Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats 358 Winchester barrel length

I mentioned in another thread that I'm building a 358 win on a 700 SA in a boyds brown laminate stock. Ilol be sending the action out as soon as I've made a decision on barrel length and twist. I'm looking for a compact rifle that I can still get my maximum velocity out of. In my wind I'm thinking 19 or 20 inches and 1/14 twist. I'm planing on running 225gr partitions and woodleigh RN 225s also. Not that it matters much but I am gonna have the barrel straight fluted to make it "my own". Any opinions or better yet, experience with this kind of build would be great.

Brandon

All I'll say is, wouldn't it be better to go long as you might want and try it? Couldn't you cut it more later if it wasn't what you envisioned? I always thought the 358 Winchester that I wanted to build would have a 20" barrel.

Built 2 different 358 Win rifles. I went with 21 inch barrels on both and would never change a thing on them. One on a short Rem 700 and one on a Sako Finnwolf.

I think 20" would be my max length. I have a 20" 350 mag in a CDL 7 that's quite handy. Plus if I flute the barrel I don't know that it can be cut after and be okay? I know the flutes usually stop an inch or so shy of the muzzle.

TwoTrax, do you have any pics of these rifles? And what loads did you use?

Get at least a 1-12 twist. Forget that 1-14.

Mine goes 20" and seems ideal to me. The one in the middle.

No current pics, lost my memory stick! I could take some and email them, do not subscribe to any hosting service any more.

Mostly loaded 200 Hornady SP snd 225 Nosler. Have loaded 250 Speer and Hornady but never killed anything with them in the 358. Used IMR 3031 for 200, IMR 4895 for the others. Have some TAC to try when I get around to it.

20" ish and a 1:12 would be my pick.

Mine is 22" and while I should cut it back, I don't despise the length enough to mess with having the front site moved back.
If you want max velocity, you might consider the 200 TTSX.

My 358 wssm has a 22” bbl if I remember right, if I had to do it all over again I’d go 20”
Yeah go with the 12 twist.
I shoot the 225 Accubonds at 2420 fps.

Thanks for all the great input!

SKane, I do have about 300 200 gr TTSX's on hand. They shoot super nice from my Whelen carbine pump right at 2825fps. My only concern, and only because I don't have enough experience with them is, will the 358 win drive them hard enough for maximum expansion? I also have a huge pile of 200& 225 accubonds and 225/250 partitions along with 200pcs of 225 woodleigh weldcores. I was just thinking case capacity with the longer projectiles would be an issue.

skybuster,

I don't have enough experience with them either - just switched to them earlier this summer (from the 225 Partition and 225 GK's).
The 200 TTSX isn't exactly skipping along at 2520ish with 47.5gr TAC. The 180's were a no-go for me for the reason you noted above.

The only experience is relayed second hand from my father. He shot a black bear with his .358/200TTSX a month or two back and said it was rather impressive performance - keeping in mind that was 50 or so yards.

I have a 16" 358 win. 225s at just over 2400 fps, 200 TSX at 2620 fps, and 160 Raptors at 2850. But I like the short and handy rifles.

I went 1/12 twist at 21" in mine, the barrel length being more for balance than performance. I'd probably do the same again as I've been very pleased with it.....though if I was doing it now I'd build it off of a short action Forbes rifle for the extra mag box length.

alaska_lanche,
What powder are you fueling the 200 TSX in your .358?

Both RL-10 and TAC.

Excellent, thank you.
I'm hoping to put a little more arse behind that bullet in the future.

Couple comments:

1) If you're fluting simply to make it your own, you can always specify they stop them short of muzzle so you have room to cut back.
2) Be aware that all the .358 TSX bullets (and most Barnes for that matter) have different operating windows. I emailed them a while back and got the below response:

The 180 will open down to 1900 fps, the 200 gr. will open down to 1800 fps and the 225 will open down to 1600 fps.

Based on this, I typically email them about every bullet I look to shoot of theirs now. The .308 168 TTSX is designed to open down to 1500 fps. I think it was the first "LRX" basically.

this!