308, 30-06, 8mm mauser, or 7.62x54R

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justin22885

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im trying to consolidate calibers for the bigger class of rifles out there, i've narrowed it down to the four above.. 308, 7.62x54R, 8mm mauser and 30-06.. i may select two of them

the .308 is probably the most efficient (in terms of energy vs weight and size of the cartridge and velocity loss in shorter barrel lengths).. but the 7.62x54R is REALLY inexpensive, $220 per 1000 rounds of ammunition, cant even buy .308 cal M80 bulk projectiles for that price, hard to ignore those prices, but about the ONLY military style semi automatic i have available to me in this cartridge is maybe an AK-100 series clone built on a PSL parts kit, but mags cost a ton.. a lot of eastern block stuff available in that caliber though.. UK59 LMG kits are fairly inexpensive, theres also the SVT40 and DP28 worthy of collection

then theres the 8mm mauser for the bigger stuff, tons of central and eastern european options for this caliber, many countries in the early-mid 20th century ran this cartridge as well as parts of north africa.. we have the FN49, hakim, G43, and the yugo M76, which like my PSL idea above i could buy an M76 parts kit and build an AK-100 style rifle in 8mm mauser as well and the .30-06 rifles can be converted with a simple barrel change.. in many cases though 8mm rifles often cant be rechambered for 30-06 because it is a bit longer, i believe the US military tried converting some of the nazi stuff to 30-06

benefit to the 30-06 is its easier to find brass and bullets for, cheap M80 147 grain bullets can make a pretty decent load for the 30-06 as well and if my medium length caliber was 308, once my 30-06 brass tears along the case mouth i can chop it down and use it a few more times for .308, before chopping it down again for 45acp if the rims last that long

__

so, is the low cost of 7.62x54R worth the small number of rifles available in this caliber or is better to bite the bullet and the extra $180 per 1000 cartridges for .308 winchester?.. and are easier to find bullets truly the only advantage over the 8mm mauser? and is that better than having a much wider selection of rifles available to me? i am a big fan of the FN49

what do you guys think?
 
I'd go .308 and x54r

I have .30-06 and x54r, and though I love the -06, there are sooooo man cooler guns and more options in .308. And as you stated, 7.62x54r is a great cheap range blaster with some good possibilities as an all around "do it all" kinda gun.

So, .308 for awesome rifles.
7.62x54r for "plinking"
 
yeah, with the x54R and a 16" AK-100 clone, folding stock, side rail, and a red dot i could get in tons of practice with it, store tons of ammo and possibly replace my AK74 with something with much more range and much harder hitting

i'm going to eliminate 30-06 from the choices though, i like 8mm mauser more and in the milsurp world there seems to be more 8mm mauser options than 30-06 including the FN49, hakim, G43, yugo M76, MG34 and 42 parts kits are available
 
I'd likely go with the 308 and the 8MM Mauser, The 06 and the 308 are pretty close in power, the 7.62R is pretty much in a 308 class too.

The 308 will do 90% of what a 30-06 will do, and a hand loaded or foreign loaded 8MM will surpass them all.

Being a hand loader myself, I don't necessarily shop for ammo price but I can certainly understand why those who don't roll their own do. Pretty expensive hobby if you shoot a lot!
 
i have yet to see a 8mm, even a hot loaded one do better than a 3006. 190gr bullet in the 3006 at 2730 fps SD-.286-BC 491, 195gr bullet in 8mm 2500fps SD.267-BC-.415. and by the way i own and shoot most common military calibers. eastbank.
 
Most of the really cheap 54r stuff is corrosive. Just something to consider. If you want one to do it all, .30-06 is hard to beat. For two, I agree, .308 and 8mm are good choices.
 
If you reload, I'd go 8mm and x54. Most expensive/most power and then cheapest/plenty acceptable power. No reloading, .30-06 and x54. The .308 only has cool guns going for it in this group. Not especially powerful, not excitingly cheap. But then I own an 8mm and a .30-06 so I'm just as biased as anyone else you'll find.
 
