Making this baby thumper in 300 H&H and 375 makes a bit more sense. Both are based on the same case so minimal retooling is necessary to produce them. The 350R is a proprietary case. I can't see that it was used for any commercially successful "wildcatting." Finding brass will be a headache (we who shoot the proprietary 404J know all about that!). And Rigby must significantly retool for this gun specifically. I guess since their guns are essentially handmade anyway, that probably won't be a huge issue.
Perhaps fitting the 350R onto a magnum action does fit the nostalgia niche better than a standard action since it was introduced in 1908 on a magnum action. But it would have been in production only six years before access to magnum actions dried up. And that dry spell was long term. More importantly, in my opinion anyway, the dry spell spanned the golden age of African safari hunting. After WWI motorized vehicles, planes, and motion pictures enhanced the safari industry/sport/culture. Ironically, the Great Depression only enhanced it more. Depressed unemployed or marginally employed were eager to escape their grim reality through press and media exposure to the glamor and mystery of the Dark Continent. So ... for nostalgia junkies wishing to resurrect those golden years, would it not be more fitting to hunt with rifles that mimic Great Depression production safari guns, i.e. magnum calibers built on standard actions? Seems like that would be a great marketing angle. 375 & 416R were introduced shortly before WWI and 300 H&H in 1925. British gunmakers would have had very limited to no access to new Mauser magnum actions for producing guns in these new popular calibers during the Safari Golden Age.
I don't know about 350R but the popular contention that 404J "shoehorned" on a standard Mauser action was fraught with feeding and cycling problems is, in my experience, more myth than reality. 350R is slightly longer but looking at my 404J, it certainly appears its standard action could have handled a longer cartridge without cutting into the forward ring.
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My 404 standard Mauser conversion actually cycles much smoother than my sporterized Springfield 03A3 and that gun is VERY smooth.
Anyway, my point was if Rigby wants to pander to Golden Age romantics (and I am not critical because I also shoot "classic" rifles with history attached), perhaps they should consider something historically accurate to that period?
