The quest for a good elk bullet!

My rifle is a Winchester, model 94 Big Bore, XTR, chambered for the 375 Winchester.  For those unfamiliar, it is basically a 30-30 cartridge straightened out and loaded from the factory with either 200 or 250gr bullets.  Keep in mind, the 30-30 is loaded to a maximum pressure of around 28,000 CUP, whereas the 375 is loaded to 52,000 CUP.  The same pressures as the 308 Winchester.

The 250gr loads are very rare since no one is currently producing them.  the 375 Win is fast becoming an obsolete round.  I'm not really sure why, because it offers a lot more power than the more popular 35 Remington, and can be easily chambered in the lever rifles.

Since the 250gr loads are hard to find, reloading is the only option for heavyweight bullets.  With the right bullet, this round can easily take just about any North American game animal, including elk and moose.

Sometimes the 250gr bullets themselves, are a bit tough to locate, and a bit expensive too.  So I did a little experiment to come up with a better alternative.

My solution was to use the less expensive Interlokt bullets designed for the 375 H&H magnum.  The first things I had to consider were that the bullet MUST have a canelure for proper crimping and use in the lever rifle magazine. 

Next it had to have the canelure far enough forward so as to not make the loaded round too long to work in the lever gun.  As you can see the bullet I chose has one.  In addition, I had to cut the tips off these bullets to make them flat nosed for safety in the levergun magazine.  In order for this to work I needed a consistent method of squarely cutting the tips off the bullets.

For a solution I settled on the "Mini cut off saw" from Harbor freight for only $20.

  Did I mention that I am using 38-55 brass in this experiment?  No?  Well, I am.  Why?  I wanted as much powder capacity as possible because I planned on pushing this setup to it's limit.  For that reason I'll not list the powder type or amount, so as not to have someone else copy my loads with maybe less than ideal results.

I have to cut the exposed lead tip off the 200gr bullet for it to function properly in this rifle and maintain the correct COAL.  To the left you see loaded rounds and you can see the difference in length of the 38-55 brass.   You can also notice the ogive (the tapered nose of the bullet) of the Hornady bullet, has more taper to it than bullets manufactured for the 375 levergun.   This allows a slight bullet "jump" to the lands, and this helps keep the pressure spike down.

From the picture at the top, you can tell the cutoff tip allows this thicker walled 375 bullet to expand properly at the velocities the 375 puts out.  I will in the near future post a video of penetration testing with these loads, using one gallon water jugs as the medium.  My goal is to pass the bullet through ten of them.

I have settled on a load that produces 2150fps with the 250gr Hornady bullet.  When you consider the top load for a 30-06 pushing a 250gr bullet is 2200fps, that puts it into perspective a little better at just what this little levergun is capable of.

This load gives me 2566 ft lbs of muzzle energy and still retaining 1530 ft lbs of energy at 200 yards.  That is more than sufficient for elk.  That was my whole reason for developing this load/bullet combination, to extend the range and effectiveness of the 375 Winchester as an elk round to 200yds.

That's zeroed 4.11" high at 100 yards and only 7" low at 200 yards, for a point blank range of 226 yards on an 8" target.

Continued on next page

Original shape of Hornady 270gr SP    length 1.290" (not used in Winchester)

Hornady 270gr after cutting to 250gr    length .965"

Modified 250gr fired into dirt bank at approx. 2100fps    retained weight 225gr

Modified 250gr fired into dirt bank at approx. 2100fps    retained weight 205grF

Factory 200gr fired into dirt bank at approx. 2100fps     retained weight 162gr

Factory Sierra 200gr flat nose

38-55 brass with the 250gr Hornady (cut from 270gr)

38-55 brass with cut 200gr Sierra

375 Win brass with 200gr Sierra (factory specs)