270 Win vs 7mm Rem Mag

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fire4hunter

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This is the situation I cannot decide between the 270 Win and 7mm Rem Mag.
These are the only 2 calibers I'm interested in. I know about the 280, in between for what I want and want to be able to find ammo if I forget my handloaded stuff. 270 wsm might as well step up to the 7mm Rem Mag. I have a 300 wsm in the tikka t3. I like it, it shoots good but kicks hard. I can shoot it fine but it's not real fun. I know a hunting gun is a hunting gun but I want to be able to shoot my hunting gun allot and have fun doing it. Pretty much decided on a model 700. here is what I plan to do with it. Hunt dear, black bear, some elk. 98% of shoots inside 250 yards, but I would like to be able to if the situation presents itself to be able to reach out to 500 yards. I know the 7mm is better but am looking for the lightest recoil. Can the 270 take elk out to 500. I would appreciate any real experience. I have looked at all the ballistic tables I know the 7mm puts out about 300-400 more ft-lbs at anyrange recoil is about 19.5 ft. lbs 270 is about 17 ft. lbs. again any help. leaning towards the 270 but if it can't do it I would like to know. Thank you
 
.270 will be more efficient for handloading, particularly for practice/prairie dog ammo. As you already have a .300 WSM, why would you need a 7mm Mag?
 
Looking for an all around gun. I got the tikka because it's light, maybe to light it kicks hard. I don't notice it when I'm hunting but I shoot allot too and I notice it then. I can't get very much after market (no stocks) for the tikka to make it heavier. I want to hunt with the same gun I shoot for fun. just looking to put the tikka away for in the gun safe and get an all around hunting gun I like to shoot and that is fun to shoot I like the 270 but I'm not sure ethical it is to take that ever rare shoot out to 500. Pretty sure its fine for deer but not sure if the 270 win. is up tp a black bear / elk at 500. also I know the 7mm rem mag is very accurate is the 270 able to achieve the same level? I suspect is it but dont have any experience with either one.
 
I have a .270 with 24" barrel, and with handloads, it will push a 150 grain bullet to 2950 f/sec. That should poke a hole through an elk's lungs sufficient to kill it.....

I just can't see a 7mm Mag as an all-around gun, at least for me. The idea of shooting 150 rounds of that at prairie dogs in a day just does not sound appealing..... 150 rounds of .270 (100gr SP over 47gr IMR 4064 for 3,000 f/sec) is no sweat.
 
thanks for your help. I'm leaning toward the 270 win. I just want to kill what I'm shooting at cleanly and responsibly. I don't want to kill it a lot :)
 
"...Can the 270 take elk out to 500...Pretty sure its fine for deer..." Not at 500. Marginal energy with a 130 grain bullet that drops like a rock between 300 and 400 yards with a 200 yard zero. A 140 grain bullet is worse, ballistically.
Can you hit a 9" pie plate, with any calibre, every time, at 500 yards? If you can't, don't take the shot. The kill zone on large game isn't as big as you'd think. A big whitetail deer is only about a yard, top to bottom, side on. The kill zone is half that and it's not much bigger on an elk. Or a moose. Bears aren't as big as you'd think either. Being able to hit a 9" pie, every time, off hand(standing), at 100 yards, is a good unit of shooting skill measure. 9" isn't very big at 500 yards. Paper pie plates are cheap targets for range shooting too.
Did you buy the Tikka or is it on the list? Look into a .30-06 and 165 grain bullets. Still marginal at 500, but much more reliable.
"...a hunting gun is a hunting gun..." Not exactly. There are ways of reducing the felt recoil that won't cost you a month's rent/morgage payment. Most of us spend more time on a range than we do hunting. A recoil pad makes a huge difference and they're not terribly expensive. $29.99 for a Limbsaver slip on. Pachmayr makes one that works well for $12. Had one on my 1903A4.
 
1. If you want significantly less recoil than the 300 WSM, get the 270 Win.

2. With the right ammo, the 270 Win. should be as accurate as the 7mm Rem. Mag.

3. Five hundred yards is a stretch for a 300 WSM, a 7mm Rem. Mag. and for a 270 Win. and more of a stretch for the majority of shooters. Once you get past 400 yards, the bullet drip difference for each 50 yard increment gets quite large; in other words, a range miscalculation of even a few yards or erroneous ballistic estimations easily translate into a miss or wounded animal at 500 yards. I have little doubt, however, that with the right bullet put in the right place a 270 Win. would kill an elk at 500 yards.
 