While the 7.62X54 is cheap now, what will it cost in the furure and how easy will be be to buy. .308 can be bought just about anywhere and it has many bullet choices. There are a lot of .308 rifles both bolt and semi auto firearms which makes it a very good choice.
 
308 is a given if for no other reason than accuracy potential and the availability of components.

As for the rest it depends on the gun, use and personal preference. Practically there isn't a great deal of difference between them. My personal choice would be 06 because it's one of the few calibers you can be assured of finding ammo for worldwide. I love my surplus 8mm Mauser, but that's because of the gun and not the cartridge.
 
In order; for me anyhow...

It would be:
.308
30-06
7.62
8mm

I'm not so enamored with the 54R as most are. I have no reason to believe that it will remain inexpensive and in fact precedents have already been set to shut off the importation from the cheap countries. Picking up US production at a rate is unlikely. And.... I will not tolerate rims when I don't really need to - just me!

8mm? Great round but well past its prime in new chamberings and general shooting sports support.

30-06? Limited advantages over .308 for 95+% of shooters. Longer actions required. Does have the potential advantage of being common and not currently loaded in any existing US service rifles if we ever went the Draconian way of some country's restrictions.

.308's your mate.
What doesn't it do for almost all of us.
Readily available in many... many loadings.
Very available brass.
Relatively short actions.
Will put down absolutely everything in North America.
Outstanding "target" round.
Unfortunately, it "bores" (NPI) many shooters... it's the .22 of mid-bore rifles.

Todd.
 
I'm the wrong person to ask. I have all of the above, stock up and reload for all of them. I will add that I don't think the 54R is that great of a round and it's out dated.
 
Here's another wrinkle to thinkle about;

How often are you actually going to be shooting with these? The various gun builds you've described are going to take a long time to realize (I'm wrapping up an M76 build, myself, which still required several dozen hours of fitting/fixing/fiddling even on a 100% receiver, since ORF wasn't the epitome of quality). Many of them do not have receiver pieces or intact barrels available (the UK59 kits are 1000$ at CenterFire for live barrels and torched receivers, and 600$ at APEX with out receivers but with no replacements unless Marcolmar decides to start selling overruns one day).

I now have LMG-type semi's and builds in 308, 8mm, 30-06, 7.5 Swiss, and (soon) 7.62x54r. The 7.5x55 Swiss STGW57 gets shot the most by far, simply because it runs the best and happens to be the most fun (followed closely by the 308 BM59). Even then, it's probably at a rate of less than 500 rounds per anum, if I'm consistent, simply because I'm too busy with life and other gun builds, as surely you must also be. Yes, the cheaper ammo might add up to a savings over many years, but the rise/fall of various ammo prices makes any predictions mere conjecture that far out, and in any case your savings will be so slowly accumulated it isn't something you would really notice or be limited by outside circumstances of financial hardship (at which point you shouldn't be shooting). Reloading for whatever round(s) you choose will make the difference between them as far as cost essentially moot.

At least with 30-06, 308, and 7.5 Swiss (and 7.5 French) you can use the exact same bullets & primers across all sets.

