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Does anyone know why the US military switched from 30-06 to .308? Is it an issue of weight to ballistic performance? Looking at the cartridges, the 30-06 looks like it would be a harder hitting round.
Maybe they needed a lighter weapon and the weapons that can chamber the 30-06 were too heavy? I'm thinking of the M60 vs. 1919A6. Or, was it a political decision? |
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Chicken Little called for you. He suggested you get a grip. |
NATO standardization, and the 7.62x51 was the United States' baby the whole way. IIRC, Stevens discusses the adoption of the 7.62x51 at length in The FAL Rifle. The Brits wanted a smaller caliber, shorter round, but the US got it's way. I would have loved to have seen something along the line of the .276 Pedersen or the Brit's .280 round, but .30 cal it was.
The interesting thing now is that we seem to be coming full circle, with the 6.8mm Remington SPC. |
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The 7.62X51 was originally designed to replace the 30-06 when, after WWII, it was noticed the 30-06 cartridge had lots of space in it; it was not full of powder.
The US (and indeed, any other) military is always concerned about moving lots of thing arund that are bigger than they need to be. So the question was aksed, why all this empty space in a cartridge. For a single round, it's nothing for several billion rounds shipped around the world an carried into combat by overloaded soldiers, it's a perfectly valid question. At the time of its acceptance, the 7.62X51 and especially the .308 Winchester could do virtually everything the 30-06 could do and in a short action rifle. You should realise by now that the 7.62X51 NATO is loaded to lower pressures compared to a commercial .308 cartridge. So be careful shooting full power commercial .308 cartridges in older 7.62X51 chambered guns. The M-14 was desigend around the shorter 7.62X51 round and was considered a superior rifle to the M1 Garand, which shot the 30-06 round. It was further discovered that rifles chambered in 7.62X51 literally ran the 30-06 chambered rifle out of Camp Perry. The DCM had to cut the target size in half because the .308 was so much more accurate than the 30-06. Not to be outdone a few decades later the 5.56 NATO chambered M16s ran the M14s out of Camp Perry. In all fairness, with modern components, the 30-06 will somewhat surpass the performance of the .308 but for some reason, and we could talk about this a lot, the .308 is just more accurate than the 30-06. At any rate, I seriously doubt that someone shot by either caliber would notice a difference and that was the whole deal for the military. I absolutely enjoy the .308 and I handload for it. It is a very easy cartridge to get to shoot well, and just coming off a match with a bolt .308, my shoulder is thankful those 84 rounds were not 30-06s. (Yes, I may be a wooss, but 84 rounds prone in a match will get your attention, especially when you are trying to be very accurate. This message has been edited. Last edited by: Sig685, F-T/R Competitor - NRA F-class Master |
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Thank you for your detailed answer. We've been trying to minimize all the different ammo types we use. My father-in-law and all of his brothers use 30-06 to go deer and elk hunting in Utah. He mentioned to me that that he didn't think the .308 was good for the terrain/distances here in Utah. I've never been hunting here, so I have no experience with it. The question came up again as I've been shopping for a 1919a4. Many of the models available now are setup for .308. Some people are converting to 30-06 because they can get cheaper ammo from the CMP. For my purposes, it may not make a huge amount of difference which way I go--30-06 or .308. I'm not planning on hauling my 1919a4 through the mountains and valleys of Utah, and I'm not buying it as my goto deer rifle. It wouldn't exactly be sporting, but it might speed things up a little, lol. I'll research it further, and if the .308 makes a difference in accuracy in an optimized 1919a4 vs. 30-06, I can go that way. Otherwise, I may go with the 30-06 so we can reload one caliber. It seems strange to me, though, that .308 wouldn't be considered by some to be as good a deer cartridge as a 30-06. Maybe they are just not as familiar with it. |
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If this is going to be done for hunting considerations I would take a second look at 30-06.
