260 Remington or 7mm-08?

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esldude

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These are darn close to the same. Any good reasons to pick one over the other.
 
if you want to get super technical, the 260 may have a very slight advantage in ballistic coefficient, depending on exact projectiles used. the 7-08 has a slight advantage in energy, depending on projectiles used. the 7-08 makes a little bigger hole.

i'd take the 7-08, but that's just because i like 7mm's. there is very little difference between the 2 in practice.
 
I'll be the dissenting opinion and say get the .260! I have one as my deer rifle. (I'm not a hardcore big-game hunter, I just thought a nice, lightweight, accurate bolt action rifle would be fun to have!) It duplicates the 6,5 Swede, is accurate, and if you handload, the bullet selection is fine. My Mountain Rifle fouls rather quickly (I suspect a rough factory bore) but will shoot 3 125gr Nosler Partitions @ 2900fps into 1.5MOA or better all day long. If you are a handloader, this is the gun to get. Leave the 7mm-08 to those who think the .260 is going to die-off or is "too small"! :neener: (j/k guys)
 
Personally, I'd only get either if I started reloading. Granted, I've seen 7-08 ammo at Wally World once or twice, but it's by no means as common as .308 or .270.
That said, I'd probably go for the .260 Rem for being the son of Swede...
 
Me personally I would have the parent cartridges. The 6.5x55 and the 7x57. Since its not a choice on the table I would side with the 7mm-08 if I was only going to use it in a bolt action rifle. Reason......ammo availability. 260 ammo seems to difficult to find, most times, and I am not sure why I never see it stocked.

Now if I was going to start playing around with an AR-10 or a FAL and was planning on rebarreling/new upper etc, I would get the 260. I have long thought that the 260 would be really sweet in a quality semi-auto platform. Based on that I have the two parent cartridges listed above, if I was going to start horsing around with either of your listed cartridges I would get the 260, with the semi-auto concept in mind.
 
Esldude;

I'm with Schromf, I'd ignore both of your options for the 6.5 Swede or the 7 X 57 Mauser. Given those two, I'd take the Swede. Given your choices only, I'd take the 7/08.

I do believe that a 6.5 class round has already been developed by Remington for the M16 upper, and it's not the .260.

900F
 
The 260 Remington would also be right at home in a heavy barrel long range target rifle!
 
There are plenth of good 6.5mm and 7mm bullets. How long a tube were you contemplating? You ever plan to be looking for ammunition in the boonies? That's why I have gone with .243Win and .308Win for myself.
 
It's a bit easier to find factory ammo for 7mm/08, and if you reload the hunting bullet selection is vasty superior for 7mm in general.
 
900F,

The .260 won't fit on the M16/AR-15 chassis. Too durn big. It needs to be housed in the AR-10/SR-25 platform, which is significantly larger in all respects.

If you are looking for a target round, the 6.5mm is tough to beat for ballistic efficiency and recoil levels. In the past 10 years the National Highpower championship (overall) has been won with a .308-based wildcat in a semi auto, and it wasn't the 7mm or an FAL or M14 based rifle. ;) Of course the wave now is toward the 6mmXC, but the long-range guys seem to be sticking to their 6.5mm wildcats (well, the Palma shooters are stuck with .308s per the rules).
 
Wanderin;

Didn't say it was the .260 Rem, said it was in the 6.5 class. Did a little research & found that Barrett is currently marketing an upper for the M16 advertised in 6.8 Rem.

I'd still like to know the details of this development. Will continue to search.

900F
 
260:

Most of the bullets available for the 260 are meant for the velocity range the 260 operates in. The 7-08 can be loaded with a great many 7mm bullets, but most of them are meant for the 7mm Rem Mag. Such bullets are of limited use in the 7-08.


David
 
900F,

Have you searched the forums at ar15.com? 6.8 Rem This might prove useful if you hadn't found it already.

From what I've gleaned there have been some issues meeting the accuracy/velocity goals. It seems that where the accuracy meets expectations, the velocity is off, and when loaded to the velocity goal, accuracy seems to drop off. The 6.8mm uses light-for-caliber .277 bullets, which sacrifice downrange flight characteristics, but allows the setup to run and fit in an AR-15 size chassis while providing a nice power upgrade from lightweight .224 bullets.

See also the 6.5 Grendel from Alexander Arms.
 
All I know about the 7mm08 is that from my 700 Ti, I got three-shot groups of one MOA with a Weaver K3 on top. Handloads and factory all shoot to the same POI. I now have a Leupold 3x9 on it; dunno if the rifle will do better, but I don't. :)

The only animal I've shot was a thick-bodied, large feral dog at 50 yards. Big exit wound.

The book sez my 139-grain bullets have a muzzle velocity of some 2,900 ft/sec.

FWIW, Art
 
Interesting discussion;

Who's tending the camp fire, I'm gettin cold!!!

Really, though; I went through the same comparisons, wanting (not needing!) one or the other.

The .260's .264 bullets have the sectional density and ballistic coefficient advantage. But, when you lopp of the barrels to ~20", some peculiar things happen to the .260
(ie: Remington Model 7)

The .260 is wed to slightly slower powders than the 7mm, and with a given case, has slighly lower bore-capacity for combustion gases.

