What Calibre to Bring on a One-Gun Safari?

[sestoppelman]

The shooter may NOT notice the difference. Everyone else does!

 

[enysse]

The shooter may NOT notice the difference. Everyone else does!

I agree, anybody will notice a muzzlebreak. There is something annoying about the sound. And you will never hear someone say I play the sound of muzzlebrakes going off in car or truck on the way to work...to lighten the day up (lol)

 

[sestoppelman]

I'd say that about sums it up quite nicely!

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

PHOENIX PHIL,

I have a good recoil pad on my .300 Win Mag now. I haven't fired it yet, and will do so before doing anything to it. However, it has basically the same kind of decelerator gel pad, as well as Montecarlo style stock, that's on my 760 Gamemaster in .30-06, which I can handle just fine, but which does give a solid kick. I couldn't put another strap on pad over that. It would be awkward fitting at best and would make the length of pull unmanageable.

As for the louder shot due to the muzzle break, I have this to say -- I'm sure some people will likely jump all over this, being it's so well established now in the lexicon of shooters, but I have been presented with solid evidence otherwise -- and that is the idea that a muzzle break induces increased noise is a myth. Conventional wisdom, which I've seen in articles on websites and in gun magazines claim the typical muzzle break causes a 20 percent increase in noise to the shooter. However, this didn't make sense to a friend of mine who set out to investigate it and proved it is a false notion; urban legend that's been perpetuated by the shooting community.

My hunting safety instructor -- with whom I've been buddies since 1986 when I attended his class in Colorado --and a mutual friend of ours both bought matching Small Ring Model 98 Mausers when they became available in SHOTGUN NEWS back in the early 1990s. (I wish I had known about it, I would have joined them!) They both had these guns made up into sporters, chambered for the same cartridge; a wildcat known as the .458 2-inch American. It was a product of Frank Barnes, who simply cut the .458 Winchester Magnum case down from 2 1/2 inches to 2 inches. The former was simply more than was necessary to take an American big bear, yet there was a lack of big bore cartridges available for the purpose. Today's .450 Marlin is about the closest thing in a commercial offering available.

Anyway, he and our mutual friend Leonard got two rifles made up in this caliber. They had the same action, same brand of barrel, barrel length, etc. The only difference is my friend had both a good recoil pad and a muzzle break put on his. Leonard's has a standard recoil pad -- nothing special -- and no muzzle break. They wanted to test how much difference there would be between them in recoil. They also decided they wanted to test out their theory that there should be no difference in noise output between a rifle equipped with a muzzle break and one without. For this, they got hold of a good decible meter. (The latter was tested and found to be working perfectly fine.)

They set up the decible meter in various positions and went through several boxes of ammunition; as I recall they fired about three boxes of ammunition each (60 rounds a piece). They put the meter ahead of the gun, adjacent to it, and behind, and at different distances. The Results? Less than a half a decible difference between the two. And of all things, the one WITHOUT the muzzle break came in the higher. That said, half a decible across several boxes of ammo was well within the range of error for that device.

My friends were not surprised, and for this reason. As they explained it to me, and as they demonstrated by sending pictures of slow motion video proving this to be the case, whether a firearm has a muzzle break or not, the excaping gases are going to go outwards at a 90-degree angle from the muzzle once the bullet leaves the barrel. What makes the recoil less violent is the fact that there is a very brief -- split second really but sufficiently significant -- spreading out of the time over which these gases are released. The sound is still at the level it always was. It's let out over a fraction of a second longer, but in total, it's the same noise level.

If you look at slow motion video of a bullet leaving a barrel, you'll see the moment it exits, gases will come out in all directions at a 90-degree angle from the muzzle. It creates a "halo" like effect, very much like a fighter jet as it breaks the sound barrier. Ever see those photos of the F-18/HORNET breaking mock and this white cloud appearing at the wing root and circling the plane? THAT is what happens when the bullet leaves the barrel of your rifle. Same effect. The muzzle break therefore doesn't change the direction of gases, but rather simply extends the time during which their expelled, letting a little at a time out along the way.