There are a much wider array of bullet weights for 30-06 that give you more options for different size/type of game. ___________________________________________________________________ Prayer of The Citadel Give me a boy, Oh God, who is willing to learn the true value of honor, the necessity of perseverance and loyalty, and the meaningfulness of devotion to God and country. And I shall take this boy as does a blacksmith take a crude piece of metal, and place him over a forge whose liberating flame of education is fired by the bellows of strict military discipline. Into this ingot of a man I shall temper self-respect and self-discipline, fear of God and respect for mankind, appreciation of freedom and awareness of what sacrifices must be made to preserve freedom, and above all an insatiable desire for truth and honesty. And when all these things I have done, I shall brand my finished work with a ring of gold to let all of humanity know that I have given back to the world a ...Citadel Man. |
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There isn't any game that you will hunt with the 30-05 that won't be killed just as easily and cleanly with the 308.
The 30-06 is slightly superior to the 308 with heavy bullets but with todays superior bullets 220gr 30 cal bullets are totally unnecessary. A 180gr TSX will penetrate just as deeply as the old 220gr soft points will. The differences between the rounds aren't as important as the differences between the rifles that shoot them. Pick a rifle you like in either caliber and be happy. Personally I prefer short action rifles that are lighter, handier and on average more accurate but a taller person with longer arms might find a long action fits them better. Try different rifles and don't worry as much about 308 vs 30-06...........................DJ Remember this is for fun......................... |
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I thought it was because the shorter rounds (.308) functioned better in "full auto" weapons.
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at the end of WW II, folks saw the advantage of the German developement of an "intermediate cartridge" which was more practical in full-auto rifles while giving up some range to the full lenght 30-06, 8x57mm, .303 and 7.62x54R in general use by the military of the day.
the Russians developed the 7.62x39mm, while the Brits developed the 276/280 (7mm). the American military didn't really want to give up their full power cartridge and introduced the 7.62x51mm (.308) which was pretty much indentical to the 30-06 with only a superficial shortening of the case...and introduced the M-14 to fire it. it really didn't fulfill the goal of an "intermediate cartridge" which would be controlable in full auto fire, but the american military forced it down the throat of the NATO allies. they had less sucess with the M-14...most of NATO going with the FN FAL |
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"Member" |
Oh the horror. Hopefully it will pass. |
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30-06 M2 AP....
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I believe in the Right to Due Process  |
Those are all fine sounding reasons, but I think, based on my admittedly limited experience, that the switch was made because the .308 is a lot less likely to set the shooter's mustache on fire. The muzzle flash out of a 30-06 Garand is, ahhh, substantial, impressive.
------------------------ "People continue to do foolish things no matter what the regulation is, and they always will." -- Warren Buffett "Crime doesn't pay.... nearly as well as politics."  |
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I said we were trying, but so far we are headed in the opposite direction.  |
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Little ray of sunshine  |
And just set the thread completely adrift, the M16 pattern rifle has replaced the M14 in high power shooting not because the .223 round is inherently more accurate, but because the extremely low recoiling .223 is so much easier to shoot. It punishes the shooter so much less than it can be shot more accurately over a course of fire. The .308 was, in fact, easier to get to shoot well at long range, at least in terms of inherent accuracy. A lot of that had to do with the excellent bullet shapes possible in the .308 - long (which also happen to be heavy, but it has more to do with shape than weight) bullets were available and fit into the gun. Long AR bullets didn't exist, and they are hard to cram into an AR magazine. People were getting interested in the AR for high power, and then the long, low drag bullets came out, and everyone made the jump. I still think you can get better bullets for long range in .308 than in .223, but the heavier recoil more than offsets the better inherent long range potential.
And, yeah, the basic reason for .308 over 30-06 was to get a smaller cartridge. The Army wasn't quite ready to give up the .30 bore, so we got the .308, which in full auto turned out to be too hard to shoot, and wasn't really all that much smaller. So just a few years later, they scrapped the whole .308/M14 combo. We should have listened to the Brits. __________________________ Ohhhhmmmmmmmmmmmmm! |
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Not quite. The main reason is that the M16 is more accurate than an M16. It is also easier to get an M16/AR15 to NM level and keep it there compared to an M14. An accurized M14 is extremely fragile, is expensive to setup and must be maintained and actually re-accurized every year or two. Not so with an AR-15; just changes the barrel every season or two, dpending on how much you shoot.
