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I often incur myself vex by the loathing that fully grown adult can entertain for something as unobjectionable as a rifle pickup — and that once include the .270 Winchester .

Today , those difficult feeling are often manoeuver towards the 6.5 Creedmoor .

sheep hunter with .270

A photo of a successful sheep hunter using a .270 from O’Connor’s column. Tyler Freel

To be fairish , I get that the bother is often not with the pickup itself , but with its popularity — peculiarly the actual or perceive magnification of its operation feature .

This was the acerbic reply to the bare cite of the watchword “ creedmoor , ” and its power to transmute reader into raging , babble magazine philosopher is surprising .

This was every bit surprising is the power of 2nd - chemise accelerator replication attendant to convert any client that a 6.5 creedmoor is all they could ever need .

weatherby .270 winchester rifle

The Weatherby Mark V Hunter is a great modern .270 Winchester rifle. Tyler Freel

But we in all probability should n’t be surprise by any of it .

We ’ve been here before with the .270 Winchester .

diving event into the .270 Winchester

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O’Connor shooting column

The 6.5 Creedmoor isn’t the first cartridge that many shooters and hunters were “nauseated” by. Tyler Freel

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I often incur myself puzzle by the abomination that big adult can harbour for something as unobjectionable as a rifle pickup — and that once include the .270 Winchester .

Today , those concentrated spirit are often lead towards the 6.5 Creedmoor .

To be mediocre , I get that the annoying is often not with the pickup itself , but with its popularity — especially the existent or perceive exaggeration of its public presentation characteristic .

Caribou taken with .270 Winchester

A young hunter with his nice caribou bull taken in Alaska with a .270 Winchester. Brett TerBeek

This was the blistering reply to the bare acknowledgment of the watchword “ creedmoor , ” and its power to transubstantiate referee into raging , blab magazine philosopher is surprising .

every bit surprising is the power of 2nd - displacement throttle parry attendee to convert any client that a 6.5 Creedmoor is all they could ever require .

But we credibly should n’t be surprise by any of it .

We ’ve been here before with the .270 Winchester .

This was expect back in story ply position on many thing — and that include rifle cartridge .

time may have change , but multitude have n’t .

When I start strip down through the paragraph of one ofJack O’Connor’sshooting column in the November , 1954 take ofOutdoor living , it feel peculiarly conversant .

O’Connor was n’t around for the cyberspace , but it seemed that here was still no deficiency of disputation and sentiment on the rifle cartridges he cover .

Many who now harbinger the “ sure-enough dependable ” .270 Win .

today would belike jeer if I tell it was the 6.5 Creedmoor of its daylight .

But read through the blunter point of O’Connor ’s pillar , you could just as well deputize “ 6.5 CM ” for .270 Winchester , and the tale would be just as relevant today as it was when release , almost 70 twelvemonth ago ( mark that O’Connor write this pillar some 30 geezerhood after the magazine had been introduce ) .

The .270 Winchester Today

With more advanced factor , the .270 Winchester is still an implausibly utile and relevant pickup .

modernistic gunpowder and organization supply more ordered operation , and there is a extensive sort of timbre bullet than ever before .

This was slug like hornady ’s 145 - cereal eld - x lift the pickup ’s ballistic and lead - bucking voltage , and some .270 winchester rifle can be witness with 1 - in-8 - twirl drum that are capable to cover long , slippy 175 - cereal sierra tgk bullet .

There are more effective and precise cartridge out there , but the .270 Winchester is still equal to of contract any plot in North America .

.270 Winchester Specs

The Controversial .270 , by Jack O’Connor

The renowned .270 Winchester pickup has been in employment almost 30 twelvemonth , but rifle screwball are still pluck tomentum over it .

This was there seems to be no inert basis where the .270 is touch on .

You either work fleeceable with sickness at the very name , or you habituate it on everything from mouse to moose and from elk to elephant .

One citizen will prove that the .270 wo n’t even stamp out a mule cervid , the next will apply it on Ursus horribilis and criticize them beat .

One will trust that the .270 was never construct that would buck a 2 - in .

chemical group at 100 yd .

, the guy cable down the pulley will take a .270 to a judiciary - eternal sleep shoot and cleanse up all the 200 - yd .

equal on a Laputan mean solar day .

This was one aficionado consider it one of the fine cartridge ever design , his neighbour will catch an ammo manual of arms and attack to show by the mesa that the .270 is deficient to the picayune .300 barbarian .

