Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

P

Pond James Pond

New member
I once had an American girlfriend. I won't bore you with details of that romantic liaison suffice to say that she was small but perfectly formed!! :D

She was also impossible to live with, but I digress.

I want to know which cartridges, regardless of their shooting merits, you think are perfectly formed (small or otherwise).

Do you prefer FMJ, cast; straight walled, bottle-necked; rimmed, belted?

For example, I very much like the look of both my .44 permutations, but of the two, I really think the .44Spl is well proportioned and a LSWC really finishes off the look nicely.
In the Mag, my Cast Performance LWN bullets look fantastic against shiny brass. Wide, but not too wide, long, but not too long.

And you....What does it for you?
 
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Beauty of the cartridge

Cartridge beauty should be in categories:

Swimsuit - .22 LR bikini

Slender rifle - .223 Remington, small and cooperative, mini .30-06

Large rifle - .30-06, perfect in all respects

Overall winner - .38 special, sweet, light, and versatile

Runner up - .44 special
 
.44Spl is nicely proportioned and a LSWC really finishes off the look nicely.
Click to expand...
And most importantly, they are accurate in most every gun.
Same for the .38 spl.
Performance is everything, more so than looks.
Looks and performance trumps all.
 
The elusive .440 Carbon - Desert Eagle sold me on this cartridge in the '90's then pulled the rug on it. I bought my Deagle just to eventually buy the barrel to shoot this round.

30-06 Great round for hunting deer, pig, bigger things and Nazis. How could you do any better than this round.

10mm. Simple, slim, elegant, powerful, effective - Best handgun round ever!
 
I understand.

The archaic and nearly dead 250-3000 Savage. Well proportioned and shaped. Caliber is a numerically perfect 25, a classic number that holds a place in the infinite line of numbers as a square of the perfect number 5 and a fourth of the perfect number 1. the velocity of 3,000 FPS is a golden number for shooters, a number striven for by every shooter of non magnum cartidges. two-fifty. Three thousand. Say those words out loud. Feel them rolling off of the tongue and listen to them glide out. Savage wanted to engineer this round outside of the box, to put the 30-30 out of the hearts of american deer hunters, to replace the outdated and primitive looking lever guns of the day. Also known as the treinta Y treinta, 30 winchester, 30 smokeless, 30 wcf, let's be serious, a cartridge that needs a dozen names to be recognized is having to work too hard.

classic, beautiful. released in 1915.

from gun auction.com

Savage.jpg


The .375 H&H belted magnum. Beautifully proportioned belted cartridge that came from a time that art was included in design when possible, it's the old fashioned steampunk super powered version of what the Americans called the 30 caliber hunting round, it was the ultimate version of the .308 bore for decades. Nicely tapered with a well proportioned bullet size. The round hammer nosed bullets look at you like a frowning, dead eyed Golem, whose only purpose is to put a hole through you. The .375 was the first belted magnum, for practical purposes, and still a contender a century after first being conceived of. Dozens of cases have been parented by it, and it was the very first belted round. It started the tradition of belted rounds, and created the entire mystique and legend that still follows the "belted magnum" all throughout the shooting world.

The .375 is a classic and an uncommonly used cartridge, used only for unusual purposes, and expensive pursuits. Nobody who can afford African hunts is too poor to spend another $2,000 buying a nice gun, and many, many people spend that extra cash buying a safari grade rifle.

This round is the Mona Lisa to the .375 weatherby's lisa simpson.

From Midway USA.

263477.jpg
 
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That 375 H&H Magnum is sure a good looking full figured bullet. Good looking and full figured is a reason why I married my wife 40+ years ago! With that said, I like them all...women and bullets.
 
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A couple I like, one I still have and the other stores years ago. Both oldtimers very long in the tooth yet would still work today provided a hunter was good and knew how to stalk.

First, the long ago stolen 6.5x54 Mannlicher in the 1903 Mannlicher/Schoenaur carbine. That cartridge with the very long 160 gr. bullets was just beautiful to my eye.

Number two, the 7x57 Mauser with that long 175 gr. round nose. Just seems to have history and a class all it's own.

As I approach the end of my seventh decade during the next year and a half, hard kicking rifles no longer are the fun they used to be. Methinks that nice lightweight M70 FWT in 7x57 will be all I use to hunt. Probably go with something like a 160 gr. Grand Slam or Nosler Partition for at least one more elk hunt next year. Whether I get one or not is irrelevant just as long as I get to go. :cool: Just do a classic hunt with a classic cartridge.
Paul B.
 
UHHHH... here in 2016, I fear that "trans-Atlantic" may mean something different than what you intended... hahaha.

Visually, I have always found the .357 Magnum to be "best in show." Often with a nickel plated case and a copper jacketed bullet, it's tall and lean and athletic. This is probably why I also find the .327 Federal and the .460 S&W Magnum to be attractive, they seem to offer similar dimensions albeit smaller and larger.

I think the .357 Sig is a sharp looking round. Actually have never owned one or handloaded any at my bench.

On the flipside, .45 Auto and .44 Mag don't appeal to me visually. It's kind of like an East German female weightlifter. Absolutely capable but not something I care to look at.
 
44 mag . . .

I hadn't really thought about it, but I gotta say, when I slip a 44 mag,specifically loaded for hunting, into my raging bull with scope, in preparation for whitetail take down . . . that just feels good.

Live well, be safe
Prof Young
 
There is just something about the click/thunk you feel and hear when you drop a heavy round into a revolver that is special.
 
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