With my 338 Ultra Mag shooting a 250 gr bullet at 3020fps would give me over 5000 foot pounds, right?, so would that be enought to kill a Lion in Africa?

If you do your part and put the right bullet in the right place the lion is dead meat not only in Africa but any other continent you chose to shoot him. Check on your local zoo open seasons. It's been a great Sunday. roger

Well heck yes! That and every other animal that walks the earth as long as a properly constructed bullet for the particular animal is used.

Where would be a good spot to shoot him at. If he were coming at me I would shoot him in the head, the bullet would be a nosler partistion. Other wise I would know where the heart is at and shoot it. My hunting partner said that my 338 ultra mag with 5000 foot pounds could kill a lion. I also own a Rem 416 mag.but was surprized to think that a 338 bullet [nosler] could do that also. Thats why I asked. What about the Cape buffalo?

jro45,

If you're for real, then I suggest that you buy a couple of books and do some reading.

Two good ones:

SAFARI RIFLES by Craig Boddington

and

THE PERFECT SHOT by Kevin "Doctari" Robertson

Both are available from Safari Press.

http://www.safaripress.com/

-Bob F.

The .333 OKH was originally designed as just the right cartridge for shooting AFRICAN lions in AFRICA with the hunter present.We are talking a lot less energy and with a bullet a little smaller in diameter.

Maybe someone remembers where it is written that more lions have been killed with the .303 British cartridge than any other individual cartridge. Is this correct or is my memory getting a little faulty? roger

For your information, a Scotsman named W.D.M. Bell killed well over 800 elephant (of his total of 1011!!) with a 7X57mm Mauser shooting 175 grain full-jacketed bullets, and quite a few others with the 6.5X54 Mannlicher/Schoenauer round using a mere 160 grain solid.



Mrs. Jack O'Connor killed her elephant with a .30/'06, (220 grain Hornady solid) and Finn Aagard killed his first Cape Buffalo with the German 8X60S cartridge!



In addition to the books listed above, I would add Bell's Wanderings of an Eleophant Hunter and Karamojo Safari. These should get you thinking!!

I have read all those books. Really liked the [I have it in my attic] one about Bell when he was killing an Elephant also the Capstick books are all good reads. I plan to go to Africa one day in a not so far away future. Also what I asked is some good info to know anyway.

I remember reading about the perfic hunting caliber the 303
and all the fighting on the railroad and the lions killing the military men and the ditch that was used to kill a lion walking over it with kilamajaro in the ditch. Thats good reading.

Once we get into dangerous game territory, no one measure of POTENTIAL effectiveness is sufficient, and foot pounds of kinetic energy is one of the worst.

With that said, when you combine the other factors such as sectional density, bullet diameter, momentum, etc., the round you mention will be about 92% as effective as a 300 gr bullet in .375 caliber clocking 2530 fps.

Close enough to the 375 H&H to do the job, but don't get overconfident and assume you have room to wiggle out of a mistake...you DON'T.

Thanks Sabot. If I ever felt that my 338 Ultra Mag could not do the job shooting a 250 gr Nosler partition bullet at 3020 fps I would not use it.I'd use something bigger. I was just wondering what the potentional was for it to kill a lion and maybe a cape buffalo. I know I'm talking big maybe to big cape buffalo.