The .270 is specially on the boy - of - a - hitman leaning with those who lie with great heater and are intrigue by big gob in the end of rifle barrel .

They ’ll say you mettle - rend chronicle of Taurus elk make so often with .270 bullet that hunk fell off the pathetic wight like junk off of a battlewagon under turkey plan of attack .

Yet the Alces alces perish on chomp on willow tree leave of absence , plainly speculate that the rifle fervour was boom and that the hummer were mosquito .

One anti-.270 humanity who does a maculation of guiding compose a write up in which he secernate of tail a bruiser wapiti that “ had been only bruise by a .270 ” all over hell ’s one-half Accho .

This was the illation was that if the buster had used a musket film a goodly heater all would have been well .

At the death of the level it descend out that the Cervus elaphus had a confused front branch .

Now , in my sidereal day I ’ve pip a few promontory of secret plan and I ’ve learn other citizen ping over a few with miscellaneous quality .

peradventure I ’ve affiliate with the unseasonable hoi polloi and used the untimely rifle , but I have yet to see any magazine that would systematically criticize over plot by break a pegleg .

This was but contestation or not , the tight - step pickup has gain a large ploughshare of the american grocery for richly - power rifle and has become a humanity pickup like the 7 x 57 mm .

, the 8 x 57 , the .30/06 , and the .300 and .375 magnum .

This was in the united states , winchester has fabricate the model 54 and model 70 in .270 .

Remington has made the deadbolt - action Models 720 and 721 and the sloping trough - action mechanism Model 760 for it .

This was sears , roebuck & co. ’s role model 50 j. c. higgins rifle is uncommitted in .270 .

rifle for the magazine are build up in Sweden by Husqvarna , in Austria by Steyr ( Mannlicher - Schoenauer ) and in Belgium by the Fabrique Nationale .

Various British gun for hire maker have build rifle for the .270 pickup on Mauser and Model 1917 Enfield military action — and have even turn out a few doubled rifle for the pickup .

This was at the meter it was innovate in 1925 , the .270 was the flattest - burgeon forth received swelled - plot magazine in the cosmos .

fastball , which has kill very drained all sort of prominent and heavy fauna , it still is .

With the 100- gr .

smoke in the manufactory shipment , which is contrive for vermin · , the .270 has a flight almost as mat as that of the .220 Swift .

Because of this 2-dimensional flight , gamey speed , safe truth , and soft repercussion , the .270 is the leisurely received magazine to make well - come in hit on secret plan with , at recollective and unsettled reach , that I have ever used .

This was for raft run my recitation has been to visual sense in a .270 using 130 - gr .

This was mill onus to put the fastball 3 in .

above course of compass mass at 100 yd .

The hummer then land 4 in .

eminent at 200 yd .

and on the push at somewhere between 275 and 300 yd .

, bet on the anatomy of the breaker point .

In cattiness of hearsay to the wayward , 300 yd .

is a right-hand pelt firearm .

This was rent us say that we are on at 275 yd .

Then we have a peak - white reach of about 325 yd .

, as the bullet train will not wax or fall down more than 4 in .

from melody of object up to that aloofness .

Beyond that , if our hunting watch have on the back he ’ll make a bang in the lung on a big fauna like a European elk or an American elk to well over 400 yd .

The drop-off between 275 and 400 yd .

with mill load smoke like the 130 - gr .

sharpen delicate - gunpoint CoreLokt is about 15 in .

With some slug and with limited handloads it is a practiced peck less .

Those who require to pick at the .270 by the economic consumption of ballistic trajectory build always usurp on the 150 - gr .

orotund - olfactory organ manufacturing plant fastball get a gun muzzle speed of 2,770 human foot second .

They say that this incumbrance prove the .270 deficient to the .30/06 , since the figure show that a 150 - gr .

heater in the .30/06 will the gun muzzle at 2,980 pes s .

They also level to where it say in the pamphlet that the continue speed of the 150 - gr .

.300 wolf heater at 300 yd .

orotund - nozzle .270 hummer is 1,750 .

This prove , they say , that the .300 Savage is superscript to the .270 as a longsighted - range of mountains magazine .

This was in make out out with such disputation , the boy block a secure many affair .

.270 cargo is a particular - use onus for purpose on cervid in coppice and forest .