There are some good bullets for the long range .308, the current favorites being the 175gr SMK and the 155 Palma. I use a lot of the 168 SMK and A-max, but I never shoot my .308 past 600 yards. I'm fixing to replace the barrel and may just go for the 185gr Berger VLD for the 1000 yard match. On the other hand, the .224 bullets are nice also, I currently use the 80gr JLK at 300, 600 and 1000 yards. It does well for me but I envy the 6mm and 6.5mm shooters and their high-BC bullets. However, only .223 or .308 are allowed in F/TR competition and .308 155gr in Palma matches. I never cram my match bullets in my magazine, and you are not allowed to load more than one round at a time in highpower matches, (except for the rapids, of course, but those are at short ranges and do not require the long bullets.) F-T/R Competitor - NRA F-class Master |
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Banned for acting like an Asshole. How's your "Kung Fu" now, idiot? |
+1. For hunting rifles, the 30-06 is quite versatile and 150-220gr 30-06 rounds can be found in almost every store that sells ammo. |
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Yep. Notice how we floated back to about the same neighborhood with the 6.8 SPC? 6.8x43mm vs. 7x43mm. 115 gr at 2625 fps (1759 ft-lbf) vs. 139 gr. at 2530 fps (1980 ft-lbf). The biggest differences were in case diameter: ~10.5mm vs. 12mm. and OAL: 58.8mm vs 65mm. ---------- The real hero is always a hero by mistake; he dreams of being an honest coward like everybody else. -- Umberto Eco |
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Here is an interesting comparison.I have both calibers in similar Tikka rifles, now all I need to do is find my Ohler and chrono these rounds.
http://www.federalpremium.com/products/compare/rifle_compare.aspx General Information: Load No Caliber Grains/ Grams Bullet Style Brand Use P308G 308 Win. (7.62x51mm) 180 / 11.66 Nosler® Partition® Vital-Shok® P3006R 30-06 Spring. (7.62x63mm) 180 / 11.66 Nosler® Partition® Vital-Shok® Ballistics Comparisons: Velocity in Feet per Second (To nearest 10 FPS) Velocity Load No Caliber Muzzle 100 Y 200 Y 300 Y 400 Y 500 Y P308G 308 Win. (7.62x51mm) 2740 2551 2370 2196 2030 1870 P3006R 30-06 Spring. (7.62x63mm) 2880 2685 2498 2318 2147 1982 Energy in Foot Pounds (To nearest 5 Foot Pounds) Energy Load No Caliber Muzzle 100 Y 200 Y 300 Y 400 Y 500 Y P308G 308 Win. (7.62x51mm) 3000 2601 2245 1928 1647 1398 P3006R 30-06 Spring. (7.62x63mm) 3315 2881 2494 2148 1842 1570 |
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In my limited experience, you will probably find more variety in loaded ammo in 30-06 than you will in .308. And the 30-06 in modern loads does carry a bit more energy, can use a bit heaver bullet.
From what I have read, the diff is meaningless unless you are hunting elk or big bear, and the 30-06 is not quite enough for big bear anyway. As to accuracy, either round, in any rifle, can shoot more accurately than I can shoot. I qualified with moth the M-16 and the M-14 while in basic. I much preferred to shoot the 14, and have an M1A now. I love everything about it, except for the price tag that comes with every pull of the trigger. (My dad does have a featherweight Win Model 70 30-06 which I will inherit as soon as I move out of CA) "Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women. When it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it....While it lies there, it needs no constitution, no law, no court to save it" - Judge Learned Hand, May 1944 |
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If you are firing USGI ammo there is not much of a flash from a Garand. |
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