.223 v 25-06

[Sharkey]

Varmint ....... If only the two choices which one

.223 or 25-06 ........ I like the 25-06 cause I reload ........ .223 Cheap to buy

I am looking for a heavy barrel varminter remington 700 probably ......

I will be looking to trade a Smith and Wesson model B .243 made in Sweden ..... Husqvarna Vapenfabriks AB serial 36#### ....... I just don't need another caliper to feed .... LOL

[MOUNTAINORACLE]

With the two choices available I to me it's a no brainer get the .25-06.

[hunterdan]

With the two choices available I to me it's a no brainer get the .25-06.

+1, longer range, and more versatile.

[Tomcat088]

Varmint ....... If only the two choices which one

.223 or 25-06 ........ I like the 25-06 cause I reload ........ .223 Cheap to buy

I am looking for a heavy barrel varminter remington 700 probably ......

I will be looking to trade a Smith and Wesson model B .243 made in Sweden ..... Husqvarna Vapenfabriks AB serial 36#### ....... I just don't need another caliper to feed .... LOL

Hmm, I don't quite get why people are answering the way they are, but whatever, everybody has different opinions. In my opinion, the 25-06 is traditionally a medium to big game cartridge. I mean you have a quarter bore projectile being pushed fast out of .30-06 brass. It's moving at a very good clip, carries a lot of kinetic energy, and is very lethal. With that said, it's by no means an optimum varmint cartridge, especially if that's the main use of the rifle. From how you worded things, that's what it sounds like the intended use of the rifle is. You like the idea of the .25-06 because you reload, and that's fine. Have you considered that every single component of that reload will cost more than components of some other caliber? You'll be using a significantly larger amount of powder, more expensive brass, and more expensive bullets, with less bullet options. Sure there are getting to be more quarterbore options, but compared to some other more common calibers, they're behind. Because of the extra powder, you'll heat the barrel up faster. Most varmints are pretty wary of noise, and so in situations where you'd be taking multiple animals or shots, the noise signature is going to be WAY louder from the .25-06. You'll shoot out barrels significantly faster, if you do any kind of varmint hunting that has a sustained rate of fire, or where you're shooting a fair amount of rounds downrange.

Honestly, it's just WAY overkill for a varmint rifle. People try to justify it by "it's so versatile" and "it has a way longer range", but that's not true. If you want a .25-06 simply because you want one, that's fine, but it's definitely not even close to an optimum varmint rifle.

Saying that the .25-06 has a longer range isn't really presenting the facts. Sure, it shoots flatter than some other cartridges, but that doesn't mean that it has a longer range, it just means it shoots flatter. Sometimes this is handy with significant differences in unknown distance shots, but at the distances most people shoot at, it's not going to have that big of an advantage, and plenty of disadvantages. It's not that difficult to make hits on coyotes at 500 yards with a .223, IF someone knows their ballistics and can read the wind. That's what far too many people don't understand, no "laser beam" caliber is going to make up for a shooters experience or skill. If you can't read wind, and don't have good fundamentals, you won't make more hits with a .25-06 at 500 yards, than you would with a .223 at that distance. Sure, it gives you a little bit larger margin of error, but the shooter still has to have the correct knowledge to utilize the either caliber.

To the OP, you mention not needing another "caliber to feed". So does that mean you already have a .223, and a .25-06? I understand that you want a different rifle, possibly a Remington 700 action, and a heavy barrel. If you don't already own a .223 and a .25-06, I'd seriously consider just staying with the .243. It won't burn up barrels as fast as the .25-06, it doesn't use as much powder, good quality and affordable brass, TONS of bullet choices in terms of weight and design. BR and competition guys shoot .243 and it's derivatives to 1,000 yards all the time. I assure you it's "longer range" than most guys can utilize their .25-06. You can reload the .243 with lighter bullets to be moving at a good clip and little recoil. You can reload it with heavier bullets for better long range performance, and it's able to deliver enough kinetic energy to take big game.

Honestly, if I was you, I'd stick with .223 or .243 if those are the only options. For a dedicated varmint rifle, I wouldn't really even consider .25-06 too seriously in the running. The .223 is a great varmint cartridge, and even it can be utilized at ranges longer than most people can accurately shoot. Too many people put an emphasis on the "bow", and not enough emphasis on the "Indian". That's just my take on it anyway.

[edritchey]

Toncat088 said that so well I'm not going to bother to add my .02.

