I own two of them and for sure I'm getting a commerative something next year.

I doubt that it'll be Remington's pump however.

I wish they'd resurrect their classic one more year.

I have a 308 - why bother with a 30-06??

quote:

Originally posted by MLG:
I have a 308 - why bother with a 30-06??

Cuz it's not a '06!

Mundane perhaps, but it will never die. But to my mind this is true for most if not all 30 caliber cartridges.

There have been a number of “experts†who have declared the 30-06 as dead. I came across one of them, Col Charles Askins, in a August 1962 Gun World article proclaimed “Is the 30-06 Obsolete?, Our Firearms editor says yes and offers the reasons whyâ€

First he criticizes the 30-06 for being obsolete as a target round. I believe Col Askins is the initiator of that gun writer cultural memory that starts off as “In 1937 Ben Comfort won the Wimbledon Cup with the 300 H&H Magnumâ€. Period. Apparently time stopped, history ended, and nothing of any significance has happened since 1937. The good Col states “for almost thirty years now, the 300 Magge has gotten the nod over the lighter, smaller, and slower cartridge.â€â€¦ “ The ’06 as a far range proposition is as dead as cock robinâ€.

The Good Col is of course playing on the ignorance of the audience. Which was even more ignorant than him about what was going on at the National Matches. Even in 1962 the 30-06 was the most popular cartridge at the National Matches. This was due to many factors a couple of which were free ammo and rules that required shooters to use a service rifle. At that time there were a few 03’s still out there, but the most popular service rifle was the NM M1 Garand. The M14 was something that only the Service Teams had in any quantity. Across the course Match Rifle shooters were required to use the 30-06, or so I have been told by an active shooter of the period. As I recall, Carlos Heathcock won the Wimbleton with a 30-06, and I know of a Mr. Larry Moore who also won the Wimbleton in the 60’s with a 30-06. I bet there were more. The 30-06 was a popular and competitive Long Range Cartridge all the way through that decade. Long Range rifles in 300 H&H are rare enough to be the highlight of a gun collection.

Today the 30-06 is obsolete as a target cartridge, but not for reasons of accuracy. It is still a fine and accurate round. It will shoot within the aiming error of most shooters. There are two basic reasons you don’t see it: it kicks too much, and the availability of sub caliber target grade bullets of much higher ballistic coefficients. Target grade subcaliber bullets were just not around in the 50’s or 60’s. Pushing a bullet an extra 50, 100 fps is not nearly as good as going from a .350 ballistic coefficient to a .6 ballistic coefficient. A bullet with the higher ballistic coefficient will always be less wind sensitive than one with a low ballistic coefficient. When you are shooting against the clock, a tiny wind change will lose you the match, if you didn’t see it and correct for it. Common long range rounds used now are 6.5-284, 6.5-08, 6mm anything, and believe it or not, the 308. The 308 is required for Palma Shooters.

Secondly the good Col criticizes the 06 for being unsafe: “It has a weak case head and is much given to blowing the base end right on out through the receiver ring.â€. Here the good Col has done what is properly called a “cross fireâ€. He put his bullet on the wrong target. I suspect too many free drinks with Remington Factory salesmen addled his brain and got him confused between rifle action design and cartridge design. The 30-06 never had a weak case head. However the M1903 action (which was chambered in 30-06) has a cone breech with significant unsupported cartridge case head between the chamber and the bolt face. Remington created the M700 series of rifles that we know as the M700, and it is much safer in case of a case head rupture.

He then makes the typical velocity, muzzle energy, bullet drop comparisons between the 30-06 and the .264 Winchester, the 300 Weatherby Magnum, the “new†308 Norma Magnum, (“a bright future is predicted for this latest Normaâ€) and the “shining new†7 mm Remington Magnum. And of course he is right, these cartridges are far more powerful when you look at velocity and muzzle energy and bullet drop. The Weatherby is still around, I guess, because Weatherby is still around. At two dollars a round the stuff is for the well heeled customer. The 7mm Rem Mag is still around, because it is an excellent round and fills a niche. The other two, particularly the Norma Mag, are just about on the ash heap of history. I think the promotion of the Norma Mag is proof that the Good Colonel had gotten enough freebies from Norma that he needed to reciprocate with positive print.

In as much as there are cartridges that provide all the virtues of high velocity and low trajectory, very few people can shoot these cannons and hit what they are aiming at. I know I can’t. I was at one Match where I saw one experienced Long Range target shooter with his new 30-338. That was the first and last match that he shot with that rifle. The blood running down his forehead, from a rear sight cut on his brow, had something to do with it. If you are flinching you ain’t hitting. I think it takes a confident person to acknowledge their limited Long Range skills, and it takes real courage to admit to friends that a more powerful cartridge will not compensate for poor marksmanship.

Apparently the Good Colonel was just being a Troll in Print as there are references in the magazine to an earlier article wherein the Good Colonel wrote “Is the Revolver Obsolete?†I guess he was writing a series of articles, all designed to create a strong reaction, in the readership. Truly “Better bad publicity than no publicity at all!â€

Colonel Charles Askins died in 1999 at the age of 90, since then, for all practical purposes “obsoleteâ€, and the 30-06 is still going strong! Yahoo.

And I have a number of 30-06's, most of them target rifles. But when I have gone Deer hunting holding a 30-06, I never felt under gunned. It is still an excellent all around cartridge.

quote:

Originally posted by Dan G:
Am curious what others think about this...

Well, he is certainly an ignorant one now isn't he.

SlamFire, I must commend you for your first post. Nice writing. And Doc, yeah, the kid was, and is, ignorant.