Of course, I lost all of my firearms in a tragic canoe accident. However…
For some reason I like the .38 Special / .357 Mag pairing of ammunition. I don’t know why; maybe they’re easy to reload? Maybe they’re old and tested? Maybe I’m biased for no good reason whatsoever. Who knows what makes the heart want what it does.
Anyway, I noticed this and liked the idea:
For no logical reason, that just looks like the bee’s knees to me. Pretty sure it’d be a fine big game rifle (provided, as always, the operator is up to the shot).
There’s a bit of discussion at The Captain’s Journal that relates to this shiny new caliber:
I need a toy in a weird caliber like I need a hole in the head, but I like that straightwall case for reloading. Also, I just never got into the .300 Blackout. I mean it’s pretty darned cool but a .300 Blackout without a suppressor is like putting shitty tires on a hotrod. It’s got the engine but the performance you wanted is denied. And I have to admit, doing the paperwork on a suppressor is a turn off. I would like to spare my hearing and I’ll do paperwork if I have to but the BATFE / suppressor thing is like doing taxes as a hobby. Boooooring.
Also, I’m not sure about the whole “legal betterness” of a straightwalled case. I’m have mostly escaped the universe of “this gun is ‘good’ and that gun is ‘dangerous’ due to some dumb fucking technical difference that nobody in the right mind would care about”. I realize the depth of the related political shitstorm but it’s just not a thing I have to worry about. Apparently straightwall versus necked case is a thing in some places? Who knew? Arbitrary regulations are fuckin’ weird.
Then again it’s a personal goal to avoid “flavor of the month” calibers when possible. Also, and far more importantly, I’ve blown all my “wiggle room” keeping the house heated this winter. A wise man would stay the course and keep his money in his pocket.
Besides, if I were wandering the woods looking to put a .357 bullet into something edible I’d definitely prefer something a bit more old school and suitable for a Curmudgeon:
Oh well, it’s fun to look at the new toys anyway.
I love my 1894C for woods carry and it makes a dandy deer rifle for the right circumstances. Buffalo Bore ammo in that sexy levergun (bested only by my Savage 99.) makes short work of Bambi.
Whats the recoil of .357 in one of those? I presume it would be pretty tame.
Very tame compared to a rifle round.
Nice!
Thanks. It’s always fun to look at new toys. Sorta like when the Sear Roebuck Wish Book would arrive for the holidays….
I hope the 350 Legend is successful in getting more AR platform rifles in the hunting fields.
As an aside, Winchester does need to learn a new trick tho. Stuffing a 35 caliber bullet into the current service rifle case was well worn trick with the 358 Winchester, which was a necked up.308 case. And the .308 of course was a shortened 30-06 case, which is ripped off the 7×57 case design. Maybe Winchester needs a new HR manager that can spot talent for more than copying someone else’s homework? Wildcatting with cheap military surplus brass isn’t new either. Seems it was popular in the post WW1 depression and after WW2. Is Winchester sending us a hint?
I’m not likely to get a 350 legend soon, what with a bunch of young kids to feed every day and all that goes with that. We had an old lever gun that put meat in the freezer every fall until the tragic boat accident epidemic swept the nation. Such a shame…
Watch out for them boats. They lose a lotta’ guns.
It occurs to me that a Henry Big Boy is in roughly the same price range as an AR in some funky caliber. Maybe this one is a toy that won’t go anywhere.
That Henry Big Boy is a beast. Heavy as all get out. Shoots like a house afire. My brother has one in 44. It doesn’t do well with heavy 300+ grain bullets tho. He also has a Rossi 92 in 357 mag that he won’t turn loose of. Action is slicked up nice and it’s super light. I like it. He won’t sell it because of my sad history with boating accidents.
In all seriousness, I really like the Rossi 92. Second only to those unicorn Marlin lever guns in 357 or 32 H&R. Would be perfect around our place. All things in good time.
Thanks for your blog. Wish I had your talent for seeing the humor in the wrenches that life tosses our way. You’re doing a good thing.
Thanks. It is funny all the weird shit that happens in what should be a boring normal life. Glad you get a smile of it.
Straight walls aside, my interest has been piqued with the 358 Yeti that I heard about on The Reloading Podcast. I it is yet another .308 case variant wildcat from Mad Dog Weapons Systems. With a 200gr FTX they claim 2189 ft/lb at 100 yards and claim to use 357 pistol bullets for practice ammo.
https://www.maddogweapons.com/358-yeti.html
I like the idea of .357 bullets for practice… but I’ve talked myself off the ledge. I need more shit chambered in “wildcat” calibers like I need a hole in my head.
I understand completely, I haven’t plunked down the cash to assemble an upper either. There are any number of other cartridges that are superior in AR10 and bolt guns. What I find appealing is the level of performance in an AR15 package that is capable of taking any North American game animal. The 350 Legend, if it finds adoption, is one of the more interesting SAAMI rounds in a while. A progression of the .30 carbine formula biggie sized, but not super sized to 450 Bushmaster proportions.
But I’ve digressed, reloaders tend to gravitate towards bizarre cartridges and loads like a beautiful girl to a bad boy.
Not much would be left of a squirrel after you hit ’em with that Henry.