[MOUNTAINORACLE]

Honestly, if I was you, I'd stick with .223 or .243 if those are the only options. For a dedicated varmint rifle, I wouldn't really even consider .25-06 too seriously in the running. The .223 is a great varmint cartridge, and even it can be utilized at ranges longer than most people can accurately shoot. Too many people put an emphasis on the "bow", and not enough emphasis on the "Indian". That's just my take on it anyway.

Tomcat: I have been shooting Varmints for well over 40 years and agree with most of what you posted but the OP asked for a choice of between the .223 & 25-06 the 243 wasn't offered in the mix. I stand behind the choices of the .25-06 between the 2 options .25-06 can be out as far as 900 + yards on varmints.

If we are adding calibers I will mention a few others that I own and have used over the years. For ranges under 500 yards I like the 220 Swift & 22-250.

Stepping up to 500 + yards this when the 500 + yards 6 mm Remington or 6mm BR are what the doctor ordered.

If the shooting is out to 800 yards or more that's when you step up to the 6mm Ackley Improved.

[Sharkey]

The reason the toss up is that I have all three calipers in rifle form .....

The S&W in .243 which is too nice for me ..... More I research more I find it's rare ...... (willing to trade for the right rifle)

The 25-06 remingtom 700 vintage 1969 my first and only varmint/deer rifle
I have reloaded and took hogs and deer out to 150 .... But it's just an ADL .... Looking to drive tacks

The .223 is an AR that I just put together and like the round

Want to start throwing it out there what I want .... but it is the what I want I need to know
I always put to much thought into a purchase/trade .... LOL

I love the 25-06 because I know it and have reloaded it .... .223 is new to me

Thanks for the response

[41 mag]

While the 25-06 is by far one of my favorite calibers, with 115 Gr Nosler partitions @ 3000 FPS, It is a deer / black bear caliber. The .223 is a fine long range gun for varmit. If shots exceed 400 yds. a heavier bullet, such as the 80 or 90 Gr A-Max or Berger fit the bill. Problem is the standard twist rate is not suited to these bullet weights. My 2 cents say hang onto the .243

[Tomcat088]

Tomcat: I have been shooting Varmints for well over 40 years and agree with most of what you posted but the OP asked for a choice of between the .223 & 25-06 the 243 wasn't offered in the mix. I stand behind the choices of the .25-06 between the 2 options .25-06 can be out as far as 900 + yards on varmints.

If we are adding calibers I will mention a few others that I own and have used over the years. For ranges under 500 yards I like the 220 Swift & 22-250.

Stepping up to 500 + yards this when the 500 + yards 6 mm Remington or 6mm BR are what the doctor ordered.

If the shooting is out to 800 yards or more that's when you step up to the 6mm Ackley Improved.

The OP said that he didn't want another caliber to feed, which I why I asked what I did. He didn't throw .243 into the mix, but he already owns the caliber. I didn't just randomly pick it out of thin air, although that could have been possible. I would also consider some other calibers, although I wouldn't necessarily recommend any in a major way over the .243.

People can say that they shoot varmints with .25-06 at 900 or 1,000 yards, all they like. The truth of the matter is, they're doing it the same as they'd do with lots of other calibers, and they're walking rounds on target. Sure the .22-250, and .220 swift are great varmint calibers, just like lots of guys love the .204. Either way, as a well rounded round, barrel life, ease of reloading, etc. the OP will be hard pressed to find better performance than the caliber he already owns, .243 Winchester. That's perfectly fine if you want to limit it to a 500 yard caliber, but I dang sure wouldn't. It's also interesting to me that you'd limit the effective range of the .243 to 500 yards, and then want to give the AI variant an extra 300 yards. I hate to break it to you, but it's not gaining that much velocity, a bit. Due to the weights of the bullets and inertia, you're still not going to see a huge drastic difference between the two at 800 yards, just a bit.

What is funniest to me about all of that, is that you put the .25-06 as a 900+ yard caliber for varmints. Let's look at the ballistics and actually see what they say, and what's happening. First let's take the crazy scenario of shooting the .243 longer ranges, and do it with the heavy bullet, that the .243 can only push so fast. Then we'll talk about doing it with the normal "varmint bullets". All numbers are run under standard temp, barometric presure, atmospheres (sea level), etc. So let's look at a .243 shooting a 105 Hornady A-max, they blow up pretty well on varmints; I know from experience. The 105 grain A-max has a G1 BC of .500 (impressive), and the .243 is able to push the 105 grain bullets in the 2,980fps range. We'll just run a standard 10 mph crosswind for comparison. Then we'll run the 75 Hornady V-max with a G1 BC of .330 and pushing at the wikipedia velocity of 3,450 fps. I'll run them in Berger's ballistic calculator with those numbers, and let's see what it comes up with.

