375 Rifle Choice

The 375 is not generally intended as a long range gun. I have the Ruger Hawkeye Alaskan in 375 Ruger. I have always had rifles with 24-28 inch barrels and shoot a lot at long range. I really fell in love with the Alaskan. It is very accurate (sub MOA) and I am using loads with 300 gr bullets that are getting an honest 2600 fps out of the 20" barrel. Is very handy to carry and shoot - I actually think I have missed the boat the advantage of the short barrell for the last 40 years. I have spent way too much chasing another 100 fps and not being practical. Actually the shorter barrels are stiffer and this aids the accuracy. I feel as comfortable with this gun out to 300 yards as I do with the long range guns at 500 yards plus. For intended use of 300 yards and in I don't think you are sacrificing anything with the 20" barrell. I chose this gun over my others for Brown Bear in Alaska in May. I am also a fan of synthetic stocks hunting purposes and really like the feel of the Hogue stock on the Alaskan.

I would never cut a barrel shorter, but that is me, there are plenty of factory rifles with short barrels. I can understand a guy wanting a short barrel because a long one gets caught in the brush all the time, but a long barrel gun...points better for me, I like the weight forward of the action that a long barrel gives and I shoot them better with them especially in the wind. But if I where hunting short distances and in the brush all day...I would go with the short gun and short barrel.

M70 Safari Express. I had this conversation earlier with another member and made a mistake of being too bias towards the Winchester M70, which inevitably offenended him because of what it implied about his current weapon. So let me just say, the M70 is a classic, it is reliable with the claw extractor, and relatively light.

The 375 H&H is a marverllously flexible round. Can be be loaded from 180 gn to 380gn projectiles. The advantage of having a rifle with a longer barrel and loading light projectiles it gives you a combination that can be used for some pretty long range shooting. On the other hand load the 375 with 300gn plus weight projectiles and you can hunt any DG you want. From my experience I have found that shortening barrels with generally reduce velocity from 30 - 50 fps per inch of barrel removed. So taking a couple of inches from a barrel will make no difference to performance. The 375 Ruger may be a little different as from my loading experience with 416 Ruger I am unable to duplicate Hornadys velocity. Since both are the same case I suspect that the 375 Ruger may be in the same boat. I also think that most savvy PHs would not recommend clients bring reloads that are loaded hot for their safari and especially for DG hunts.

As to which rifle to buy? In the end it comes down to personal preference. And that gentlemen is the reason why there are so many different brands on the market. It would be a boring world if we all had the choice from only one brand of rifle. In the end what matters is where you poke that projectile on your intended quarry no matter what gun you have.

I have a Ruger Hawkeye Alaskan in 375 Ruger myself and hopefully one day I will win in the lottery and go and hunt some buffs
I really enjoy shooting that gun and it handles very well in my opinion.

Btw, barrel length has nothing to do with precision (unless it is extremely short).
Shorter barrel gives less speed, but in many guns it can in fact increase the accuracy because the barrel gets stiffer.

A 375 would no be my first choice when it comes to long range guns(300 yards+) anyway

Originally Posted by RickB

I disagree! I cut the barrel down so I have an excuse to buy another gun for long range shooting!

Ok back to being serious. I agree about the factory design, but like you said at less than 100 yards it won't matter. But like politics, and Chevy vs Ford, people have their favorites. Some people are willing to cut there winchester down just so they keep their winchester.

Jeeeezzzz mate - you just don't like Win's do you...what happened to you and the Win's to became enemies?

Thank you all for explaining this shorter / longer issue. I am with Enysse on this one - would not cut - period - rather buy a shorter 'stiffy'

I am a ruger person at heart. I lost what like I had for winchester back arround 06 ish when they stopped making the guns in the US. I don't hate hate them, they are no longer one of my favorite. I used a model 70 featherweight on my trip to SA in may. Oh by the way they are short and light and I love that in a gun. I am a big guy and I like carbine style guns. They just seem to fit like a glove. I owned a gun back in 97 that I loved. Bought it I'm Germany at an American rod gun club show. It was a CZ imported by Springfield armory. Mauser mdl 98 convertion in .308. I loved that gun! Until I had to put a round in it! It would only chamber certain rounds. Like the head spacing wasn't right. I could have got it fixed(to this day I wish I did) but didn't. Ended up selling it back. I just like the Mauser 98 action. And ruger was one that copied it. So that is why I like ruger. I know there are others but I tend to stick with ruger....no real good reason lol.

Originally Posted by TerryR

You'll love the Winchester, great choice. Make sure that you mount a good scope, I prefer S&B but Leupolds seem to be the most popular choice. Just avoid a cheap scope, you can't hit what you can't see plus the bush is no place to discover that your scope can't handle your rifle's recoil.

I've had great success with a Leupold VX III 1.5-5x20 with the #4 reticle. Made 20 to 300 yard shots with it. Deadly accurate combination with the LH Model 70 2005 New Haven Safari Express, .375 H&H. I hunted factory Remington 300 grain A Frames. I handload several different bullets for it and consistently achieve MOA precision.