In all honesty james. If the animal is hit directly in the heart it'll drop quick even if its hit w/ a 22-250. the 270 can take elk in the right hands, VERY skilled hands, but...... very few of the hunters out there are very skilled, even though they ALL claim to be able to blow the ba??s off a bull flea at 1645 long paces w/ a 40 MPH crosswind, in a blizzard, after running miles UP the mountain at 8000+ ft elevation. Now my experience has been that a couple out of a thousand are truely VERY skilled marksmen. More importantly w/ the preasure of a once in a lifetime hunt VERY few guys will pass on the iffy shots. Knowing this its just not wise to advise the use of the 270 on elk. I feel that the 7mag is about the starting point for elk rifles. You 've said that the 06 was your most used for elk and that the 280-almost identicle to the 7mag-is your favorite now, both are bigger than the 270 . people need put their pride in their pocket and face facts, if you talk to people who've hunted alot of elk, VERY few will PREFERR(1in 10,000maybe) the 270, roughly half will approve or disapprove of it , but a good share-10 to 20 percent- will ABSOLUTELY not accept it as an elk rifle. the performance of the 270 is subjective and a matter of opinion, The ONLY FACT is that there IS controversy. such controversy tells you one thing, you have to move up the power scale a notch or two for true elk caliber. No one argues the 7mags. Now you obviously have had great success w/ smaller calibers, thats fine for better than average people like yourself, but that wont be the case w/ the average guy, he may take some, but eventually he'll lose animals. I do know a guy from Wyo who year after year takes elk w/ his 243 and the cheapest shells he can find, I know another guy from MT who uses a 22-250 he does hand load , they never wounds em either. That does not mean that either of these are elk calibers, because NIETHER of these are, exceptional guys can get away w/ it.