Anyway, I'm sure someone will come up somewhere with "scientific evidence" claiming it actually makes a gun louder, but I'm just relating what my friends said their test revealed. And oh, by the way, the muzzle break and gel recoil pad made a HUGE difference in recoil. No surprise there. He said neither gun had a violent recoil. Both were simply a big "push." However, whereas his gun stopped pushing at a point, Leonard's gun just kept going! LOL!

I didn't notice a lick of difference in noise before or after I had the muzzle break put on my 7mm Rem Mag. It was WAY too loud and left my ears ringing in either case. LOL!

That said, I keep forgetting to bring them -- which will NOT happen when I go to Africa -- but I plan to use earplugs from now on. In fact, I brought a set when on my last bear hunt. Never fired, but I had them nonetheless. As for whether I get to use them or not depends on whether I have to rely on a snapshot or I have time to set up. Then again, I have these really great earplugs I bought at a military shop as I was deploying to Iraq which have valves inside. They are open in normal use, but close to a noise over a certain decible level. The sound of a shot will cause them to close in time to prevent your ears from ringing. It's not like a headset, but it was certainly all I needed for shooting on the range. Then again, I was only shooting the M-16 with its glorified .22 rounds. But they DO work. What I like about them is you can wear them without deafening yourself, which you don't want to do while hunting. Your ears are obviously a big part of sensing for the presence of an animal. These plugs allow you to still hear pretty well, but cut off any really loud noise. Not sure if a PH would recommend wearing them during a hunt, but in either case, it would be good to have them along. If one shouldn't wear anything until the time of firing, then I have another set of regular plugs that hang around my neck on a string, making them available at a moment's notice.

This said, in November I took a nice doe with my .250 Savage. I forgot my earplugs this time around, but to be honest with you, I barely noticed the shot. I DID notice moments afterwards, however, much to my surprise -- and delight -- that my ears were not ringing. That little .250 Savage is not only very pleasant to shoot, but it's not at all that loud. My ears certainly weren't left hurting like after shooting my .30-06 or 7mm Rem Mag.

And no, I'm not near Blacksburg. I believe that's all the way on the other end of the state. Actually.... hold one...... Looking on Googlemaps, it appears to be 100 miles south of where I hunt, which itself is about 30 miles west of Charlottesville. As for me, I'm way up in the Washington D.C. metro area.

The type of recoil pad I was mentioning attaches to you not the gun. Give a look here:

Cabela's: Cabela's Recoil Pad - Right Hand

And I agree with you that with or without a muzzle brake, the total sound is no louder or softer. Sound is energy, that energy is released by the bullet being fired. So long as the round stays the same, the brake has no affect on the energy released. It is a totally static device adding nor subtracting any energy leaving the barrel.

It does however change the direction of some of the energy. The brake works by redirecting some (a substantial amount) of the energy to the top, bottom, left and right of the barrel through the port holes of the brake. It must do this in a balanced manner to prevent causing the barrel to jump in one direction or another. By balancing out that energy redirection the barrel is much more calm at the shot. The other important part of this is that it is redirecting energy that would have exited the barrel in the same direction as the bullet. By 'stealing' some of this energy and redirecting it, it reduces the 'equal and opposite reaction' as defined by Sir Newton and thus less recoil is felt.

BUT, this redirected energy consists in part of sound energy. When this leaves the the side of the barrel at roughly 90 degree angles, it will travel until it hits something and is partially absorbed by that surface but is also partially reflected or echoed. One way or another your ears will be in the path of that sound energy and more so than if you had no brake.

An extreme example of this is shooting in an indoor pistol range. I think you'd agree that the average pistol round contains less powder than your average high power rifle round. Yet I don't think you'd not wear hearing protection in that range. And the reason is that the sound is bouncing all over the place and it makes it back to your ears.