To echo Sunray:
500 yds. is a long way out there.
Perhaps under ideal conditions (read that RANGE conditions) you can hit a pie plate consistantly @ 500 yds,
Field/hunting conditions are vastly different. There will be no shooting bench. Odds are the shot will be hurried. Wind conditions will be unfamiliar. etc., etc.
You must be intimately familiar with your equipment: What is my drop at 500 yds? (Do you have a range finder, will you have time to use it?) Do you have a "trick", "ranging reticle" (Leupolds "Boone and Crockett", etc.), OR can you guesstimate holdover accurately. (The difference in drop from 400 to 500 yds. is 16"+.)
I've made several 500 yd+ shots on game, but they were under "ideal" field conditions: solid rest, no rush-time to range target, process info, etc. This is more "sniping", than hunting in my book.
I will admit to one "blown shot" on a Whitetail. Range was 587 yds., 10 min. before dark. From a solid rest I took the shot, "guesstimating" holdover. With the shot the buck dropped immediately. I started towards the deer, he got to his feet and took off into the trees/brush. I had hit him high in the back, but not a spine shot (so much for "guesstimating" holdover). I spent an hour looking for a blood trail with a flashlight, gave up and got my bird dogs. They tracked him in 40 min., end of story.
The point being, I WOULD NOT purchase a rifle/cartridge for it's ability to make 500 yd. shots consistantly. With the proper bullet and perfect shot placement, either the .270 or 7mm mag will do the job.
The weak link will be the shooter.
 
To anwser Sunray I own a tikka t3 in 300 wsm and I have the limb savers recoil pad made a HUGE differance. I est the recoil to be around 26-28lbs of recoil because the only info I could find for my 6.5 lbs rifle is with 180 gr bullets and it states that it would be 30 lbs. Everyone is making a good point about the range. I don't believe I would ever take but a couple long shots in my life. 500 is what I figure would ever be my max. I would never plan on taking a shot like this with out a proper rangefinder super calm wind conditions, and rock steady rest of some kind you can find these in the field. I also plan on figuring out my ballistics with my load and ordering a custom bullet drom compensating turret. I think this would be an extremely rare opportunity to take a shot like this, but if it ever happens I want to know the gun can do it. Right now I'm only comfortable out to 250. I have shot this and am hitting clay pigeons 8 out 10 times at this range and the misses are just barely, these are a lot smaller than 9 in pie plates.
 
Also I know that a shooter is the weak link in a shot out to 500 but lets just assume I know what am doing and am capable of making this shot. I am not at this point but would never take a shot at a range I have not made many times before. I have made a bad shot on a deer and it was a horrible experince my second animal gut shot it I live in western Wa so if it runs into away two far and gets into heavy brush you have to almost trip over it to find it. It went about 150 yards and I had 4 people helping me look 2 of us got within in 10 ft of it without seeing it. Didn't find it till 6 days later when the coyotes dragged it out of his hiding place and spread deer hair all over the place. I almost quit hunting but decided that I just need to pratice shooting more, slow dow and not rush the shot if I can't get comfortable with my position before the animal leaves then I miss my chance to get the animal I not going to rush the shot again. I never want to feel that way again I was sick over it. So same applies if I am not comfortable shooting to a certain range I wont take it. Passed on a Big black bear last year was probably 300-350 yrds out didn't have my range finder and never shot that far before, hard to let that big guy go but I sure feel better than if I had taken the shot wounded him and then never found him.
 
A 500 yard elk rifle is really a specialized tool.

A .270 is a fine elk rifle within reasonable ranges.

500 yards is starting to get pretty darn unreasonable for most calibers that we hunt with.
 
While Im a big fan of the .270 there are a lot more bullets to select from for the .280.
 
At 500 yards, the issue is less the cartridge than the shooter's skill. Yeah, the Maggie shoots flatter than a .270, but it ain't flat, flat, flat like a laser. And wind will drift the Maggie's bullet: Granted, less than a .270, but still enough to cause a gut shot instead of a heart hit.

IMO, anybody without hundreds and hundreds of rounds of experience, with much of it in "way out there" practice, who goes to slinging lead at a 500-yard elk just really hadn't oughta. Folks do, and folks do kill stuff--but they do a lot of wounding, as well...

With that in mind, then, I'd recommend the .270 and some good used reloading equipment and a fair amount of shooting. Get all married up with the rifle, and you find that you can keep on extending how far you can hit.
 
Jeff Cooper said that anything over about 200 yards is not hunting, it's guessing. He felt a real HUNTER should be able to stalk to within a couple hundred yards of his game.

200 yards is a LONG way off, and the problem is not the gun, it's the hunters ability to hold steady enough in hunting conditions to make a good shot at that range. Experience shows the majority of today's hunters can't.
 
Keith, I've read Chairman Jeff's comment on that, and it's one of the few areas where I disagree with him. The caveat, here, is that I grew up with the idea that anybody ought to be able to hit most anything out to 300 yards with iron sights, and my father proved in front of witnesses on several occasions that 500 yards was not a safe distance from which to stand and look at him. So to me, 200 yards is not all that big a deal.

I realize full well that not everybody has had the opportunity and experience or even given a hoot about developing the skill and expertise to feel comfortable with shots out past 200 yards.