Now, as far as which rounds I would like to shoot enough to make minor cost differences worth worrying about;
-From what I gather (and will soon learn firsthand from the M76) 8mm semi-autos tend to be pretty punishing to shoot. Very loud, and typically hard kicking. The big, heavy, elongated bolt/piston parts in the M76 strong attest to this.
-30-06 semi-autos are similar. Both '06 and 8mm have looooong cases that run at high pressure, so you get lots of fast moving powder gases that smaller/lower pressure cases simply don't generate. That energy is ultimately delivered to your shoulder and ears. Garands use a weakish load, so they are still in the 'soft shooter' range, but my FN49 in 30-06 kicks pretty hard even with the gas turned down as much as possible. Long rounds equals heavy parts that move around a lot at speed, which means felt recoil.
-308 resolves some of the attendant kick of the 30-06, and lower case volume means pressures drop faster over barrel length. So not as long, heavy, or hard kicking, and not quite as punishing. Unfortunately, these guns tend to be quite a bit shorter than 30-06's so the light weight and short muzzle bring recoil/boom right back up there. 308 conversions of 30-06's are an interesting idea, though, like my BM59, since the extra weight and bolt travel really softens the smaller cartridge (although my BM59's 18" muzzle and tri-comp turns the volume up to 11, the kick is on par with my VZ58)
-7.5x55 is my favorite cartridge. It does everything 30-06 can do, but is shorter, and runs at a much lower pressure. Surplus ammo is available, and RUAG is supposedly gearing back up to supply GP11 to the civilian market now that they have stopped military production (I assume Switzerland is going to 308 for their belt feds). Components and even loads are identical to 30-06, and multiple makers now sell brass and cartridges. Each year the K31s are more popular. The round can probably work in most 8mm magazines, and possibly in 30-06 boxes. With a ton of work, it will fit in 7.62x54r magazines, though the taper is an issue (not an issue in pan mags)

The one thing 7.62x54r has going for it is that there are a plethora of options to explore; Degtyarov, Goryunov, Maxim, PK series, UK59, PSL, SVT, and even those expensive Winchesters. 8mm has a few ridiculously expensive/rare German guns, the M76, the Hakim, some early BREN variants (ZB series) and the ZB37/BESA belt fed. 30-06 has the Garand, very rare early belt feds, BAR (expensive/rare and not that great in practice), FN49, Johnson (expensive/rare) and that's about it. 308 is in lots of platforms at this point, but aside from the NATO battle rifles (FAL, G3, M14/M1A, AR10) the platforms for it are so new that parts kits will never be available (guns aren't demilled any more, they are all shredded :mad:)

30-06/8mm = probably the most adaptable cartridge, which is great for a bolt gun but not so much in an auto
7.62x54r = probably the most diverse set of platforms, which is great for the builder, but few of them are very practical for the shooter
308 = A decent array of platforms, and a vast array of ammo that is less diverse in performance than 30-06 and therefore more likely to function in a given semi auto
7.62x55 = All the pros of 30-06, half the benefit of the shorter 308, but a strictly boutique option for the most part. Would be a lot more compelling if there was a bit more popularity (not unlike certain AR rounds) and options for it.

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TCB
 
My 2 cents. I load ,308 it for what milsurplus is selling for online. So if you want 2 rifles get 2 .308's. One auto and one bolt gun. I do 70% of my hunting with a Ruger M77 in .308. I love my range time with my M1A1.
 
I have a 30/06 BAR. The gun is old and low capacity. The only reason the 91/30 gets out more often is I do not care if I bust it up on a 4 wheeler. The 30/06 is far and away the most versatile rifle caliber. Yes, they are doing a lot with the 308. But the 30/06 can shoot anything from 50gr varmint loads to 220 gr brush busters. A Remington 125 gr 30/06 sp has more energy at 500 yards than a 62gr 5.56x45 has at the muzzle. The 125 gr cartridge is a lightweight load for thin skinned game such as antelope. The standard 30/06 hunting cartridge is 150gr 3,000 fps. You can get a lot of good hunting ammo at good prices for the 30/06. You do not see a lot of steel case ammo for the 30/06 because brass case ammo is the same price. A dated soft point for the 30/06 is adequate. They have been blowing large holes in game animals for 50 years or more and they will still be taking game 50 years from now.
 
For hunting in the US (in hunting is what you're thinking, of course), I'd pick the '06 or .308, in that order. Ammunition is more readily available than the two European calibers, and that can be a big deal if you bring everything but your ammo stash along on a week-long elk hunt.

If you're just going to plant lead in dirt banks, choose whatever caliber fits in the rifle you want to carry.
 
