A bigger bullet does not necessarily mean bigger power. While the 35 Remington has a bigger bullet its case is much smaller than that of the 308 or 30-06 and thus drives the bullets at much slower velocities. Also the 35 remington only comes in lever actions and thus requires you to use round nose bullets to keep from firing the rounds in the magazine. This eats up any long range velocity and energy. The 35 rem is only slightly better than the 30-30 as far as ballistics goes.

Don't get me wrong, it is a great round for what it was intended to be used for (close range deer) but I would not get one for a first rifle. It severly limits your future hunting oportunites should you hunt for bigger (elk and moose) game than deer or happen to see the buck of a lifetime at more than 200 yards.

To give you some perspective the 35 Remington drives a 200 grain bullet at a muzzle velocity of about 2080 fps and has a muzzle energy of 1920 foot pounds. At 200 yards it has droped to 1380 fps and 840 foot pounds. The trajectory of the 35 remington looks like this. Sighted in 2 inches high at 100 yards puts the bullet back to zero at 150 yards and 6 inches low at 200 yards.

The 308 firing a 150 grain nosler ballistic tip has a MV of 2820 fps and ME of 2649 foot pounds. It equals the muzzle energy of the 35 remington at 300 yards (1935 foot pounds) and has more energy at 500 yards that the 35 rem does at 50 yards. Trajectory for the 308 looks like this. Sighted 2 inches high at 100 yards puts the bullet back to zero at 220 yards and 6 inches low at 290 yards. You can hold dead center of a deer size animal and not have to compensate for bullet drop all the way out to 260 yards with a 150 grain Nosler ballistic tip bullet out of a .308 Win.

The 30-06 beats the 35 remington be even more.

Go to different web sites like Federals, Remingtons, and Winchesters and look at their ballistic charts for different cartridges and bullet weights.


AS far as a rifle is concerned Savage makes a good dependable rifle that won't break the bank. Another very good and much better IMO is the Howa line or Weatherby vanguard. They are essentially the same rifle as both made by Howa. You can get the vanguard in a synthetic stocked blued rifle for less than $400.00 at Walmart. They are excelent rifles for the money.