Now going the opposite direction, if you've ever hunted lets say geese in an open field and shooting up, you might have noticed the report of the unported 12 gauge is just a short pop that really isn't very loud at all. Why? Because the sound energy is traveling mostly up and the sky doesn't provide much reflection of the sound energy.

Now that's a simple explanation of the physics. My own empirical evidence comes from the one time I shot my 300 RUM with a brake on it and no hearing protection. The pain in my ears as well as the ringing that took like an hour to stop and the resulting headache that not even the worst bottle of tequila could produce told me all I needed to know.

I'm not trying to win an argument here however. And I'm not trying to convince you to not buy the muzzle brake, but I would suggest you make it the last alternative. And if you do end up with one, for the sake of your own hearing, wear something to protect that hearing when you shoot.

 

[sestoppelman]

Thank you Phil for explaining so well what certainly I could not. Obviously you know of what you speak. I am an uneducated boob, but I do know what my ears tell me.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Thank you Phil for explaining so well what certainly I could not. Obviously you know of what you speak. I am an uneducated boob, but I do know what my ears tell me.

Don't give me too much credit, I still learned the hard way with that .300 RUM. Never will forget that.

 

[sestoppelman]

Another one to be not forgotten is the Ruger Blackhawk in .30 Carbine. Loud!!

 

[enysse]

Thanks Phoenix Phil for your explaination of how a muzzlebrake works. It was a great physics lesson.

 

[seattlesetters]

For plains game (excluding eland), I can't imagine anything would be substantially better than a garden-variety .30-06 or .308 Win. Ammo is plentiful for both and they are proven perfomers.

For dry, dusty areas, perhaps something that makes a bigger hole might be in order, but I can't imagine more power would be needed to kill thin-skinned ungulates. Perhaps a derivative of the .30-06 like a .338-06 or .35 Whelen for more open savanna or something based off the .308 Win case like a .338 Federal or .358 Win would be nice for bushveld. With modern bullets, these rounds approximate the performance of such old African numbers as the .318 Westley Richards and 9.3x62, two cartridges with storied histories. I'd think these four would be fine for all plains game, including eland, and a guy wouldn't really have to worry about recoil all that much.

But..what do I know? I've never been (yet!) and have yet to shoot any African plains game.

 

[Ardent]

There is an enormous difference between a 9.3x62 and a .30-06, not even close to the same class (9.3 is closer to .375 H&H in effect) and once you've been to Africa your opinion will likely change. I'm only heading back for the secod time so no expert, but saw enough with regards to how tough African game are to be happy I use a .375 all 'round. Many are happy with .30-06, but it's definitely going on the lighter side as Kevin Thomas points out in the beginnig of this fantastic thread here. Many hunters from the US underestimate the size, and tenacity of African game, and if you're spending all that money on the hunt of your dreams why go with a marginal gun?

 

[sestoppelman]

The .338-06 and the Whelen are quite close to the 9.3 and .318 but the .308 based rounds lag behind considerably. I think all these are adequate but like Ardent says, why go cheap on the gun? Take the biggest thing you can shoot well thats appropriate for the largest game you plan to shoot. You dont really need a .375 for plains game, but there is no arguing its performance and if there is a chance of meeting any DG animals...well, way better off with the .375 than any '06 type round.

 

[johnfox]

For plains game (excluding eland), I can't imagine anything would be substantially better than a garden-variety .30-06 or .308 Win. Ammo is plentiful for both and they are proven perfomers.

For dry, dusty areas, perhaps something that makes a bigger hole might be in order, but I can't imagine more power would be needed to kill thin-skinned ungulates.
But..what do I know? I've never been (yet!) and have yet to shoot any African plains game.

Seattlesetters, continue with that line of thought and you'll be just fine.

I've only got one trip under my belt so I'm not exactly any kind of authority, but I took a 300SAUM with handloaded 165gr Woodleighs and my mate took a 6.5x55 with 140gr Accubonds and both cartridges were very effective. When Ross, my mate, shot his oryx, the PH commented "I've never seen an oryx go down like that before."

