Yesterday a mate gave me a copy of
"Notes on Sporting Rifles" by Gerald Burrard; third edition, 1932.
What first struck me was the definitions of bore sizes,

LARGE BORE.
A rifle the calibre of which is greater than .600in.

MEDIUM BORE.
A rifle the calibre of which is not greater than .600. nor less than .400 in.

SMALL BORE.
A rifle the calibre of which is less than .400 in.

MAGNUM SMALL BORE.
A small bore rifle which has a M.V. of 2,500 fps or more.

BORE.
Large-bore rifles are not described by the diameter of their bore but by the word "Bore" with a number prefix- e.g., 8-bore, 10 bore, etc.
Well, times have changed and so has the idea of what constitutes a big bore.

A comment he made about the Winchester 270 when writting about rifles for hill shooting,

"The 270 Winchester has too light a bullet and too high a pressure for my liking"

About the 375 Magnum he wrote,

"Looking at the list of magnum small bores, the 375 Magnum will at once strike one on account of its large diametered bullet of good weight and muzzle velocity of 2,800 fps. The result must be extremely flat trajectory and great killing power".

I find the above interesting I hope you do too.

I wonder how old Mr. Burrard was in 1932?
Just noticed that the third printing was 1932. This sounds like pre smokeless attitudes.

To give him his title he was
Major Sir Gerald Burrard, Bt, D.S.O.
In 1932 he was 52, (in 1920 when the book was first published he was 40 yrs old).
The comments on Bore were preceeded by
"The introduction of cordite and other nitro powders towards the end of the last century revolutionised everything. The old definitions can no longer be accepted. Formerly sporting rifles were divided into three catagories, viz: Large bores, Express and miniature" In this chapter I give the details of no less than six different classes of sporting rifles".

This is:

http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j233/Larz16Von19/muzzle.jpg

Bob

Oldun,

I am not at all as technically informed or accomplished as many shooters here are but if you were to talk to some of the old timers in India's many old clubs they may well agree with this logic.

The 270 was not popular in India in the days when guns and ammunition could be imported though the 30-06 was very popular and still is. I guess we got these preferences from the British sportsmen during the Raj.

DGR bigbore?

bulet weight
at least 300 grains
SD
at least .300 (or darn near it)
velocity (muzzle)
at least 2050
ME (yeah it's worthless)
at least 4000 lb-ft

meet ALL those, and it's a big.

fail one, it's questionable and probably souldn't be thought of as a DGR big bore (ex. 500 jeffe, misses SD by a little, or 9,3x63/64 .. misses bullet wieght by a little)

miss more than one, it's not a DGR bigbore

it just has a big hole in the barrel

jeffe

I propose that a 400 gr .400 @ 2000 fps sets the floor. As jeffeosso suggests I agree that an SD of .300 or better must be maintained as the numbers are tweaked upward from there. Smaller bores may be big medicine but unless they're 40 or wider they only aspire to big boredom.

Seem to remember reading recently that at one stage(as in long time ago) any cal below .470 was banned for hunting in some of the British colonies, think India was suggested.

Anyone any idea if this is true? If so when and where?

jeffe...the 411 hawk with a 400 gr @ 2160 meets all those requirements

so does the 50-110 in a blr x2

within reason and common sense i would like to add that bullet design and performance adds a lot to the equation. for example you can scrimp on the s.d. with a flat nose or cup point solid or scrimp on the bore diameter with a nosler partition or north fork because of performance inside the animal

quote:

Originally posted by 416SW:
Seem to remember reading recently that at one stage(as in long time ago) any cal below .470 was banned for hunting in some of the British colonies, think India was suggested.

Anyone any idea if this is true? If so when and where?

45 caliber, as in 577/450, but yeah, all 45 caliber stuff was outlawed... so the natives couldn't couldn't pull bullets and shoot at the british...

which is the 470, 475, 475#2, and I think the 450/400

jeffe

quote:

Originally posted by Omnivorous_Bob:
This is:

http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j233/Larz16Von19/muzzle.jpg

Bob

Now, that's middliin' onto large!

quote:

Originally posted by mehulkamdar:
Oldun,

I am not at all as technically informed or accomplished as many shooters here are but if you were to talk to some of the old timers in India's many old clubs they may well agree with this logic.

The 270 was not popular in India in the days when guns and ammunition could be imported though the 30-06 was very popular and still is. I guess we got these preferences from the British sportsmen during the Raj.

Perhaps. But I see Corbett used a 7X57mm for some of his tiger shooting. I've even seen a couple that were shot wit, of all t'ings, a .22 Savage Hi-Power!

He was right on at least one thing, the .375 H&H hits hard and shoots flat.

I don't have an iron-clad definition of a big bore other than when you take a cartridge out of the casegard 100 people go "what is that & can I shoot one?".

Works for me

Rich

I have shoot "Man eating" Sea Gulls in the Swedish Archipelago with Bofors 40 mm gun, -Traser ammunition of course.

15459 grains bullet at 3135 fps...

quote:

Perhaps. But I see Corbett used a 7X57mm for some of his tiger shooting. I've even seen a couple that were shot wit, of all t'ings, a .22 Savage Hi-Power!

There was a mini high velocity craze before the Raj died and companies like Westley Richards made double rifles in some of the high velocity smallbores like the 250-3000 and 22 Savage Hi-Power. That said, there were probably more animals killed in India with shotguns with ball loadings than all other kinds of guns. It's not what some would like to hear - I was even accused of being "un-sporting" by a member for saying this some time ago.

The popular bolt rifle chamberings included the 7mm Mauser, 6.5 Mannlicher and the 30-06. Sadly, because of ammunition availability issues these days it is only the 30-06 that is popular.

Cheers!