Whatever happened to the .350 RM?

Case capacity 350 Rem Mag is about one gr more than 35 Whelen so really shouldn't be a surprise almost equal velocity.

Myself I was never interest fat mag case in short action plus short barrel.. Notice Win stopped at 325WSM.

When Rem made model 673 in 350 Rem Mag I came close.
 
Not sure about that. The 7mm REMINGTON mag sure was successful.
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yes, and it actually was a "bigger bottle" and delivered more than previous common rounds in that caliber.

Just the opposite of the short magnum .350 and 6.5mm, which delivered the punch of longer standard rounds in a short package.


IMO the crappy bullet selection is what doomed the 350 Rem mag.
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If you mean the limited offering of Remington factory ammo, yes, but every .358 bullet available to handloaders can be run in the .350 Rem Mag.
 
I have a Remington 700 Classic, I purchased new in the box (new old stock) about 20 years ago. They were only made one year, I believe. The year was 1987, if I remember correctly.

I had previously owned a 35 Whelan but it was Ruger 77 and I had troubles with it, although it was an accurate gun. Being a Jeff Cooper fan, I knew the 350 fire Plug was a favorite of his, so when I see that Remington Classic sitting on a table at a gun show, I didn't hesitate to purchase it.

It's never had a factory load shot out of it. I have always used handloads. I have mostly just shot deer with it, but can attest it's a thumper. I have always loaded 180gr Speers and 200gr round nose Sierra's out of it. Both would hit the same point of impact at 200yds, so I could used them interchangeable. The 180gr load would hit about 10" low at 300yds so it was plenty flat shooting and I killed a lot of deer with it, for a few years at all reasonable ranges from 20yds to 300yds.

It's really quite a versatile rifle. Recoil is heavy, I suppose, but not that bad, not worse then my 45/70's, maybe a little more then my .308 Win in my Browning BLR with 180gr factory loads, but the 700 Classic is probably just a tad lighter in weight.

I haven't used the 350 much in the last few years, mostly because I have been busy and just didn't take the time to make up the handloads for it, and I have a lot of other rifles, so there just isn't time to hunt and shoot them all.

But the 350 was about as destructive as any rifle I ever used on deer, anyway, and I have tried a bunch of calibers. With a heaver bullet, 225gr to 250gr it would be a great hard hitting rifle for about anything inside it's effective range. But it's a handloader's rifle, not for the guy that buys all of his ammo at Wal-mart.
 
i shoot 225 gr serria spbt at 2600 fps in my custom 98 mauser 35 whelen and its a honest three shot 1-1.5 moa rifle.
 
North American hunters have largely ignored the middle bores. 350 Remington MAG rec'd little positive press at the time of introduction. But one cartridge that I really thought would make it was the .356 Winchester. Impressive results on big game at reasonable distances yet it also faded away.

Jack
 
A hunting cartridge cant survive without good factory ammo.
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Perhaps that may prove true in the 21st century, but it certainly wasn't true in the 20th century.

Three of the greatest "hunting" cartridges ever "survived" for decades as wildcats before they were adopted by factories. The .22-250, the .25-06, and the .35 Whelen. Probably add the .257 Roberts to that list as well, though it became a factory round well before the others.

Certainly lack of good factory ammo inhibits the chance of commercial success, but its not the kiss of death for a truly good cartridge.
 
44 AMP said:
Perhaps that may prove true in the 21st century, but it certainly wasn't true in the 20th century.

Three of the greatest "hunting" cartridges ever "survived" for decades as wildcats before they were adopted by factories. The .22-250, the .25-06, and the .35 Whelen. Probably add the .257 Roberts to that list as well, though it became a factory round well before the others.

Certainly lack of good factory ammo inhibits the chance of commercial success, but its not the kiss of death for a truly good cartridge.
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Survived but were never anywhere close to mainstream or popular prior to factory adoption. Most factory roll outs were the renaming of a wildcat or the slightest modification of a wildcat.
 
old roper said:
reynolds357, I think it was more than just factory ammo vs just no interest.
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It was a combination.
1. Sorry factory ammo.
2. Poor bullet availibity for reloading due to deep seat depth.
3. The rifle should have been a long action (thus 2)
4. The .338s of the day were a huge mountain to climb.
5. 350 Norma was a 350 done right.
6. Too much recoil for most shooters
7. Very few people hunted anything that needed a magnum 350.
8. Elmer Keiths writings glorifying the 35 Whelen were re-published at just the wrong time for the 350 Rem Mag.
 
Survived but were never anywhere close to mainstream or popular prior to factory adoption.
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By the numbers, no, but isn't it interesting that enough people kept them going for 30+ years and popular enough for the factories to eventually adopt them as their own. I suppose the rounds filling a niche that (at the time) factory rounds didn't might have had a bit to do with it.

I think the big problem was that there's no free lunch. For a lot of people the .350 Rem was too much, and for some others, not enough.

The .358 Norma may have been "done right" but if .350 Rem recoil is too much, then .358 Norma is out of the question.

There's a lot of rounds out there that filled their niche pretty well, but not well enough to dominate the market for that niche. A lot of the time, it seems that some good rounds get "shelved" when the factory reduces or even drops support for them moving on to other things in the hope of making more money.

