Heard a rumour the other day that Winchester/Browning have conceeded the WSSM's are a big flop and will be discontinued.
Apparently shops are having major difficulty moving them and they are being very heavily discounted.

My local smith is prepared to get rid of his stock at cost and throw in plenty of factory ammo to sweeten the deal.

Cheers...
Boof.

I don't think this is really new news. WInchester screwed up big time, when they started chambering the WSSM cartridges in major percentage of their produced guns and it became dificult at best to find any other chambering. As a for instance look at the Gallery of Guns site and search for winchester Model 70's, (they are a major distributor of WInchester). Then look at how many WSSM rifles are in stock as compared to standard cartridges, very few standard rifles, most with a quanity of "0" in stock on standard cartridges and WSSM rifles galore. This has been like this for many months.

The shooting world other than the gun rag writters, have been less than enthralled by the WSSM cartridges for a while, and when you start looking for a new Winchester in a certain cartridge and configuration and can't find it you move on to other makes.

Yes, Winchesters marketeers screwed the pooch on this one.

Agreed.

There is no reason to halt production of 22-250, 223, 243, 257 Rob etc cartridges in order to make room for production of an entirely new and unfounded cartridge.

Some said that the short fat craze would never come to an end, however 2 years later but for the 300 and 325 WSM's, you hear nary a word in reference to the merits of any other WSM or WSSM.

-Spencer

The WSSMs should never have been born in the first place.........

AD

quote:

Originally posted by allen day:
The WSSMs should never have been born in the first place.........

AD

I previously posted the question.....who did they ask???(meaning the marketing people.....asked who about what they wanted to see in new cartridges)

Allen...as usual your batting 1000 with that post.

I would have bought one, but I shoot LH and it was almost impossibe to find a LH one. I bought the Savage 112 FLV, 223 instead. It was cheaper than any other LH I could find.

quote:

Originally posted by schromf:
.........

The shooting world other than the gun rag writters, have been less than enthralled by the WSSM cartridges for a while,............

Yes, Winchesters marketeers screwed the pooch on this one.

Here's the important part.

Gunwriters pimp anything new. Without new they would have nothing to say and their magazines would have nothing to print. Add in the advertising dollars they recieve and it is no wonder that their are few, if any, honest gunwriters.

They relay on all the pilgrims who beleive everything they read to get a product going, then they hope momentum keeps it going. Unless the product really works it all comes to a screeching halt eventually.

quote:

Originally posted by Mickey1

Here's the important part.

Gunwriters pimp anything new. Without new they would have nothing to say and their magazines would have nothing to print. Add in the advertising dollars they recieve and it is no wonder that their are few, if any, honest gunwriters.

.

You got that right! A friend of mine gave me a copy of the latest Shooting Times. I might as well been reading sales brochures from every firearms/accessory manufacturer in the country. The magazine epitomizes the term "gun rag".

And putting a WSSM in a single shot is ridiculus !!I've felt for some years that we've pretty much filled up the cartridge spectrum. There's a long list of cartridges doomed to failure from the start the WSSM will join them.

What I hear is the .300 WSM is selling, and the .325 is still in the initial surge.

I really didn't understand what the WSSM cartridges were for. There isn't any compelling reason to have a short action varmint rifle because you really don't care how long and heavy the thing is.

Perhaps the WSSM rifles can be converted to something useful like the .376 Steyr.

jim

quote:

Originally posted by ELKMAN2:
I would have bought one, but I shoot LH and it was almost impossibe to find a LH one. I bought the Savage 112 FLV, 223 instead. It was cheaper than any other LH I could find.

I considered getting one last year for deer since it's just about the only .25 you'll find chambered in a factory LH gun but of course any new comes out in left hand about a year after its originally released. I instead ended up with a 7mmRM and do not regret the purchase, especially after seeing how well the 25WSSM is doing.

The WSSM seems like a good idea if you were to have an action specifically suited for it, like a mini. I know next to nothing about them save for the one case of .25 I picked up at the range. I have heard and read that they are bears to get to feed properly. This is probably what killed them?

Maybe when the .243WSSM and 25WSSM are relegated to the obsolete bin, people(marketing from ALL THE MAJOR MANUFACTURERS!!!) will figure out that with the 6mm Remington and the 25-06 Remington that you had about as good as it gets for the 6's and 25's.....especially the 25's!!!
Even Remington only offers one version of the 6mm......the VLS and 2 versions of the 25-06....BDL and CDL!!! The 243 Winchester shows up several times in their current catalog!!
The real screw-up from both sides was the neglecting to base a .25, .264 round off of their original SAUM or WSM cases!!! The SAUM's in my opinion(yes I've got a butthole too!!) were a better case design than the WSM's but marketing timing relegted the SAUM's to the back burner!! The SAUM case versions in 6.5 are starting to show up in the long range crowd and a 25 built on that case may have been a significant player in the market!!
Not meant to flame at all for those who shoot the WSSM's!! I wish you well and hope a lot of varmints receive "their airmail invitations home" thanks to your efforts!! But my bottom line thinking is that they didn't accomplish enough gain for the hype!! I don't read the gun rags anymore because I figured out a long time ago that it was all about the money and advertising dollars!!! I've probably watched more chambers cut, more actions trued, more triggers tuned than a bunch of those guys!!! And I was only 3 hours short of a minor in English from college so I could have probably written a pretty good article or two.....if I was getting paid to do it!!!
I know where there is one of the BROWNING varminters in .243 WSSM that has been on the shelf for about 2 years!! Maybe I can pick it up for $300.00 and get 10 boxes of ammo free with the purchase!!!
And this is coming from a guy WHO does think the .204 Ruger chambering is not a flash in the pan!!!! GHD