My objection, I guess, stems from Jeff's rather arbitrary judgement in that matter...

And the last buck I killed was out at a rompin' stompin' 30 yards. I felt plumb ashamed to use a rifle, at pistol-distance. But, I didn't have a pistol...

:), Art
 
This is the situation I cannot decide between the 270 Win and 7mm Rem Mag.
These are the only 2 calibers I'm interested in. I know about the 280, in between for what I want and want to be able to find ammo if I forget my handloaded stuff. 270 wsm might as well step up to the 7mm Rem Mag. I have a 300 wsm in the tikka t3. I like it, it shoots good but kicks hard. I can shoot it fine but it's not real fun. I know a hunting gun is a hunting gun but I want to be able to shoot my hunting gun allot and have fun doing it. Pretty much decided on a model 700. here is what I plan to do with it. Hunt dear, black bear, some elk. 98% of shoots inside 250 yards, but I would like to be able to if the situation presents itself to be able to reach out to 500 yards.

I know the 7mm is better but am looking for the lightest recoil.
Click to expand...

From the highlighted parts in the above paragraph I don't know why you'd pick the 7mmRM over the .270 Win.

What you're looking for in a new rifle.

  1. You're looking for a flat shooting accurate rifle that will reach out to 500 yds.
  2. You want a rifle that won't kick the hell out of you with recoil.
  3. You want to shoot it enough to get good with it, that means you need a pretty good supply of ammo for practice and that you need the best price you can get (ammo for the .270 is less expensive than ammo for the 7mmRM).

Sounds like you've already talked yourself into it, you just need a push.
 
When I got my 7 mag, I was looking at the .280, very similar to the .270, but with a better selection of bullets at the time. I really like the 7mm bore. But, I thought, "Ya know, I can load the 7 mag down if I don't like full power loads, but I can't load the 280 to match the 7 mag. So, I got the 7 mag. A couple years later and the 7STW was the "must have". Hell, it never ends, LOL!
 
There is hardly a lick of difference between the 270 and the 7mm Mag when you get down to it. The Big 7 does have a slight edge. IMO, you're wasting a great rifle in the 300wsm. As stated by fire4hunter get a recoil management system and use that fine rifle. If you reload, you can load to '06 levels and reduce recoil that way. And let's not even talk about 500 yd shots because the average hunter cannot keep consistent hits in the kill zone at that range.
No one needs an excuse to buy another rifle and you'll do what you want, but the 300wsm in that Tikka is a great big game rifle. That would be my elk rifle if I owned it.

NCsmitty
 
fire4hunter,
For what it's worth most of the elk, moose & deer I have shot have been with a 270 Win. stoked with Federal factory load (P270E) 150grain Nosler Partitions at 2850 out of the muzzle. My current 270 is a Tikka T3 Lite Hunter. A very accurate out of the box rifle. However I am pondering going with a recently purchased Ruger M77(tang safety) 338 Win Mag as my one gun for all my North American big game hunting. A point to ponder before you purchase your rifle.

Good Luck,
P95 FAN
 
You can chunk heavier, better BC/SD bullets with a 7mm. Why NOT the 7 mag? It's more gun, costs the same, plentiful ammo out there for it. I had a guy give me some 160 Fed premiums with Nosler Partitions. They are very accurate and shoot 1/2" below my handloads in my gun if I ever need the factory loads on a trip.

The Mag will give you a hundred more usable yards, especially on a heavy critter like an elk, not so much on deer. But, it it carries more energy farther out for big game. Flat shooting, hard hitting long range gun. I like mine, anyway. I never got on the .270 bandwagon. Was going to get a .280 until I realized I could load a 7 down to .280 levels, but I can't load a .280 up to match the magnum. And, I didn't have a belted mag. In the Savage 110, .280 was the same price, the same gun, so what the hell, get the bigger gun was what I figured was the thing to do. Don't like the power level, think it's too much, load it down some. No biggy.

I push a 150 to around 3200 fps, btw. I chronographed the Federal load, but don't recall the velocity. It was as hot as the manuals, though. Can't really get much more out of the magnum by handloading in my experience. I settled on Reloader 22 for the powder, seems to work the best for me.
 
Could I be so bold as to recommend the .270 weatherby magnum. I know many folks have some bad views on weatherby rifles but I love my MK V in .270 wby. It drives a 150 grain bullet at 3250fps. More than enough to take an elk in my opinion.
 
I have 270 and 280 barrels for my Sig SHR. I settled on the 280, no particular reason. Personally, I would take the 270 over the 7mm Mag. I don't ever see myself taking a shot on game over 300yds and the 270 would meet those needs. Nothing wrong with the 7 though. There is tremendous flexibility in the 280. I have 175gr NP that I used for moose all the way down to 100gr hollow points for varmints.
 
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