Whether victims of poor marketing, bad timing, or a misunderstood customer base, there have been a slew of marginally popular magnum cartridges that never really get off the ground. Many are excellent rounds, while some others were the answer to a question never asked. I have them categorized below by the reason I think they failed to thrive on the market.
Table of Contents
Failure to Adopt
.308 Norma Magnum
This should have been a slam-dunk for popularity. Basically, a legitimization of the then-popular .30-338 wildcat, the 308 Norma was unveiled in 1960 and chambered in rifles by the Danish firm Shultz & Larsen. Norma sold casings, chamber reamers, and supplied specifications to anyone who wanted them, but no major US rifle makers picked it up. A shame, really, as it has a slightly longer neck and stabilizes bullets better than the 300 Winchester that buried it several years later. Many custom rifles were built in .308 Norma back in the day. If you can snag one, do it.
358 Norma Magnum
This excellent cartridge suffered the same fate as its stablemate in the paragraph previous. It holds a loyal following in Western Canada of all places, but the lack of acceptance by US rifle manufacturers doomed it from the start. The 358 Norma competed directly with Winchester’s already established 338 Magnum, and few saw the need to add another magnum to their lineups. It drops game like a sledgehammer, though, and is #1 on my wish list for my next rifle.
Bad Marketing/timing
5mm Remington Magnum
Resembling the later .17 HMR, the 5mm Remington is essentially a beefed-up .22 Magnum case loaded to higher pressure. Pushing .20 caliber bullets at around 2300 feet per second, the 5mm Remington outpaces the 22 Magnum by 200-300 fps with similar bullet weights. It is an excellent small game and varmint round. Unlike the debut of the 17 HMR, where rifles were given heavy barrels to maximize the long-range potential of the new high-velocity round, Remington brought out the rifle in standard lightweight configurations. They were made for walking, rather than sitting, and advertised as such. That, and the cost of the rounds being not much cheaper than some centerfire rifles, doomed it to being a curiosity.
222 Remington Magnum
The 222 Magnum was a result of military testing to create a replacement for the 7.62×51 cartridge, and actually competed directly with the .223 Remington for military adoption. After losing out in the trials, it was brought to market as the 222 Magnum, offering a boost in velocity over the then-popular 222 Remington. Ballistically, a twin to the 223 Remington, it was almost immediately cast aside by rifle makers upon the adoption of the 223 by the US military.
6.5 Remington Magnum
One of the original short-magnums, the 6.5 Remington didn’t even have much of a chance to achieve even near-marginal popularity. A potent round, it was designed with a case requiring a deep bullet seating depth when shoe-horned onto the short-action Remington Model 600 rifle. The stubby 18 ½” barrel of the Model 600 did little to help what could have been a decent long-range caliber for light rifles. It was a similar error to the 5mm Remington, a great round housed in the wrong platforms.
.264 Winchester Magnum
The first “hot” 6.5mm round to hit the American market, the .264 Winchester, arrived with a great amount of fanfare from its parent company, and it was buried by the 7mm Remington Magnum within 5 years. The .264 was designed to reach out and touch big game animals at the longer ranges found out west, but the 140-grain cup-and-core bullets offered in factory ammunition placed it on the lighter side for elk. The round was also labeled as “barrel burner” by gun writers like Jack O’Connor, further damaging its chances of acceptance. It still maintains a small, loyal following, but it is virtually unknown in the larger hunting community today.
.350 Remington Magnum
Probably one of the best rounds ever created for chasing big game in thick cover, the .350 Remington Magnum suffered from the same housing problems as its 6.5mm stablemate. On top of those concerns, the recoil generated by the 350 in the lightweight model 600 and 660 rifle would almost make your nose bleed. Ballistics are nearly identical to the .35 Whelen (for which brass is easier to source), so many left it on the shelf.
Why
.256 Winchester Magnum
Introduced in 1960 to the shooting public, the .256 Winchester Magnum was greeted with a yawn. Based on the .357 Magnum case necked down to 25 caliber, the cartridge is not really a magnum, nor did it fill any real niche in the firearms world. Originally chambered in the single-shot Ruger Hawkeye pistol and the Marlin model 62 Levermatic, the 256 was designed for metallic silhouette competition and killing varmints. It offered nothing in rifle that the .222 Remington couldn’t do for the same money, and it had about the same range as the .22 Magnum. It was quietly dropped from the market after several years, and no one really noticed.
The RUMs
Bigger and faster was the order of the day in the 1990s, and Remington brought it with the Remington Ultra Magnum family of cartridges. Offered in 7mm, 300, 338, and 375, the RUMs competed directly with Weatherby’s line of big magnums but offered no clear advantages over the established rounds (with the exception of the 7mm) and slowly faded out of production with their short action counterparts, the SAUM family.
Ruger Compact Magnums
After the runaway success of their 375 Ruger cartridge, Ruger decided to neck it down to take 30 and 338 bullets and shorten the case to fit a short-action rifle. The 338 was unique in being the only short-magnum 338. But the 300 did little that the Winchester Short-Mags would not do. Neither are catalogued by Ruger anymore.
So what
In days of yore, “magnum” was the European term for a ridiculously large bottle of cheap wine. When big, fast bottleneck rifle cartridges appeared on the scene, a resemblance was noted, and the term became synonymous with high-performing rifle rounds built on a large case. Just like wine, some mature better than others, and a few leave us wondering, “What were they thinking?”