Look at the WSSM rounds today, all the rage when new, today, not so much and some of them seem headed for the shelf already.

Do you think we'd have a bunch of screaming little .17 rimfires if Rem had kept making the 5mm Magnum?? Fads come and go. Sometimes new and decent rounds fade away, sometimes old "moribund" rounds get a new lease on life.
 
It was a combination.
1. Sorry factory ammo.
2. Poor bullet availibity for reloading due to deep seat depth.
3. The rifle should have been a long action (thus 2)
4. The .338s of the day were a huge mountain to climb.
5. 350 Norma was a 350 done right.
6. Too much recoil for most shooters
7. Very few people hunted anything that needed a magnum 350.
8. Elmer Keiths writings glorifying the 35 Whelen were re-published at just the wrong time for the 350 Rem Mag.
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1. The factory ammo was good, just not up to what we consider acceptable today. Remember, this round came out in the 1960s, more than 50 years ago, and round nose bullets were still acceptable.

2. The same bullets were available then for all 35s. If the round was not designed for 250 grain bullets, don't load them. If people wanted a 35 caliber rifle, they wanted factory offerings, not wildcats like the 35 Whelen.

3. Not arguing that one. Short actions and short rifles were all the rage with factories then. Remington had a short action and Winchester didn't, so Remington liked to show off. They even put the 6mm in the 660, even though it needed a medium-length action.

4. There was only one .338 at the time, and it was Winchester's. Remington wasn't going to chamber their competition's round in their rifle.

5, 6, 7. Nobody was asking for a mid-caliber cartridge except maybe some gun rag writers. In the 1960s, most deer hunters wanted flat-shooting small calibers: 6mm Rem, 243 Winchester, 257 Roberts, 25-06 Rem, 284 Win, 280 Rem, 270 Win, 300 Sav, 30-06, 308. Weatherby had cannons if you wanted one, the 7mm Rem and 300 Win were considered a lot of gun back then. Coming out with a 35 caliber magnum was not very well thought out. Kind of like their 8mm Rem Mag: American shooters never really wanted an 8mm, let alone one that quickly gained a reputation as a heavy kicker.
 
I have Lyman 45 and loading data for 35 Rem,358Win,350 Rem Mag and 358 Norma Mag used Rem bullets. I started reload later part of the 60's and I really don't remember seeing factory ammo for 350Rem Mag or even factory rifle.

You had 338mag,264mag and 7mag back then also and had Wby.

Guys I shot with never mentioned 350Rem Mag. I live in San Francisco back then and we had some pretty nice gun stores.

You can put any list you want but you have to have buyers or your not going to sell.
 
I suppose a lot of it depends on where you were, when. In the Adirondacks, in the late 60s there were movies of African safaris where that little Rem .350 carbine performed very impressively. People talked about them, but I never ran into anyone who actually got one...

In the late 70s through early 80s, you found some in the Pacific NW, IF you could buy it before someone else did and shipped it to Alaska!

When Remington dropped the 600s, there was still enough demand for the .350 that they wound up costing about double what essentially the same rifle in .308 did in the PNW. No, the deer hunter didn't want the .350, but some deep timber elk hunters did, and whether needed or not, the .350 had a demand from people hunting Alaska. It was, and pretty much still is a seller's market for that niche carbine.

Remington tried to bring back the idea with their 673, no doubt hoping to get sales based on the nostalgia for the 600 and the .350. I should have worked (did, for a little while) but that niche is a lot more crowded than it was in the 60s. I almost bought one, but already having a .350 it was low on my list, and of course, now they're gone as new guns and horribly overpriced as used ones.
 
Scorch said:
1. The factory ammo was good, just not up to what we consider acceptable today. Remember, this round came out in the 1960s, more than 50 years ago, and round nose bullets were still acceptable.

2. The same bullets were available then for all 35s. If the round was not designed for 250 grain bullets, don't load them. If people wanted a 35 caliber rifle, they wanted factory offerings, not wildcats like the 35 Whelen.

3. Not arguing that one. Short actions and short rifles were all the rage with factories then. Remington had a short action and Winchester didn't, so Remington liked to show off. They even put the 6mm in the 660, even though it needed a medium-length action.

4. There was only one .338 at the time, and it was Winchester's. Remington wasn't going to chamber their competition's round in their rifle.

5, 6, 7. Nobody was asking for a mid-caliber cartridge except maybe some gun rag writers. In the 1960s, most deer hunters wanted flat-shooting small calibers: 6mm Rem, 243 Winchester, 257 Roberts, 25-06 Rem, 284 Win, 280 Rem, 270 Win, 300 Sav, 30-06, 308. Weatherby had cannons if you wanted one, the 7mm Rem and 300 Win were considered a lot of gun back then. Coming out with a 35 caliber magnum was not very well thought out. Kind of like their 8mm Rem Mag: American shooters never really wanted an 8mm, let alone one that quickly gained a reputation as a heavy kicker.
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As to 4, there were two 338 factory rounds (338 win mag and 340 wby), and the 333 OKH was a moderately popular wildcat.
 
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