Hey, thanks for all the replies. Parashooter got it right. I was needlessly alarmed. This is what I got from Rifle magazine:
Dear Mr. Norstog,
The newest Hornady manual lists a 150-grain Hornady using 56.2 grains of
Winchester 748 at 2,900 fps. This is a maximum load for a Hornady bullet.
The load in the Rifle 243 is a maximum load for the Sierra bullet. We do
recommend reducing all the loads in our magazine by 10% and then working up
to be extra safe.
Hodgdon owns Winchester powder but they do almost nothing to promote it.
When was the last time you saw a Winchester powder ad ever. They have
minimal load data for the Winchester powders. They are pushing their Hodgdon
and IMR brands especially on the web site.
Check out our LoadData.com site it has data from all the manuals. We have
loads of data Using Winchester powders in the 8x57. The nice thing about our
web site
www.loaddata.com is that we have almost every bullet and powder
combination available.
Thanks,
Don
Wolfe Publishing Co
I do think two nice things about the 8x57 are: it goes through the press really easy, and it will digest surprisingly stiff loads of medium-to-fast burning powder. two other good things are, sporterized mausers are still really cheap, and it will knock down a moose with 1 shot.
I like the .35 Whelan, too, it has a more sensible relationship of case volume to bore than the '06. My brother switches off between his Whelan and his 8x57 when we go elk hunting. I stuck with the 8 until last year when I switched to a 30-40. That's another story. This year we may move into open country - 7mm mag, here I come.
jn