“sharps”

I’m just guessing, mind you, but I believe the first American deer rifle was the Model 94 Winchester. To be sure, a lot of deer fell to Model 73s, Marlins, Trapdoor Springfields and flintlocks, but the first sporting deer rifle was the 94. Since that iconic rifle there have been a whole lot more.

Sharps Rifle Company will bring more power to the AR platform with the .25-45 Sharps this summer.

Today relatively few handloaders take the time to anneal their case necks. Dave Campbell is one of those few.

Simple pleasures: That’s what deer hunting with friends is all about.

It’s as big as the Grand Canyon, it’s right at home when chambered in a classic lever gun like the Winchester Model 1886, the Marlin Model 1895 or a classic Sharps falling block, and like America herself, it’s big enough to handle Alaska. Meet the "Most American" rifle cartridge: the .45-70 Government.

The Sharps Rifle Company (SRC) developed the .25-45 Sharps cartridge and introduced it in 2012. Not to be confused with Shiloh Sharps—a company that makes historically correct blackpowder cartridge rifles—SRC is for all practical purposes built around this one cartridge, which is designed to replicate .250 Savage ballistics in an AR-15. Four years after its introduction, most hunters have never heard of the .25-45 Sharps. That’s about to change.

If a new rifle cartridge is not supported by one of the main ammunition manufacturers, it doesn’t seem to get much traction. This is unfortunate, specifically in the case of the .25-45 Sharps, because it provides an easy-to-obtain ballistic advantage over the two most popular AR-15 chamberings: the .223 Rem. and the .300 Blackout.