.243 105 A-max G1 B.C. = .500@2,980 fps
Range (yards) Velocity (fps) Energy (ft-lb) Trajectory (inches) TOF (sec) Drift (inches)

0 2980 2070 -1.50 0.0000 0.00
100 2787 1811 -0.00 0.1041 -0.61
200 2602 1578 -2.98 0.2155 -2.50
300 2425 1371 -11.11 0.3349 -5.81
400 2255 1185 -25.15 0.4632 -10.68
500 2091 1020 -46.05 0.6014 -17.28
600 1935 873 -74.91 0.7505 -25.81
700 1787 744 -113.07 0.9118 -36.49
800 1647 632 -162.14 1.0868 -49.57
900 1516 536 -224.06 1.2767 -65.29
1000 1396 455 -301.13 1.4830 -83.89


.243 75 gn Nosler BT G1 B.C. = .330@3,450fps
Range (yards) Velocity (fps) Energy (ft-lb) Trajectory (inches) TOF (sec) Drift (inches)

0 3550 2378 -1.50 0.0000 0.00
100 3220 1957 -0.00 0.0888 -0.75
200 2913 1601 -1.86 0.1867 -3.13
300 2627 1303 -7.84 0.2952 -7.35
400 2359 1050 -18.88 0.4157 -13.69
500 2107 838 -36.19 0.5503 -22.51
600 1872 661 -61.37 0.7014 -34.23
700 1654 517 -96.52 0.8719 -49.38
800 1459 402 -144.45 1.0651 -68.52
900 1291 315 -208.77 1.2840 -92.17
1000 1157 253 -293.99 1.5299 -120.60


Now let's have a look at the .25-06. You're about to have lots to throw a fit about, so we'll run two scenarios. We can push the lighter weight bullets much faster, which is more the varmint style, or we can push a similar weight bullet a bit faster, because it is a .25-06 right, take advantage of the weight. This first scenario is pushing a 117 grain Hornady BTSP that has a G1 BC of .391 and Wikipedia lists it pushing a 115 bullet at 3,000 fps, so let's even give it a little extra and run it at 3,100 fps and the same 10 mph cross wind. Then we'll also run it pushing some lighter "varmint style" bullets. That would be something like an 85 grain Nosler Ballistic tip moving 3,550. That's the load on Midway for the Federal Premium V-shok ammo. The 85 Nosler Ballistic tip has a G1 B.C. of .329.

.257 117gn Hornady BTSP G1 B.C. = .391@3,100 fps
Range (yards) Velocity (fps) Energy (ft-lb) Trajectory (inches) TOF (sec) Drift (inches)

0 3100 2496 -1.50 0.0000 0.00
100 2847 2106 -0.00 0.1010 -0.75
200 2609 1769 -2.80 0.2110 -3.09
300 2383 1476 -10.72 0.3313 -7.24
400 2169 1222 -24.77 0.4633 -13.43
500 1966 1004 -46.24 0.6085 -21.97
600 1776 819 -76.73 0.7691 -33.20
700 1599 664 -118.29 0.9472 -47.52
800 1439 538 -173.49 1.1451 -65.32
900 1298 438 -245.53 1.3648 -86.97
1000 1182 363 -338.23 1.6074 -112.64

.257 85 gn Nosler BT G1 B.C. = .329@3,550fps

Range (yards) Velocity (fps) Energy (ft-lb) Trajectory (inches) TOF (sec) Drift (inches)

0 3550 2378 -1.50 0.0000 0.00
100 3220 1957 -0.00 0.0888 -0.75
200 2913 1601 -1.86 0.1867 -3.13
300 2627 1303 -7.84 0.2952 -7.35
400 2359 1050 -18.88 0.4157 -13.69
500 2107 838 -36.19 0.5503 -22.51
600 1872 661 -61.37 0.7014 -34.23
700 1654 517 -96.52 0.8719 -49.38
800 1459 402 -144.45 1.0651 -68.52
900 1291 315 -208.77 1.2840 -92.17
1000 1157 253 -293.99 1.5299 -120.60

Wow, that's interesting, isn't it? Obviously for longer ranges, the .25-06 does better with heavy bullets, that sounds about right, sure. Let's look at the .243 that's pushing a 105 grain bullet, not quite as fast, and at 1,000 yards, what happens? Well, amazingly, the .243 has 37" LESS drop than the .25-06, that's more than 3 feet. Then let's look at the wind drift at 1,000 yards for the 117gn .257 vs. 105 gn .243. Amazingly, the .243 has 28 3/4" LESS wind drift at 1,000 yards. When you're shooting at small targets like varmints, it sure seems like the .243 would have a MUCH larger margin of error for a misjudgement in wind than the .25-06. Even when you compare the .243 75 grain bullet vs. the 85 grain bullets from the .25-06, they are almost identical.