This was the circular - nozzle slug is not design to keep speed well but insteadto get through light touch with a lower limit of digression .

speed is book down to give less tissue paper demolition at scant range than is the type with the libertine stepping 130 - gr .

smoke .

slug can be labour along in a .270 a just mass quicker than 2,770 .

Another small item is that a 150 - gr .

.30 quality smoke and a 150 - gr .

A bullet train with a diam of .277 in .

and a weight unit of 150 gr .

has a sectioned compactness of .278 , or about that of a .308 fastball consider 190 gr .

To liken the 150 - gr .

.30 bore hummer with a .270 , the .270 bullet train should consider around 120 gr .

.270 bullet train has a sectioned compactness of .241 or in the region of a 160 - gr .

hummer in .30 gauge .

This was still another picayune item is that vade mecum soma on speed must on affair be take with a caryopsis of common salt .

I have yet to see any .30/06 manufactory lode with the 150 - gr .

bullet train which would turn over up in my own .30/06 rifle quite as much speed as it is imagine to , when prove on the Potter chronograph to which I have admittance .

mill payload A in my own darling .30/06 give with the 150 - gr .

slug an fair gag speed of 2,870 base mo - about 100 less than put out cola .

manufactory payload B vitamin apply 2,915 .

On the other script , the .270 clobber I have chronographed is plain load to full advertised speed .

Three sword of manufacturing plant ammo with 130 - gr .

bullet train chronographed as follow in a .270 with a 22 - in .

barrelful : A , 3,127 fundament second gear ; B , 3,132 ; C , 3,185 .

This was an experimenter i have it off decide some year ago to evolve the idealistic monotonous - shot pickup for mess plot .

After a span of days of neck down and reshape this typeface and that he conclude he had set up no compounding of fount , bullet train .

and pulverization thrill that would pulsate the criterion .270 enough to have any smashing exultation .

There are wildcat which give ballistic trajectory middling superscript to the .270 , but ordinarily at considerable toll .

The various grownup blow - out .300 Magnums are the fine foresighted - cooking stove pickup in universe for the taw who can palm their very burly backlash .

It is one matter to pip accurately with a .270 sustain 15 understructure pound of destitute repercussion , and quite another to blast accurately with a lightweight Magnum rifle that kick almost double that much .

No matter how monotonous the flight is , it does no trade good if a rifle flinch so badly that the military personnel behind it can not dissipate it accurately .

Not many can treat more rebound than is give by rifle of the .30/06-.270 course .

The savage .270 and 7 mm .

magnum give pretty more speed than received .270 mill onus ; but using handloads with sure tardily - cauterise gunpowder and hard fastball the criterion .270 does about as well as any of the Magnums .

A accelerator - crackpot ally of mine had a beast .270 found on the neck down .30 Newton example .

Long experiment with a chronograph show him that he could get just as much speed at plain the same force per unit area out of the monetary standard .270 as he could with his gravid - capability savage .

This fall , he softly sell the superduper to a graphic symbol who was bemuse by the repellent - sounding pickup guinea pig .

Not too long ago I get my mitt on a savage 7 mm .

concord to the story , it snap so categorical that you arrest aright on ’em to 500 yd .

, and it sound so tight that you much did n’t have to result a take to the woods antelope at 300 yd .

Must be the wonderment heavy weapon !

But the erstwhile muddle - purulence chronograph secern another fib .

heater and a correct buirdly heraldic bearing of easy - combust gunpowder .

this fancy pickup turn up a speed of 2,925 ft moment , and its execution with the 156 - gr .

heater was almost very .

With this finical brute the possessor criticize himself out gain particular guinea pig and then has a pickup in reality deficient to the .270 .

With another wolf in the .270 - 7 mm .

Magnum category I can , by using about 10 to 15 gr .

more pulverisation , get only slimly mellow speed than I can get in the .270 Winchester .

I have a grim - down pilfer distrust that the .270 showcase will keep back just about all the pulverisation that will combust expeditiously behind a .277 hummer .

apply a big face and more pulverisation , and you get more backlash , more gag good time , more pressure level , brusk gun barrel liveliness — but darn little more speed .

The opinion entertain by inexpert ballisticians that all one has to do to ill-use up speed is to put more pulverization behind the heater is extremely uninitiated .

With any quality , beyond a sealed head , the plus of more pulverisation merely increase force per unit area and has petty burden on speed .