My 2 cents. I load ,308 it for what milsurplus is selling for online. So if you want 2 rifles get 2 .308's. One auto and one bolt gun. I do 70% of my hunting with a Ruger M77 in .308. I love my range time with my M1A1.
 
Forget the chambering and consider the rifles first. All 4 of those have pretty much the same felt recoil out of a bolt action and use for hunting anything. The .308 and '06 are ballistically identical. Difference is a half in of case, about 100 FPS with like bullet weights and the length of the receiver.
The 8mm is very close to being a .32 calibre '06 too. Isn't for larger game though. Same game.
Forget milsurp ammo too. Most of it is long gone and it's not accurate enough. Plus a lot is corrosively primed. Not that that is a big deal. Just nuisance.
The rifles they 4 use just ain't the same. No hunting rifles count, but milsurp have personalities all their own. Shooting a K98 isn't the same as shooting a 1903A3 or Mosin. Nor is an M1 the same as an M1A. The latter not being milsurp, but only as close as you'll easily get to an M-14.
"...Garands use a weakish load..." Nonsense.
 
ive already considered the rifles and i can find what i want in any of them, id like a good milsurp bolt action, an LMG, and a shorter semi automatic with a 20 round capacity for any of the calibers i listed.. i can get the short semi automatic with 20 round mag in an AK platform for all three, the yugo M76, M77, and PSL.. (custom builds of course).. LMG options (because i love playing with belt fed) is a bit of a pain in the rear for .308 though, the really good belt feeds for .308 are really expensive and more sought after, M60 being my favorite by far in the caliber, but in 8mm you can get MG42 kits fairly cheap and the czech UK59 LMG kits are fairly inexpensive as well (a 7.62x54R LMG)

its also not all that easy to find an old milsurp available in .308 since .308 came around after the old military bolt actions had been replaced with semi automatics, in this category i find more rifles in the 8mm mauser chambering than any of the rest

308 has its advantage though in being smaller, lighter, more efficient and still delivering almost all the same juice as the 30-06, and rifles chambered in it are common with a lot of aftermarket, FALs, M1As, HK/PTR, yugo M77 are all fairly inexpensive and can easily be accessorized to fit what i want, but i could consider this a wash between all three by easily being able to build a PSL, M76, or M77 to use mostly standard AK components, either one would make a great big-brother to my AK-74 (i build this too, so i know how to build AKs from parts)

the only advantage of the 30-06 that i'm even considering 30-06 for is the fact that if i choose 30-06 and 308 id only have to stock up one type of bullet.. and if i ever decided to start shooting 300 blackout i could cover three varying sizes of calibers and still only use one bullet.. and theyre fairly inexpensive bullets too

___

im looking for something i can really get behind, buy the reloading equipment for, stock up on, do the most of my shooting with.. something i will grab first no matter the occasion, be it a hunting trip, self defense situation, or just some range time, right now my 5.56mm converted AK74 build is that rifle and i shoot almost exclusively SS109 through it

__

what a couple of you had said before about 7.62x54R does have me thinking and wondering just how long those cheap prices are going to last, coupled with the fact that rimmed cartridges are a headache to deal with in magazine fed rifles.. i could design and make my own sub-8lb 7.62x54R rifle that uses DP28 drums if i really wanted to.. but once that cheap ammo is gone it loses its ONLY advantage

im curious, 30-06 brass is cheaper, especially since id probably use the once-fired stuff for building up a decent ammo cache.. can this cheap once fired 30-06 brass be converted to 8mm mauser?
 
I like 8mm Mauser myself over 7.62x54R. Haven't had experience with .30-06 or .308 (though I own a rifle in each caliber; I haven't fired them yet, though). The 8mm Mauser is a hard-hitting round that isn't a shoulder killer. It's a heavy push but there's no sharpness to it. 7.62x54R is a bit sharp, at least with lighter grain bullets. If you run the 203 grain Silver Bear ammo out of it, it takes away a lot of the sharpness.
 
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