FWIW, I'm in the process of putting together a 7x64 to take on my next trip.

Good shot placement and good projectiles, everything else comes second.

 

[seattlesetters]

The .338-06 and the Whelen are quite close to the 9.3 and .318 but the .308 based rounds lag behind considerably. I think all these are adequate but like Ardent says, why go cheap on the gun? Take the biggest thing you can shoot well thats appropriate for the largest game you plan to shoot. You dont really need a .375 for plains game, but there is no arguing its performance and if there is a chance of meeting any DG animals...well, way better off with the .375 than any '06 type round.

Agreed. I love the .35 Whelen and the .338-06, and think the .318 WR and 9.3x62 to be about my favorite "classic" cartridges (along with the .404 Jeffery).

However, I can't imagine an animal hit with a 250gr, .330-cal cup & core bullet fired at 2400fps from a .318 Westley Richards would be dead any quicker or more effeiciently than if the same animal was shot with a 210gr, .338-cal TSX bullet fired from a .338 Federal at 2600fps. There just can't be any measurable difference between the two when it comes to performance on game. At bushveld ranges, I'd surmise both would knock the snot out of critters big and small..

 

[sestoppelman]

In that you are likely correct, however if you step up to the 9.3 and run that same 250 gr up to over 2500 fps, it will hit harder, no question. True most cartridges in this realm perform about the same on game within reasonable ranges say around 200 yards. But if we say the .375 H&H is better than all the aforementioned rounds, then incrementally each bigger, more powerful round is better than the smaller one before it at least in small amounts. And using a modern bullet to compare to an old C&C bullet as you did is grossly unfair to the older round. Use a TSX in both and see what happens. Yes I know they dont make one for the .318 but they sure do for the 9.3. I am taking that caliber and bullet to Zim in June.

 

[WINCHESTER JAKE]

416 REMINGTON

416 REMINGTON. I SHOOT 350 GRAIN SWIFT A-FRAME BULLETS LOADED FOR ME BY DOUBLE TAP AT 2700 FEET PER SECOND THROUGH THE 24 INCH BARREL THROUGH MY WINCHESTER MODEL 70 SAFARI RIFLE. I HAVE BEEN IN NEAR 100 DEGREE WEATHER HUNTING THE MANY HOGS I LOVE TO HUNT. NO PROBLEMS EVER WITH JAMMING. SURE IT IS OVER KILL FOR A HOG BUT I WANT A ONE GUN RIFLE FOR AFRICA. CRAIG BODDINGTON ONCE SAID TO ME AT A SAFARI CLUB MEETING THAT ANY OF THE 416'S WOULD BE A GOOD CHOICE FOR A ONE GUN SAFARI ESPECIALLY IF THE BIG FIVE WERE INCLUDED ON THE LIST ALSO. SO I TOOK IT TO HEART AND HAVE BEEN WORKING OUT WITH THE RIFLE. A DREAM RIFLE AND NEVER ANY PROBLEMS WITH JAMMING IN THE HEAT. OF COURSE NEVER SHOT A CAPE OR EVER BEEN TO AFRICA. SURE THERE ARE SO MANY OTHER RIFLES OUT THERE LIKE THE 375 H&H WHICH I ALSO HAVE AND DEARLY LOVE AND IT IS ALSO A DREAM TO SHOOT. AND I AM NOT SAYING THIS 416 IS THE GREATEST GUN. BUT I HAVE BEEN GIVING THE 416 REMMY A WORK OUT AND IT IS SO MUCH FUN TO SHOOT. AND THE PRICE OF THE WINCHESTER 416 REMMY DIDNT CLEAN OUT MY POCKET BOOK. ANY WAY GUNS ARE FUN AND I AM HAVING FUN WITH THIS ONE NOW. I WILL HAVE FUN WITH MY 460 WEATHERBY AS SOON AS ART ALPHIN FINISHES MINE FROM A-SQUARE WITH HIS COIL REDUCING STOCK. I WILL SEE IF IT STOMPS MY REAR OR NOT. BUT I AM SURE IT WILL BE FUN GIVING THAT A WORK OUT TOO. BUT I MUST SAY THIS 416 REMINGTON SURE IS A LOT OF FUN TO SHOOT. I AM NOT 100% WHICH RIFLE I WILL END UP TAKING TO AFRICA TO SHOOT MY FIRST BUFFALO BUT THIS 416 REMMY WILL BE HIGH ON MY LIST.

