.404 Jeffery

The .404 Jeffery is a large caliber, rimless cartridge designed for large, dangerous game, such as the big five (elephant, rhino, cape buffalo, lion and leopard) of Africa. Other names for this cartridge include .404 Jeffery Rimless, .404 Rimless Nitro Express, and 10.75 × 73 mm. It was created by Jeffery of England based on their desire to duplicate performance of the .450/400 (3¼") cartridge. There are two basically similar sets of dimensions for this case, depending on the manufacturer. The .404 Jeffery as originally loaded fired a .423" diameter bullet of either 300 gr with a muzzle velocity of 2600 ft/s and muzzle energy of 4500 ft.lbf or 400 gr with a muzzle velocity of 2125 ft/s and 4020 ft.lbf of energy. It is very effective on large game and is favored by many hunters of dangerous game. Performance and recoil are similar to other African dangerous game cartridges.The .404 Jeffery was popular with hunters and game wardens in Africa because it gave good performance with a manageable level of recoil. By way of comparison, the .416 Rigby and .416 Remington Magnum both fire a 400 grain .416 " bullet at 2400 ft/s with a muzzle energy of approximately 5000 ft.lbf, which handily exceeds the ballistic performance of the .404 Jeffery but at the price of greater recoil and in the case of the .416 Rigby, rifles that are significantly more expensive.

History
Originally the .404 Jeffery was very popular with hunters in Africa and saw significant use in both British and German colonies. As the British Empire began to shrink, many of the popular British big-bore cartridges also dwindled in popularity, and the .404 Jeffery was one of them. By the 1960s it had all but disappeared from common firearm usage. This condition was mostly the result of the closing of the British Ammunition giant Kynoch, which was the primary manufacturer of the .404 Jeffery and many other British cartridges. The introduction of the .458 Winchester Magnum in 1956 in the Winchester Model 70 bolt action rifle provided an affordable alternative to the big Nitro Express rifles and cartridges and helped to hasten the demise of the .404 Jeffery. Winchester also started a marketing campaign at about this time called "Winchester in Africa" with much success. Renewed interest in heavy game rifles and political stability in Africa has led to a resurgence in African hunting and the rifles suited for it. Kynoch Ammunition has reopened as Kynamco Limited Kynoch Ammunition. Hornady and Norma of Sweden are also offering .404 Jeffery ammunition.

Commercial and wildcat children
In recent times, the .404 case has seen a resurgence in use by wildcatters. This case has no belt, unlike many other magnum cartridges, which can be desirable for handloading because of possible problems with case head separation with repeated reloading of belted magnum cartridges. The rimless design also contributes to smooth feeding from the box magazine of bolt action rifles.

Some common commercial children of the .404 Jeffery case are the Remington Ultra Magnum (RUM) cartridge family, as well as the Winchester Short Magnum (WSM) cartridge family, which in turned spawned the Remington Short Action Ultra Magnum (RSAUM) cartridges and the Winchester Super Short Magnum (WSSM) families. Both the Winchester and Remington cartridges have also spawned many current wildcats.

The .375 Dakota by Dakota Arms and the .400 Tembo by Velocity USA, are cartridges based on a .404 Jeffery case.