The 6mm Remington was introduced in 1955 as the 244 Remington with a fast rifling twist intended for light varmint bullets. It was unable to compete with the 243 Winchester, which had a slower twist and was able to stabilize both varmint and big game bullets. In 1963 the cartridge was renamed 6mm Remington; Remington changed their rifling twist to 1:9 and added a 100-grain bullet, with no changes to the cartridge. Based on the 7x57 Mauser (257 Roberts) case necked down, the 6mm Remington has considerably more case capacity than ther 243 Winchester, and thus is somewhat faster with all bullet weights. This error in perception (Was it a varmint cartridge, or a combination varmint/deer cartridge?) has prevented the 6mm Remington from ever catching up with the 243 Winchester in popularity--but it is a fine and accurate cartridge, both for long-range varminting and deer-sized game. Loads include an 80-grain varmint load at 3470 fps and a 100-grain big game load at 3100 fps.