Ergo; the .260 loses more velocity from a shorter bore than does the 7mm. The 7mm gives up slightly less to the .308 than does the .260 to the 7mm.

This factored into my ultimate decision........
I had already had/used .308's and .30/06; but not a 7mm or .260/6.5.

Hence, I went with the 7mm because the rifle is to be used as a "Mountain Elk-rifle", and maybe mule deer. Yeah, I'll also occasionally whack a whitetail with it, but mostly I use a .223 for deer. No need to use a slegde hammer when a tack hammer is all that is needed.

If I could only have One Gun (perish the thought!!!), I suppose I'd go with the 7mm.

But, I may still one day get a .260 just to "tinker" with it.
(I suppose that makes me a "gun nutt", huh?)

But you know what? ,,,, a Remington m700 Mountain rifle in .270 would split the difference with a little more zap, to boot- and weighs the same as the Rem m700. (At least according to Remington, and before I took a 7/8" wood boring bit to the butt stock of my Mod 7-LS to lighten it. Got it down to under 6lbs !!!!!!)
 
First of all, I agree with Dakotasin that there's probably very little practical difference to a game animal whether hit with a .260 or a 7mm-08.

Secondly, I do have a Sako 75 in 7-08 and that's what I shot my deer with last year, but I only got it because Sako didn't offer a .260!

I'm a believer in the concept of high sectional-density, high ballistic-coefficient bullets that retain velocity and effectiveness without needing to be launched at hard-recoiling velocities. Most 6.5-calibers take advantage of this principle of the physics of ballistics. I think that's sexy! ;)

John
 
Lots of good info here from you fellows. Just as I had hoped, ideas from angles I didn't even consider.

A few suggested going with a .270 or such. The attraction to the 6.5-7mm is its efficiency. The high SD's allowing them to work well without maxing out speed.

Especially good info on the 260 being effected more by shortening the barrel. I did have in mind keeping this short. So maybe the 7mm-08 is better in that sense. Thanks for all that detail you went into GooseGestapo.

I also see the similarity to the 6.5 swede and 7x57. My thinking was in the USA the newer rounds might be easier to come by as I don't reload. As it was the seeming efficiency of these that got me to thinking in the first place.

I don't intend to use these are pure target rifles. Though I very much like high levels of accuracy. Would love to be able to put the money into it to get a Tubbs rifle in the 260.

I have a .243 and .308 and was intrigued by something different. Maybe getting a nicer rifle in one of these and letting the .243 and .308 go. One better rifle in place of two lesser rifles.

As for the 6.8 SPC I am aware of it. And the AR's in 6.5 which look great. Certainly seems the ticket in a battle/assault rifle. I like such things, but really have no need of them. Trying to avoid the temptation to relapse into 'gun nut syndrome'.

Again, thanks for the great info and help podering all this.
 
Actually when your talking about accuracy, all of the above listed rounds perform well. There isn't a slouch in the bunch, when looked at from purely the cartridge side of this equation. Where the devil details are is in the platform, ie: what rifle? All things considered any one of these will give you under 1 MOA in a quality rifle, and with paying attention to details you can half that number or very close.

I disagree about the choice of 7mm bullets available for handloading though. There are a lot of bullets available for the 7mm, and most are not for magnums. There are a few magnum only bullets, most in the "heavy end". Right now Nosler is making partitions, Sierra makes gamekings, Speer does Grand Slams, Hornady makes the interlocks, this doesn't include the smaller outfits like Barnes, or the foriegn ones like Norma. There are piles of good bullets for the slower 7's, I have used almost every manufacturer I listed on game in a 7x57. I really only use two loads anymore for hunting, both absolutly perform on game, and my handloads are giving me right at .65-7 MOA from the bench, with a 20" tube. In my mind it just doesn't get any better than that for hunting and I quit experimenting and fiddling a long time ago. My "Magic" bullets? Nosler 140gr and 150gr Partitions. There are a couple from the above list I can tighten my groups up with, buy cheaper, or get a little more velocity with, but none put it all together as well and give me the performance on game. I also grant that my rifle is niether a stock rifle, and it is not picky on bullet types, it is very cosmopolitan in that regard.

The 7mm platform really is only bettered by the 30 cals in bullet availability. The 6.5 doesn't have the bullet selection of the 7's but what is out there is very good, do some homework, the selection is OK, but nowhere near what you can find in the 7mm's. I load for both 6.5 and 7mm and it is always easier to find my 7 components, I end up ordering most of my 6.5 stuff.

The 6.8 is a 27 cal, and the current one being fiddled with for the AR-15 platform is not even in the same class as any of the above mentioned rounds. It is a very light 27 cal bullet, with nowhere near the powder capacity as these rounds. My comments still stand on the AR-10/FAL use of the 260 Rem, but it must be in a rifle that was chambered for a 308 originally.

I would bank all the comments you have recieved and look for the rifle, this always seems to make the final influence when I am buying rifles. Finding a 6.5x55 in anything but a CZ right now is going to be tough, the 7x57 is difficult to hunt down in new rifles, the 260 Remington has bettter availability, and just about everyone chambers the 7mm-08. So without significant effort on your part your choices become limited, and your first choice of calibers becomes the reality.
 
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