Hi Airborne
I have been recently contemplating a dream rifle for long range deer and elk and ultra long on varmints. I was looking for an easy to form case and something that was less common than 06 or 308 but not something where I would be pioneering the loading data. I also want to be able to shoot it out of a gun that was light enough to carry afield to put down a wounded animal or to walk a short distance from the truck to call in coyotes.
My friend "Dave in Idaho" told me about an article in Varmint Hunter Magazine by Steve Timm that covered the .280 A.I. so I dug out the article and was quite interested. I searched for info on the internet and liked what I saw. In short I think a .280 A.I. is just my cup of tea.
Here are a few ballistic highlights that you can compare to the 06.
I ran numbers for a 140 grain nosler ballistic tip moving at a very realistic 3150 feet per second from the muzzle. The ballistic coeficient is published at .485
It has 3000+ foot pounds at the muzzle.
2000+ feet per second at 700 yards.
1000+ foot pounds at 875 yards.
Drops below subsonic at around 1600 yards.
It drops 22 minutes of angle at 1000 yards and 44 minutes at 1400 yards. This means that you could mount a leupold tactical scope with a 1 inch tube over a 40 MOA tapered base and shoot the crosshairs at 1400yards while having enough internal adjustment to come back to a 100 yard zero.
I dont know how the 06 compares to this but this is all quite exciting to me. All the performance of a 7mm mag with less recoil, less gunpowder, a certain level of uniqueness (is that a word?)and positive reports of tight accuracy and tons of clean kills.