Best long range rifle caliber?

[Burnsie]

http://www.snipershide.com/forum/ubbthreads.php


^Lots of good information for the questions you are asking.

[mojo]

You might want to look at this package ...
http://www.snipercentral.com/entrypackage.htm

Calibers: 308, 243, .22-250, .223

I really don't know enough to recommend a caliber but the above seem to be popular choices.

[toadyoforangeville]

For long range at it's best use a 7mm remington magnum. Terrifying everything from gophers to grizz since '62. At extended ranges I might add.....

[The_War_Wagon]

Originally Posted by The_War_Wagon
2) On-a-budget-answer - .308 (and get an FAL)

ta da.

Bob

Not the best choice for 500 yards and out. It's a battle rifle, not a precission rifle.

Well, not to mince the point TOO finely, but it IS why I mentioned it as the "on-a-budget" answer. It IS the finest long range SEMI-auto battle rifle in the world (and this from a man who's ALSO owned an HK91, and currently owns a PTR91!), and if you're on a (tight) budget, your rifle may have to do MANY things; perhaps not ALL of them PERFECTLY, but maybe, MOST of them ADEQUATELY, might be the best you can do.

Did I mention this thread has MANY tangential possibilities?

Bob

[synergy]

Well, not to mince the point TOO finely, but it IS why I mentioned it as the "on-a-budget" answer. It IS the finest long range SEMI-auto battle rifle in the world (and this from a man who's ALSO owned an HK91, and currently owns a PTR91!), and if you're on a (tight) budget, your rifle may have to do MANY things; perhaps not ALL of them PERFECTLY, but maybe, MOST of them ADEQUATELY, might be the best you can do.

Did I mention this thread has MANY tangential possibilities?

Bob

That's all fine and good, but it depends on the criteria.

For 500-800 yard shots, when a bolt gun in being considered by the OP...it will give him an accuracy advantage.

If you consider what it takes to make a shot at 500 yards+....running the bolt on a gun isn't that big of a deal. Hitting your target when you do your part, is...IMO.

[toadyoforangeville]

yep onlyhitscount. Ask any gopher fired upon by the 7mm, from under my feet out beyond 500 yards they can't escape its bite.

[Lycanthrope]

I shoot beyond 500 yards quite a bit and there are some things you need to think about.

First off, I really think you need to have a gun that shoots sub moa accuracy. 1.5" groups at 100 yards are nealy 8 inch groups at 500 and that's not acceptable for me. It get's worse the deeper you go. Handloading is a must. A good base gun is a must. The Remington 700 and the Savage 110/111 work well. A Model 70 Classic can do it as can Weatherbys but after market parts are more expensive.

Good triggers are a must. Some rifles offer more options than others for parts. The Savage accutrigger is decent out of the box. A Remington can go down to 2.5-3lbs stock, but aftermarket triggers only run about $100-$200 (yes, they are worth it).

Decent glass. No you don't need a Zeiss, but things can look very small at 800 yards. When you step up in magnification and bell diameter, you step up in weight. Many rings can't handle the extra weight. Leupold STD rings are absolute junk with a heavy scope. You may have to glue the scope in with a heavy recoiling caliber. (My 7STW ate 3 sets of rings and 2 scopes before I put a brake on it.) With a large bell diameter you may run out of adjustment with the target knobs part 400-500 yards. In order to get it back you need down angle bases and those cost nearly $100 on their own. With a 50mm bell, I needed down angle bases with the 7STW.....which is a screamer. A typical .308 would drop almost 2 feet more at 500 yards......

That's just to start. I won't even get into parallax, wind, factoring in distance of the scope above the bore.....etc.....

On a budget? Savage 110 with Accutrigger, good rings/bases, a Nikon scope and a lot of time to work loads. Or the same with a Remington 700. The Remington can be built a lot easier into a full custom later.

LycanwhereisTomcat?thrope

[arrrrgh15]

Some of the ones I've seen do very well at matches...243, 300 win mag, and 6.5 Creedmoor. Particularly at the longer ranges, (beyond 600 yards). The .308 can hold it's own as well but is usually out peformed at the longer distances.

And a bolt gun would probably be your best bet to start. You can, with practice, run a bolt gun very quickly. For time i fired three shots (one each at a 100 yard steel, 200 yard steel, and 400 yard steel in 15 seconds. You can fire two shots at a single target exposed for only 5 seconds. A bolt gun can be very quick.

Its not just the caliber of the bullet, but also the equipment used to launch it. Lycan did a very good job at pointing that out. Caliber alone will not get you there. There is much more to it than that.

Do you reload?

My suggestion would be to pick up a savage or rem 700 as stated above and stick to .308 to start with if you don't reload. Plenty of match grade ammo available and it will get you to 1000 yards if launched from an accurate platform and a good shooter. Not to mention that there is a plethora of info available for bullet drop, wind drift, etc. Once you've gotten the fundamentals down and decide you want to keep progressing, look into other calibers.

Please don't skimp on glass or mounts.

good luck.

[jmiro]

I find this site mind blowing. I was thinking of posting the same question after I was flipping through the cddn catalog. I was thinking about picking up one of the FN 308.

[SteveWag]

I have seen a pretty wide range of successful calibers used to punch holes in PAPER at 600 and 1000 yards. 308 Win out of a bolt gun at both ranges. Out of a gas gun a lot of 308s go sub-sonic before reaching the 1000-yard target, some pretty hot hand loads are required when using an M14. 223 is fine to 600-yards and is iffy at 1000, but can do the job with good hand loads and a hi-rate twist. 22-250, a bunch of 6mm, the same for 6.5mm, 7x57, 7-08, 260, 30-06 work well, not to many magnums being used. For 1000 yard shooting, heavy, long bullets with high ballistic coefficients driven at 2900-3000 FPS do well. Good bullets are easier to find in 224, 6.5, 7 and 30 caliber/mm. 25 caliber is a black hole. Reloading is a must. If I were forced to use an off-the-shelf rifle, a Savage 12 F/TR in 308. My personal is a 22-250/1in9 twist using Hornady 75 Gr. A-Max bullets.
Steve