I have no experience with the 357 Maximum, but to paraphrase someone here whose handle is unrecalled--"There's no replacement for displacement"--meaning the boiler room. I've always thought the 357 Max would make a great lever action rifle cartridge that could conceivable handle 357 mag and 38 Special rounds as well, but that's just musing.
That said, I greatly love the 357 Magnum. Had my agency included the 357 Magnum to the caliber choices it authorized in 1987 when it added the 9 x 19 Parabellum and 45 ACP, it would have been a tough choice between changing ammo in my 4" 357s or re-equipping with the bottom-feeders. 357s didn't get added until 1994--only 60 years for that one to bubble up. At the same time (1994) my shop added the 40 S&W, which was 5 years old. Hey, I just worked there.
I'll steer this back into the thread's lane a bit now. The 357 needs a bit of barrel length to reap the benefits that the 180-200 bullets have to offer. In 2015 my old shop shifted gears with the 357 loadings from the 1994 load (W-W Super-X 158 grain JHP) to the Federal #357B--the 125 grain JHP that claims 1450 FPS on paper--it runs 1425-1435 FPS from my 4" 686, so 'Close enough for government work' methinks. The premise was that the old load wasn't showing expansion when fired from the J-frame 2" guns that most of the deputies were hauling around as back-up/off-duty disincentivizers, while the Federal 125s did. There is that barrel length aggravator--showing its teeth again, even for the Jello blasters.
My 357s have barrel lengths of 4", 6", 6.5", 7.5", and 18". My biases are obvious here--hunting and heavy-for caliber bullets.
One side-note before I stop hacking at you all......cylinder-to-forcing come gap makes a difference, too. My 4" 686 shoots all full-value loads 75-125 FPS faster than my pre-27 S&W N-frame x 6.5"--religiously. WTH? Short answer is that the 686's flash-gap is .004". while the pre-27's is .011" Yes, I have inquired about setting the barel back a turn and re-cutting the forcing cone--a couple gunsmiths I have queried have said 'Yeah, I'll do it, but I don't think the juice is worth the squeeze.' Nicely enough, my new Python x 6" has .003" flash gaps consistently. Yeah. there will be some chronography to test that premise out. Trust nothing--test everything. Trust NOTHING.
