todd
Well-Known Member
This pretty sums up all of the hoop la over new firearms, cartridges, and do I dare say, molds. Ian mentioned Hornady's Zombie Max line, what a stroke of genius. Yep, may sound silly, replacing the red tip for a lime green one and packaging in a snazzy eye colorful eye catching box reflective of what was socially popular at the time. It provided revenue for jobs, more product R&D, and competition for new ideas. Some folks go off about fad or niche rounds, so what, they need to look at the big picture it helps keep our passion alive. How boring would life be if we only had 22 Hornet, 30-30, 30-06, 375 H&H, 9mm, 38 Spcl, 45 Colt, and 45-70, etc? Yea, many of us suffer a bit of severe gastric reflux when we hear 6.5 and Creedmoor. Likely the same feelings some folks had close to 100 years ago when they heard the words ".270 Winchester", or the early 60's when the 22-250 was commercialized.
Whether we want to admit it or not our sport has benefited from hair brained ideas, technology, and/or marketing. Did I mention medium bore '06 based wildcats (sorry just couldn't resist).
i think it was about the time (late '90s?) Lazzeroni rifles began and then the manufacturers came up with the Ultra Mags, Short Mags and the Short Action Ultra mags that i gave up on magnums. the last "new" cartridge i bought was the 6.5 Creedmoor (i think i bought it in 2009 or '10) but now it is older and somewhat obsolete cartridges, like the 30 rem and 7.65x53 and the 30-40 krag. i would say that the 30-06 is King. i shot alot of deer with '06. i have only one '06, jap type 99 that will either be rebored or rebarreled. heck, my deer count would be nothing if it weren't for the 30-30. i retired my win m94 30-30 about 20 some years ago, but i gave it to JES and he returned me with the 35/30-30. i know that it has only 3 or 4 deer to its credit, but the m94 still impresses me.
the 7 Mauser is #2 on the deer kills list for me. i consider the 7 Mauser to be THE perfect deer cartridge. actually, i would say any of x57 Mauser's is a good deer cartridge.
i have a 1973 ruger #1 in 270 win that shoots much better than i can. i haven't used it in 10-11 years (i started hunting with cast boolits) but gosh durn it, the #1 makes deer quake with fear!!!