Honestly, when you even compare almost apples to apples, the .243 WILL best the .25-06 in any of the bullet ranges that the .243 shoots. Why is that, that doesn't seem to make sense, right? Well, let's look at the parent cartridges, the .308 and the .30-06. The .30-06 has always had a slight edge over the .308, but you spent a lot more powder to get the edge. The .308 put up almost the same performance, but without the barrel wear, as much recoil, or using as much powder. This was all fine and dandy, but you also have to remember that the two cartridges are shooting the same diameters of bullets, so the same weights have the same B.C.'s. Now when you start comparing the .243 vs. the .25-06, you realize that lots of those bullet weights overlap, BUT there is an important difference. Because the .243 has a smaller diameter, similar weight bullets have to be LONGER; a side effect of this is that they will have higher B.C.'s than their .257 caliber counter parts. At long range, B.C. is what will start affecting how fast you bleed off velocity, and how much wind drift and drop you have. So flat out, the .243 WILL hang with the .25-06 even at longer ranges. If you noticed, even shooting the 105 grain bullets at a slower clip, it'll have less drop than the .25-06.

So let's take a step back and think about this. The .25-06 is more to reload in terms of components, it has more recoil, it's louder, it'll heat up the barrel faster, have a shorter barrel life, etc. etc. The numbers aren't lying, and I haven't fudged them a bit, I even gave the .25-06 the benefit of the doubt with the heavier bullets and tacked on an extra 100 fps from the published numbers. It still does NOT outperform the .243 at long range. Even when you look at the more conventional ranges, it still doesn't shoot all that much more "flatter". Almost all of the loadings will have reasonably close velocities, with similar weight projectiles. When that is the case, the 6mm BC's will overcome and outperform, or at least tie the performance of the .25-06 EVERY SINGLE TIME. Where the .25-06 will have a slight advantage is when you get to the heavier bullets for the caliber that finally have comparable BC's to the .243 bullets, but more mass. THEN, and only then, will they finally put more K.E. on target. We've already determined that the .243 has enough K.E. to kill large game, and WAY more than enough even at 1,000 yards to kill varmints. So I just don't see how the .25-06 outperforms the .243.

I'm not trying to be disrespectful MountainOracle, but will you please explain to me why the .243 Winchester (or similar) is only considered a 500 yard cartridge to you, while you consider the .25-06 a 900+ yard varmint cartridge? By the numbers, the .243 is just as good, or better than the .25-06 in all the range of bullets that the .243 shoots. I think you're letting you love of a cartridge get in the way of the ballistics, or you've never really ran the numbers for the ballistics. I don't intend this to be a knock against the .25-06, it's a fun cartridge and definitely has it's place. I still don't like the propagation of myths that get passed off as fact. I really would take the .243 over the .25-06 for a varmint cartridge, and even for long range shooting. That's how I feel, but I'll let the numbers speak for themselves. If ya'll would like me to run some other numbers, let me know, and I'll be happy to run whatever you like for comparison. Still, it's pretty obvious that you can't discount the .243 and blow it off the way it has been.

[dk99358]

The reason the toss up is that I have all three calipers in rifle form .....

The S&W in .243 which is too nice for me ..... More I research more I find it's rare ...... (willing to trade for the right rifle)

Did you buy it as an investment or to hunt/shoot? Hunt that sucker is my opinion. If it has really nice wood, swap it with some sort of aftermarket stock.

The 25-06 remingtom 700 vintage 1969 my first and only varmint/deer rifle
I have reloaded and took hogs and deer out to 150 .... But it's just an ADL .... Looking to drive tacks

If your varmint hunting is once in a while the 25-06 will work but if you're thinking a lot of shooting, recoil and ammo costs will kill you. I've killed an awful lot of groundhogs in the last 35 years with my 270 and 110 Sierras, now I prefer my son's 223 or my 7mm-08 with 100 gr Hornady HP's.

The .223 is an AR that I just put together and like the round

I love the 25-06 because I know it and have reloaded it .... .223 is new to me

Thanks for the response

Reloading 223 is the same as reloading 25-06 unless you get some military brass, then you need to do something with the crimp in the primer pocket. That's not an issue with commercial brass.

My vote of the 2 cartridge choices would be 223, try TAC (it likes to be pushed hard) for a powder with your choice of bullet.

Dale