I won't shed any tears. I looked briefly at the 25 wssm, but decided I'd much rather have a .25- 308 or a 257 roberts.

I have 243win and 260rem barrels for a savage. The really silly part is it is one of those 110 short actions - just a long action with a stopped bolt and a small magazine hole. What's even more amazing, is that that extra 1/2" just isn't that big a deal. If I wanted a really short action rifle I'd get a Ruger #1.

Yes, as far as performance goes, there are standard bolt-face wildcats, or even semi-mainstream cartridges that will approach or even surpass theie WSSM counterparts.

Just getting started on a 22 CHeeta (look at stevespages to see the dimensions) and it actually surpasses 223 WSSM performance by about a half to a full grain of powder, and I am sure operates at a lower pressure.

Gawd the WSSM's are a dumb idea, who needs a 2 inch action in 404 Jeffrey bolt-face.?

-Spencer

Woo Hoo,
Time to buy some more of those: soon to be cheap, nobody want's one, doesn't feed right, pieces of shit rifle. If they get cheap enough I'll buy one in all the calibers they come up with.

I'm kind of fond of the model 70 winchesters myself. They have a longer magazine than the the Browinings. Feed like a dream in the push feed.

Woo Hoo Time to go shopin

The 17HMR would be the formula for how to do it.
Plane tickets, guns, ammo, and a pre written article for every gun writer in America.

You won't find one in my safe at any price.
I agree with many others the idea should have been aborted.
P.B.

I wish I could have bet on this in Vegas because I would have put at least $1,000 on the odds that most of the new cartridges would flop. They just don't make any practical sense. The marketing experts at the Winchester and Remington need to back and take basic marketing over.

Whatever this fiasco ends up costing, wouldn't it have been good to have that money spent on improving Quality of the existing rifles.
There's talk of Mag writers being pimps, well they outdid themselves on the benifit of a 1/2" shorter action, stiffer, more accurate, and so (few) ounces lighter.
And Wins own published ads, with 30 cal anyway, showed a miniscule difference of drop at 300 yards.
Enough people have feeding problems now, so why make it possibly worse?
Cripes, the present (old) cartridges were better than most peoples shooting ability at the longer ranges.
John L.

I think "Pimps" is a little harsh.

In my experience, there's two sides of the hall. You got your "Editorial" side; yep, some English majors, Levis with holes in them, and loafers that need new soles.

Some a little weird. I had one newspaper colleague who would wait until the last minute before deadline, then come in and write her stories all the while sipping her pint of cheap brandy.

Then you got your "Sales" side of the hall. I expect it's different for the Gun mags, but basically the idea is Armani suits--guess who makes all the money?--and girls in tailored outfits and F*ck-Me pumps.

Slick talkers, all.

Historically, that hall was the Great Divide, and never the twain would meet.

"The New Yorker" is, I think, the only magazine left where the sales people don't tell the editorial folks what to write.

Still, look around: It's not just magazines, it's everywhere. On a higher level, MBAs rule the world.

People who have never created anything.

Little substance, just merchandising.

flaco

N.B. All that said, seems like attrition in gun publishing is rampant. I regret the loss of all gun publications.

Do you think the situation would be different if editorial did more than take up the space between the ads?

Don't know, but there is probably good and bad pimps, and it's getting that way I just buy the gun mags FOR the ads. I love a bargin especially.

And I sorley miss the old gunwriters, Jordan,Keith, etc. They could write about nothing and still be interesting.
John L.

quote:

Originally posted by flaco:
I think "Pimps" is a little harsh.

I think of gun writers as whores.
"Give me the money and I will do the immoral thing you desire."

That would make the gun rag publishers..... pimps.

FYI,

The WSMs ain't settin the world on fire out in these parts either....Lots being cleared out as we speak.

...Seems the craze has come and gone....good riddence!

Jeff

"these new fangled things aren't selling very well"

wonder if this was said about cartridge, vs muzzleloaders... pinfires... rimmless cases, and belted cases....


in fact, gents, the wsm aint anything but a 284 with a full (slightly rebated) rim...


the wssm is worthless, to me... and has me wondering how much work they'll be to convert to something else.

jeffe

I think Winchester got on a role and dreamt up some more "mysterious" and "interesting" calibers. Most bullet manufacturers that I spoke with were, 1) less than impressed, and 2) scratching their heads wondering why the hell all of these "fad" calibers came about.

I am not for or against the WSSM line. I do not own one and never even considered it.