.264 Win Mag or 280 Ackley Improved and Why?

I LOVE the .264 win mag. I dont know anything about the .280 AI, so cant speak on its behalf. I personally have a win 70 in .264. If you dont load your own ammo, I would do some research on availabiltiy of factory ammo on the .264 first. Here in my small town there is only one place to buy ammo and its grey box stuff. I do personally load my own. Until a few years ago bullet selection was real slim, but now there is quite a good selection. Ive seen um from 95 grainers, up to 160 grainers. The bullet in itself is a long skinny bullet so it has a reputation of being a barrel burner. It is a VERY flat shooting rifle, and with some fine tuning on handloads is very accurate. My rifle/handload combo produces 1/2 moa groups constantly which I was told is impossible from a belted magnum case but I have proved otherwise. I am a fan of hornady bullets and hodgdon powders. I have loaded 129 grain bullets, and my favorite the 140 grain SST interlock. The 140 has a BC of .520, and SD of .287. If you are looking for a good long range flat shooting gun with minimal/nonexistant recoil this is your gun. I have shot everything from deer, elk, bear, etc. with this gun and none have stepped another step.

Ok, bottom line is this gun is soon to be obsolete. Since it is so fast with such a long skinny bullet, and the reputation of being a "barrel burner" they seem to be being phased out. Alot of gun manufactures are not offering this caliber anymore. This being said, if you are in a remote area and are missing ammo it may be diffacult to find, but so is the .280AI im sure. Ok, there is my $.02. Good luck with your choice.
 
if youre reloading-- the 280 is hard to beat. tons of options there. the 265 is ascreamer, but like txagy said-- bullets in the 26 cal arent as popular.
 
The 280 is much more reloader friendly. The 264 is a 'twitchy' thing to get to shoot well and has less barrel life.

If you are thinking about long range use the 280AI is much better. I use a 280AI for 500-1500 yard shots shooting the 180VLDs at close to 3000fps. The 264 is not even close at those ranges.

Jack
 
Last edited:
I have both the 280 Ack and the 264 Win Mag. They are both great cal and you can't go wrong with either. If i had to make a choice between my two rifles i would keep my 280 Ack.
, just because it is not as heavy as the 264 Mag . When it comes to flat shooting the 264 will run with the best of them. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
 
I don't own a 280AI but did shoot a 7mm express for years did alot of chronographing etc with that rifle. I've know some pretty good shooters over the last 25yrs that have had mixed results with the 280AI mainly the velocity gain over the 280 myself I opt for the 7x57AI and 284.
I think now the 280AI may be a better round but not one that I would build.
I was looking in Feb PS magazine and they had the result for a 600 yd match, in the light rifle had (11) 6.5 shooters only (2) 7mm.
I think alot comes down to if you want to fireform brass?
With the new bullet out for the 6.5 see alot more calibers, I shoot a 6.5x284 then had a 264 mag done up I'm just in load developement now and it looks like it's a shooter. Well good luck.
 
My 280AI has been a pure joy to load and shoot. The bore life will be greater and pills are more prevalent in .284" dia. The 280AI is a 7mm rem mag contender with a good length barrel.
 
This would be just an antelope rifle. I know if any of you read many of my responses, I am a #l fan of the 25-06 rem. I have yet to find any caliber I like to shoot paper, or game with. I find them just a joy to shoot, and hunt with. Loading, is easy, the're not too picky just a great caliber. I just want something different. I'm leaning towards 264, just for it's application. I have one rule, I don't hunt things that can eat me. So bears, and such are out. I hunt deer, antelope, and if given the chance to hunt elk again, I would stick with my good old 30-06. I've always been a fan of hitting what I'm aiming at vs how big of a gun I carry. I've had the big magnum's, and am not recoil shy. I just don't see the need for the animals I hunt. I know the .25 is plenty good enough, but I want to play. I have enough guns already, I just need something to tinker with. Does this make any sense. I got a .221 fireball off of a member on here, and have it shooting 3/8" groups, and have not really tinkered with it too much, it's a shooter. I hope to hear from some more 264 shooter's, and see some load data. I also am partial to Sierra bullets, if that helps. Butcher
 
My 264 loves IMR 4831. One of the better loads I've worked up for it is an 85 gr Sierra hollow point over 63 gr of IMR 4831. It averages 3325 fps. I've shot 2 whitetails with 125 gr nosler partitions. The first one was a buck at about 100 yards. I shot him through the front shoulders and it crushed him! The other one was in the neck at 30 yards. My 264 shot ok with 140 gr factorys. It really started to shoot when I started to reload for it. It took me a while to learn when shooting groups with this rifle you have to take it SLOW! The barrel heats up quickly.

Good Luck, Budmandan
 
I have a 280 AI built on a M700, action blueprinted and a Hart #5 Flutted 24" barrel. I handload Nosler 160 gr Accubonds at 3000 fps and shoot groups that measure in the .2's. It shoots flat and hits hard at long range due to the bullets high BC.
The 280 AI requires that you fire form virgin brass from standard 280 Remington. This process is painless. Once cases are ff, you are now ready to load 280 AI.
The 280 AI is also very flexable, max loads give you 7mm Rem Mag performance or you can load it down to 7mm-08 levels. You can also shoot factory 280 Rem loads as well.

The 264 Win is based off the 7mm Rem Mag case so you can neck down cases. Factory ammo might be tough to obtain in some areas. I am not aware of any current factory offerings, too bad for such a flat shooting round.

I would say, go with the 280 AI and don't look back.

Regards,

JD338
 
I have a couple of AI's, and would be handloading. I just do not want to do a tight neck gun again. I hate to neck turn. I'm not to good at it, and at the price of Norma brass, I have a buddy do the neck turning for me. I'm still in the deciding phase, so I may end up with maybe even a 6.5-300 short mag. Hey, that just may work. Decisions, decisions.
 
If you have a 25-06 I do not see an advantage to going from .257 to .264. The .284 does offer many more bullet choices and personally I thing the 264 win mag is dying slowly. I do not own any of these calibers but cover them with the boring old .270. If you are set on a 6.5mm cartridge why not spice it up with a 6.5/284 or 6.5/06 AI or 260 remAI or the classic dying cartridge 6.5 RemMag.
 
I bought a .264WM in a Remington classic last year. The .264 classic was put out in 1986 and I am a very big Classic fan, so I just had to have it for my collection. The rifle was in great shape. It nearly looked like it came of the new shelf. I didn't have much need for it (have rifles all around that caliber). However, I had to have it. Then when I had it, I had to do some shooting with it.

I ordered some .264WM brass but got tired of waiting on it, and necked down some once fired 7mag brass I had. (By the way, the 7mag is based off the .264 necked up not the other way I believe). I did no load development, just loaded 14cases (to try) with IMR 4350 pushing a 120gr Nosler BT (I hear better talk about 4831 w/ the 264) and went to the range. I was impressed, once on center, I shot a 3 shot group well under an inch (two were inside one another).

The next day I carried it & killed a small 7pt (~130#). It put a LARGE hole through the shoulder. However the deer ran a decent ways. I think a larger bullet is in order (although this is a small sample to make a conclusion /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif) but that’s all I had on hand at the time.

With the large case, there is right much room left void in the case. If I were you, I would look into the 6.5/284. Not only being pronounced for accuracy, the bench guys are getting some screaming velocities from this case. Nearly, if not matching the listed .264WM speed with (264) max loads.

If you are leaning 6.5, by all means get that one. If not you’ll always wish you had went the other way…

Oh yeah, I agree the 25/06 rules /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grinning-smiley-003.gif!
 


Write your reply...
Back
Top