to me that I do need one and why and that I should also be getting one for each family remember. I am certainly not going to waste my SKS on hunting, no-sir-e!
 
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