But then not much has been left of squirrels around here anyway for quite some time now…
}:-]
Sorry man. Last time I started writing squirrels I got sicker than a dog and all I really did was spread printouts all over the kitchen table. Don’t fret. The story’s not dead until I’m dead… and I’m not dead yet.
It’s a rimless 357 Maximum. It’s exactly the same fscking thing. It claims a 100 fps more than the Maxi but with modern powder I’m going to put my arse out there and say the Maxi can match it evenly.
It’s stupid.
It’ll sell a lot of guns.
Mission accomplished.
Never heard of the .357 Max. You’re right… same damn thing.
I think I’m going to hold off on this particular siren song.
The .357 maxi was a lengthened .357 magnum. It lost popularity because it started to flame cut the top straps of revolvers that were chambered for it after about 50 rounds. Ruger dropped the chambering toot de sweet once the warranty claims started to come in. I can’t recall if any other manufacturer chambered revolvers for it but I do know that Thompson Center produced barrels for their handgun in the chambering.
I own a Rossi copy of the Winchester 1892 with a 20″ barrel and love it. 38 special loaded with a cast 158 grain lead bullet and 3 grains of Bullseye is JUST below supersonic and is cheaper than .22 LR to reload. Good for rabbits and such like game. With a jacketed bullet loaded into .357 mag cases to full power it is good for about 1850 FPS M.V. to 150 yards max on deer and the recoil is non existent. Good fun and cheap as chips without going to any exotic cartridge and/or expensive AR15.
Some good ideas there. 3 grains is a tiny charge. Something I never considered against a rabbit.
“straight-wall restriction” Never heard ah such a thing not Trump-related. Rationale, anyone?
I’m mystified too. Then again California made rules that created a “bullet button” so anything is possible.
And then outlawed the bullet button. Idiots.
BTW, I used to own three canoes and one sailboat. Never lost a single gun until one fateful day when the wind suddenly freshened significantly…
Bwa ha ha ha…. they outlawed the bullet button. I had to look it up. There’s nothing so stupid that California won’t codify it.
Ever consider a Thompson Contender? Sure, it’s a pistol, but you can get barrels in everything from .22lr up to the massive .45-70, and there’s probably something even larger I’ve not heard of yet. So you have your pistol cartridges available, you have manly rifle cartridges available, you have bone-breaking big-bore cartridges available, and all you really need to do is determine if you want to spend barrel money instead of gun money to shoot what you want to shoot.
Mine was in .30-30, .222 Remington, .30 Herrett, .44 Mag, and 410 shot-shell. Alas, I say it was because during a particularly windy day of trying to rid a local lake of Chinese carp my canoe capsized and all I was left with was a six-pack and a paddle. Tragic, I’m sure you’ll agree.
Yeah, those canoe accidents suck. Seems like they happen to everyone. Tragic.
I love me my rossi 1892 in 44 mag and stainless steel.
Added a rear peep sight in place of the wart safety and it’s a pile of wonderful for deer.
Pairs nicely with a Taurus tracker in 44 stainless
The straight-walled cartridge thing is a thing in Ohio. It seems the Fuds were in charge of writing the hunting legislation, and they don’t like anything that isn’t a muzzle-loader or a shotgun, but the compromised.
I was looking at a Henry in .45-70, but I need a gun that eats expensive ammo like a fish needs a bicycle.
Indiana too, I believe.
Certain places allowed only shotguns, muzzleloaders, and handguns for deer hunting because whitetail had been hunted to extinction back in the day. (It was so long ago that people forgot the original reason and now assume it’s because the land is flat, and yet never wonder why it’s okay to hunt squirrel and coyote with a 7mm Rem Mag if the fancy takes them.)
People said “What about carbines chambered for pistol calibers?”
DNRs thought this over, and said “Okay, but no shenanigans. No saying .243 is a pistol caliber because you can buy an Encore chambered for it. Straight wall calibers only.”
And people said “Well, what about .45-70? It has a straight wall. And it’s pretty slow, so it won’t shoot through a schoolbus full of nuns and orphans two counties over.”
And DNRs said “No, .45-70 is a rifle caliber. It needs to be a straight-wall caliber with a case shorter than… well, shorter than the .45-70.”
And people said “Cool! .450 Bushmaster coming right up!”
And the rest is… well, not history, but still current events.
(Although the DNR finally relented and let Hoosiers use bottleneck rifle cartridges on whitetail, in addition to squirrel and coyotes.)
Good background. I hadn’t thought about the limits of whitetail populations (back around the depression I’m thinking?).
I do like how regulation leads to strangely unpredictable and sometimes wonderfully weird “innovation”. Without regulation there wouldn’t be a zillion muzzleloaders of various abilities in circulation. Also limits on “assault rifles” in the 1990’s is why everyone and their dog has eleveneteen of them in 2019 (except me, canoe accident and all). I hadn’t considered the origins of the .450 Bushmaster but another direction of “innovation” is air rifles. Some ocan already take down big game and they seem to be on a trajectory (no pun intended) to get bigger, more powerful, and more accurate. They’re still too expensive for my tastes right now, but I think it would be cool if someday it’s cheap and routine to drop an elk with an air rifle.
Thank you for the info, Tam. Say “hey” to Huck- I think I take care of his doppleganger.