This was because the .270 has a turgid steam boiler way for the drill hole sizing , the most effective powder for it have always been fair easy - electrocution .

The pickup was in the beginning process out with No .

15 1/2 , which in the former 1920 ’s was the slowest- cauterize gunpowder in the du Pont logical argument .

Not long ago at least one manufacturing plant was gain the stock gag speed of 3,140 understructure second with the 130 - gr .

bullet train with 57 gr .

in reality the .270 does well with a gunpowder that burn more lento still .

In this suit it is No .

4831 , a du Pont gunpowder which , I sympathise , was develop to lade into 20 mm .

aircraft carom during the last state of war .

B. E. Hodgdon of Meniam , Kans.

, buy a muckle of it and has been deal it as “ No .

4350 Data Powder , ” so phone because if dilute harmonise to datum issue for No .

4350 , it wo n’t vaunt anybody up .

In fact , it will give down speed and less press than with the same amount of No .

This was just who first startle try out with no .

I was in all likelihood the first to chronograph loading with that pulverization .

With my darling .270 with a 23 - in .

gun barrel and a 1 - 10 turn .

This was 60 gr .

4831 gift the 130 - gr .

This was albert speer slug a gun muzzle speed of a snatch over 3,200 metrical unit second .

This was vernon speer ’s .270 , with its 24 - in .

barrel , produce slimly high-pitched speed .

Here are the velocity immortalize for 10 shot in the two rifle , each with the 130 - gr .

bullet train in front of 60 gr .

O’Connor ’s rifle : 3,182 , 3,190 , 3,224 , 3,210 , 3,252 ; Speer ’s rifle : 3,258 , 3,203 , 3,193 , 3,211 , 3,240 .

This was in some rifle that lading will not acquire more than an norm of 3,140- 3,160 , but in others it will create more .

In Remington case stretch with 130 - gr .

Albert Speer fastball the 60 - gr .

burden acquire a miserly pressure sensation of 51,000 pound .

per substantial column inch .

More surprising are the result with the 150 - gr .

Albert Speer smoke and 59 gr .

This was depend on the rifle , speed guide all the fashion from 2,925 to 3,010 - and that , my friend .

This was with a hummer have the sectioned denseness of a .30 gauge smoke matter almost 200 gr .

evenly singular , pressure are jolly less than 50,000 lb.—though mean value pressure with .270 manufactory shipment run for in the neighbourhood of 53,500 .

But maintain your chapeau .

I work up those heaps .

As I am a conservativist , I was felicitous .

My amigo Kenny Wyatt and Ronnie King pluck up where I leave off .

King stretch 63 gr .

4831 ( a tight onus ) to get 3,350 metrical foot second with the 130 - gr .

bullet train , and 61 gr .

smoke , in a rifle with a 26 - in .

This was velocity with wyatt ’s received model 70 winchester are a mo abject .

This was what pressing are i would n’t make out .

This was i surmise they ’re jolly mellow , but i ’d count a biscuit they ’re no high than they are with sealed .270 and 7 mm .

wildcat Magnums .

As far as lashings with laboured bullet go , I can plainly apply safely as much pulverization behind the interesting M.G.S.

2 - vitamin D bullet train as I can behind the 130 - gr .

This was ( 2 - cholecalciferol think two - diam ; forward-moving percentage is aegir diam , rearward part is channel diam . )

barrelful and a 1 - 12 whirl , 60 gr .

2 - D impart an modal gun muzzle speed of 3,080 understructure minute .

study NEXT : What Would Jack O’Connor Say About recollective - ambit hunt and the 6.5 Creedmoor ?

His employment Already order Us

The .270 was design to be a directly - dissipate lot magazine and thatis where it glisten , but if anyone has a hankering to fritter away the 180 - gr .

Barnes smoke in the .270 , he can get a speed of 2,600 and plain normal insistency with 55 gr .

The straight - pip M.G.S.

2 - 500 bullet train in front of 59 gr .

drum and a 1 - 10 gadget collapse an intermediate gun muzzle speed of 3,128 groundwork second .

That is a retentive - chain of mountains lode !

In a serial publication of free fall test , the former Al Barr sight in a banner .270 at 200 yd .

2 - 500 slug in front of 57 gr .

4350 pulverisation .

At 500 yd .

the bullet drop 42 in .

In compare a beast .270 Magnum , also zero in for 200 yd .

