6x45 Satisfies

Over the past three decades, I have received many letters from highly satisfied 6x45 owners, most making the point that this little cartridge ‘punches way above its weight class’ and doesn’t waste meat. Its secret, of course, is its modest velocity which allows the .243 bullets to hold together and retain optimum weight for astonishing penetration (I used mine to shoot well over 100 animals in the impala/blesbuck weight class and I recall recovering only about three bullets – all of Gregor Woods’s influential writings on this calibre, and it is now my favourite rifle for use on the animals for which it is suited. I recently used it to take an impala ram and a blesbuck ewe, both large, mature animals in fine condition. I took both shots at about 90m after extensive stalks, and both bullets passed clean through, the blesbuck being a frontal chest-shot, the bullet exiting from the rear of the left rib-cage. Both animals ran no further than 50m before collapsing. I used hand-loaded Hornady 100gr round-nosed soft-points exiting the muzzle at 2 400fps. This is one of those calibres that just works well and does not damage meat.”

For longer shots the 6x45 also works very well with bullets in the 87 to 90gr weight class at around 2 600fps. I shot several springbuck with mine taking body-shots at 200 to 250m during a night cull, and one at a measured 330m, though I don’t recommend this – I was developing the cartridge as a hunting round and putting it to extreme tests. – Gregor Woods