 

[sestoppelman]

Hey Win, Should we wear ear plugs when we read your posts?

 

[seattlesetters]

In that you are likely correct, however if you step up to the 9.3 and run that same 250 gr up to over 2500 fps, it will hit harder, no question. True most cartridges in this realm perform about the same on game within reasonable ranges say around 200 yards. But if we say the .375 H&H is better than all the aforementioned rounds, then incrementally each bigger, more powerful round is better than the smaller one before it at least in small amounts. And using a modern bullet to compare to an old C&C bullet as you did is grossly unfair to the older round. Use a TSX in both and see what happens. Yes I know they dont make one for the .318 but they sure do for the 9.3. I am taking that caliber and bullet to Zim in June.

I fully understand it is unfair to compare a c&c bullet to a modern TSX. I was simply trying to illustrate that cartridges like the .318 WR made a fantastic reputation over decades with sterling performance using c&c bullets, and that today's technology makes even a smaller-capacity cartridge like the .338 Federal perform at least equally well to what has been considered "excellent" for several decades.

I realize the 9.3 is close to the perfect all-around Africa plains-game cartridge. I wouldn't mind having one myself. However, the .35 Whelen is essentially its equal any way you slice it. It launches 180 - 310gr bullets with basically equal velocity. Of course, the .338-06 is the equal of the .318 WR with the exception that the .338-cal enjoys a huge advantage when it comes to premium bullets.

Africa has her traditions and they include many of what we all consider to be the classic cartridges. There are many more that would have made the grade had they been used extensively, and modern technology has changed the game so that a few which may not have passed muster 50 years ago can now do all that's required with aplomb. This technology also allows the hunter to shoot a rifle with considerably less recoil....something that is always better for accuracy and shot placement. We now have a host of fine medium-bore cartridges with which to challenge Africa's game...even if they don't fit the old definition of a "classic" Africa cartridge...and that's a good thing.

I think you will absolutely love the 9.3x62 in Zim. I can't imagine a finer choice. Are you planning on hunting buff?

 

[sestoppelman]

No buff this trip, done that before. I used this same 9.3 in Namibia in 2007 so I already know its capabilities. It hits pretty hard. I used on that trip the 250 Nos Accubond, this time the TSX. Next time I go for buff I have this lovely CZ .404 Jeffery to try out. And I agree there is really no practical difference between the Whelen and the 9.3 at least from a game getting perspective.

 

[seattlesetters]

I'd be very interested to hear your take on the 250gr Accubond vs. TSX regarding performance on game. What's on the menu?

 

[sestoppelman]

After the trip I will be able to compare the two bullets but as of yet I have not used the TSX except on paper. The Accubond did quite well I thought on oryx, kudu, and hartebeest in Namibia. Recovered one out of my kudu, everything else was thru and thru. The one recovered bullet retained if memory serves about 75 percent of its weight. It also shot very well, perhaps a little better than the TSX however I spent quite a bit more time developing loads with it than the TSX. As to the menu, the biggest thing on my list is eland which are big so thats one reason for the larger caliber. But remember also that Zim has established minimum caliber and power ratings for game and eland requires a minimum energy level of about 3150 ft/lbs for eland. I had originally planned to take my 7x64 Ruger but it wont quite make the cut power wise.