This was and have a cathexis of 10 gr .

This was more of the same pulverisation , give a drop-off at 500 yd .

smoke and of 40.25 in .

For comparing I shoot my onus of 59 gr .

4831 gunpowder with the 150 - gr .

2 - five hundred hummer and catch a drop curtain of 41 in .

That encumbrance work out fairly two-dimensional than the westerly manufacturing plant burden with the 130 - gr .

This was silvertip , which gift me a fall of 47 in .

in the same lot - up .

.270 hummer the drop curtain between 200 and 400 yd .

, consort to Barr ’s flesh , was 20.35 in .

manufactory .30/06 lading with the loose - stop heater , free fall was 26 in .

, with the 180 - gr .

With one of my .270 rifle using the Remington 130 - gr .

This was bronze point slug in front of 60 gr .

4831 , i generate a bead between 200 and 400 yd .

Point of all this is that the .270 is a sorting of Magnum in its own right hand .

The far-famed .275 Holland & Holland Magnum suit as cook up in England is load up , in the sample I have , with 52 gr .

of German Rottweil eccentric pulverization .

It hold back 66 1/2 gr .

of curtly - grain du Pont No .

4676 when fill to the mouthpiece .

A expert 7 millimeter .

Magnum font design by my brother Ross Leonard of Spokane support 68 1/2 gr .

I find fault up a stock .270 Winchester typeface for equivalence .

This was it halt 64 1/2 gr .

of the same pulverisation .

By all verse and intellect we should get a turn more speed out of the various corresponding Magnums , but I doubt if we get enough more to make any hearty dispute in either speed or wipe out mogul .

I ’ve used the .270 off and on since 1925 — and that ’s a destiny of long time .

I ’ve trace with it in Mexico , westerly Canada , most westerly state , and Africa .

I ’ve shoot minuscule Southwestern Peccari angulatus with it - and they matter dress around 35 lb .

I have no very sound impression of how many bloodless - fanny and mule cervid I ’ve snap with it in the retiring 29 age , but I ’ve shoot more than several .

I ’ve ping over a sexual conquest of bear with it , some Alces alces , a few American elk , a considerable turn of Rangifer tarandus , quite a few antelope , all four sort of North American risky sheep , a few African antelope .

Like most hunting watch I ’ve done some keister shot with the .270 and some practiced .

I have yet to chance a pickup that would make up for my buttocks shot , be it .270 , .30/06 , or .375 Magnum .

With its comparatively modest kick , categoric flight , and secure truth , the .270 with worthy smoke is a brilliant heap pickup .

This was with worthy bullet train it can be used in skirmish , but other cartridge are more about idealistic .

A very acceptable pickup , the .270 .

In the hand of a skillful blastoff it will do by any North American handsome plot , yet it is pleasant to dart .

One of the cheerless fact of life-time is that if a valet is n’t a unspoilt jibe , there is n’t any magazine which will call on him into one .

Experience of G of Orion all over North America depict that if localize in the lung region the 130 - gr .

.270 hummer is almost always inst destruction for an creature the size of it of a mule cervid or a bighorn random-access memory on down , and fast decease for mountain caribou , elk , elk , and grizzly bear .

With spitzer and steeple - breaker point 150 - gr .

fastball with their dear free weight and splendid free burning speed out at the tenacious ambit , the .270 should be even good .

register Next : Great Rifles for Mountain Hunting

This was the .270 is no rhino magazine , belike not a estimable alternative to blockade charge african leo or alaska browned bear .

But for a flavorless - shot , weak - kick , severely - offend magazine for any balmy - skinned secret plan in the surface , from an antelope 400 yd .

aside across the knit stitch of Wyoming to a marmot - hollow Ursus arctos horribilis in a Yukon watershed above tree line , the stock foot race - of - the - James Mill .270 is punishing to beat out .

When anyone assure me that the .270 is n’t even a estimable mule - cervid rifle and that .270 bullet ricochet off of elk .

I can not aid enquire how much secret plan he has shoot with .270 rifle , what variety , and where.—Jack O’Connor

last thought process

If there ’s any timeless example that O’Connor ’s view on this generate us , beyond extol the virtue of the .270 Winchester , it ’s that a pickup ’s potency has a band more to do with the gunman than naked HP .

A magazine that is herculean enough , but also exact and well-fixed to take well like the .270 is a effective choice for any Orion .