Well, I hope you folks are happy with all of this 338 talk.
You prompted me into digging out an old safe queen I put together in 1997. I call it the 338-08GD. Yeah, I know someone else probably did something similar 35 years before me. It makes me feel good.
The case has been straightened out to a 1 degree taper and the shoulder blown out allow a .250 in neck. The shoulder taper is appx 40 degrees as well. I measured it yesterday.
Ok, is has slightly more capacity than the original 308 case and looks pretty good.
I loaded up 50 rounds with 225gr Hornady SST Interlocks. The OAL, is set to about .010 off the leade.
46.0 grains of WC867(W748) over CCI 250 primers. This rifle, wears a 19.5 in bbl.
When I first took it out, the bbl was 26 inches, I cut off 4 inches to see how much velocity difference there would be. Nada. No difference at all. Not enough powder in the case to make a difference. I cut it back another inch and there was a slight decrease. I then cut it off in 1/2 in increments until I had a definite 25-50 fps velocity loss.
The rifle is built on a 98 Mauser action I picked up at a gun show for $25 and a Shilen take off Match bbl from another show, for the same price.
I put one of those swing safeties that Tradex offers onto the end of the bolt and dug up a set of double set triggers from a rifle that was going to be chopped by police order. Shame, a lovely post WWI 98 sporter that someone went to a lot of time and trouble to make a decent job of. I hated seeing that receiver get torched.
Anyway, the rifle went together about 16 years ago and after taking one deer with it, I relegated it to the back of the safe.
The velocity from this set up, isn't the most impressive but a 225 grn bullet at 2400fps will do the job on anything in North America, quite well.
The metal, is resting in a cheap Bell and Carlson stock and wears a Leupold 2x7x32 VXII. The rifle is handy and balances perfectly between my hands as I hold a rifle. One of the reasons for this, is the heavy match barrel.
Now, the results on target. That's the important part. It shoots consistently into sub moa groups at one hundred yards and the same at 200 yards.
Recoil is very mild, even from the bench.
My T3, is giving this gem nasty sideways glances. It's going to be a toss up which gets carried in the field this fall.
The T3 is in 6.5x55 and I can't find any fault with it. It shoots flatter than the 338-08GD and likely will do as much and maybe more at just about any range beyond 200 yds.
That 225grn bullet has a lot going for it, under 200 yards and maybe out to 300 yards. I will try it on wet magazines with a piece of plywood to simulate bone at 300 yards. It should be interesting.
