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50target
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400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Apr 14th, 2026 at 1:48pm
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A friend of mine bought out an estate and has some 400 Whelen brass (new) and 375 Winchester brass (new) and I am curious if it might be of use  for some of these old calibers that can be made from it. If so I will post on the FS section. I am not familiar with the 400 Whelen but some with the 375 Winchester. Appears the 375 didn't get much traction and I know the 35 Whelen appears to be more known.
Thanks and for any questions send PM to keep the traffic down on this thread.

Thanks

Bob
  
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RBKenn
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #1 - Apr 14th, 2026 at 8:54pm
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The .400 Whelen was a problematic cartridge from the beginning.  It is a rimless case with no shoulder.  Rimless cases typically headspace on the shoulder and there is none.   The rim on this cartridge is only .003 larger diameter than the case head.  In those early days of reloading the cartridge developed a bad reputation quickly. It was never adopted as a standard by a firearms manufacturer.  I am surprised that you were able to find new brass with that head stamp.
  
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1Hawkeye
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #2 - Apr 15th, 2026 at 4:16pm
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Wanna hear a good one. Starline is making .400 Whelen brass and calling it .30-06 basic
  
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ssdave
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #3 - Apr 15th, 2026 at 4:58pm
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I've got a friend just got a 375, I would love to get brass for it so I can load for him without cutting down 38-55.

400 whelen was only problematic because of trying to make it headspace on a non-existent shoulder.  I did a cartridge similar, as did Ken Waters.  We later compared notes and had an interesting and parallel process/reason for making it. 

Mine is the .429 express, which is a 30-06 case blown out straight.  It headspaces on the mouth.  Kens is the 444 marlin rimless, also 30-06 blown out straight and headspacing on the mouth.  Difference is length of the case, mine is longer, his is identical to 444 marlin.  We both use 444 marlin dies to size the cases and load.  

Mine is 2.333 inches long, and can push a 300 grain bullet at upwards of 2600 fps.  It headspaces flawlessly, and case life is 10 or more loadings.  

I'll check out starlines 30-06 basic.  If it's long enough, it'd save my scarce 30-06 basic (2.65" long) Jamison I had Marc make specially for me for wildcat cartridge forming.

P.S.  I went and looked at Starlines site, at 75 cents apiece and 2.5 inches long, the basic brass looks perfect.  Thanks for the heads up here on it. 

I'd be interested in both the 375 and the 400 whelen brass OP has, depending on price.
  
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GT
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #4 - Apr 15th, 2026 at 7:29pm
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I have a 400 Whelen among the rest of the Whelen family of rifles.  If you alter the specs slightly you get a .020" shoulder and nearly .020" worth of body taper for the rest of the case. As Kenn said though there isn't much to headspace off of and they can be problematic but a thumper when they work.  The 375 and 338 make a much better solution.  What brand is the 400 case?
GT
  

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50target
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #5 - Apr 15th, 2026 at 10:32pm
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The 400 Whelen  brass is Quality Cartridge and the 375 is Starline.
  
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Cat_Whisperer
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #6 - Apr 16th, 2026 at 8:20am
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ssdave wrote on Apr 15th, 2026 at 4:58pm:
I've got a friend just got a 375, I would love to get brass for it so I can load for him without cutting down 38-55.

....


30-30 brass blows out to the correct length.
  

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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #7 - Apr 17th, 2026 at 7:50am
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Hello, Is the 400W marked as so? I have a buddy building one. He would love to have them. If selling? How many and what's the price? Plumloco
  
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50target
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #8 - Apr 18th, 2026 at 6:33am
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PM sent to Plumbloco.
  
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #9 - Apr 23rd, 2026 at 11:36am
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The late Michael Petrov used the 400 Whelen and wrote a few articles on it. He concluded most 400s had been made with an incorrect chamber reamer, one which left too small a shoulder. There should be .018 for the shoulder, which is about what the 45 Auto has to headspace on. With correctly formed brass, he had no trouble with it.
  

Karl
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #10 - Apr 24th, 2026 at 4:38pm
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I would be interested in the .400 Whelen brass. I have had a .400 Whelen that was chambered as per the original specifications found by Nichael Petrov. The problem arose when folks tied to just neck up .30-06 brass. The .400 Whelen has less body taper than the .30-06 to allow the creation of the shoulder. If the chamber is cut to the original specs and the brass sized accordingly, there is adequate shoulder.
  
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KWK
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #11 - Apr 27th, 2026 at 1:27pm
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Further down in my notes I see another fellow found an old American Rifleman article by Whelen on the subject. It gives case dimensions of .455 at the shoulder and .431 at the base of the neck. 

That neck is smaller than other sources. Perhaps Whelen meant to turn down the neck a bit to give a little extra shoulder?

Petrov's numbers had come from a chamber cast of an early 400 rifle. That rifle worked perfectly with cartridges made with Whelen's own dies, which he'd been able to borrow.

It's a wildcat. Pacific Tool will make it whatever shape you want. Whelen designed it for 405 WCF bullets. Using the heavy bullets for the 450/400 NE, an -06 case should get one performance close to that of the elephant rifle.
  

Karl
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Re: 400 Whelen and 375 Winchester
Reply #12 - Apr 27th, 2026 at 1:59pm
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As KWK said, the 30-06 case blown out to big bore can give elephant rifle ballistics.

My 429 express pushes a 300 grain bullet at 2400 fps at about 50,000 psi.  Bump that pressure up to max at about 70,000 psi, and it will do 2600 fps.

That's the same range as a 375 H&H with 300 grain bullets.  Of course, the 375 does it at lower pressure.

For those wanting to apply this to single shots, the 405 case is nearly identical to the 30-06, the base is about .010 smaller but it works okay.  I did a 338-06 wildcat single shot using 405 brass and my small base 338-06 match reamer.  You can also use 9.3x74R brass, which is identical to the .30-06 at the base.  The advantage to these wildcats is that you can use the whole array of .30-06 based wildcats and cartridges; 6mm-06, 6.5-06, .25-06, 270, 280, 338-06, 35 Whelen, 375-06, 375 scovill, 400 Whelen, 444 marlin/429 express, and all the ackley improved versions.  Many of these have easily sourced and inexpensive reamers and reloading dies. If you use a reamer modified to have no rim cutter, you can deep chamber for additional capacity since both the 405 and 9.3x74R cases are longer. 
  
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