Innholdsfortegnelse for September/October 2021 i RifleShooter

Milled Steel and Walnut Thoroughly enjoyed the feature article on the Winchester Model 70 Super Grade in French walnut [July/August, pictured above]. A rifle like this brings that deep-in-the-chest feeling of pride of ownership and a sense of beauty that I think many American shooters have lost in their firearm choices. I’ve heard guys like me derisively called “those milled steel and walnut boys,” but I’ll take that moniker with pride. This is one 60-year-old that’s had enough of walking into gun stores with the shelves filled with black, synthetic rifles and handguns. I don’t know when these whipper-snappers will discover life is too short to hunt with an ugly rifle. My Super Grade is a 6.5 Creedmoor in tiger-stripe maple [inset photo]. My sons are already asking who’s gonna…

Ruger’s Custom Shop has taken the popular Ru ger Precision Rifle and created what may be the ultimate production-class PRS (Precision Rifle Series) competition rifle. When Ruger’s Precision Rifle broke upon the still-nascent PRS scene several years ago, it was revolutionary. A production-line factory rifle with a suggested retail price of around $1,300, it was configured with a set of features that enabled new PRS shooters to walk onto the shooting line and be competi tive with shooters firing custom rifles that cost four times as much. The Precision has an innovative hybrid chassis-type folding stock that’s configurable to fit the individual shooter, a heavy 26-inch barrel and an AR-type free-floating handguard. Its aluminum magazine well is compatible with multiple different high-capacity magazines, such as the popular AICS types and…

In addition to being a genius in firearms design, John Browning of Ogden, Utah, was a shrewd businessman who sometimes sold manufacturing rights for one of his creations to more than one company. While the basic design was the same, subtle details differed. An autoloading shotgun built and sold by Fabrique Nationale of Belgium as the Browning Automatic-5 was built and sold by Remington in the United States as the Model 11. An autoloading big-game rifle sold by Remington as the Model 8 in .35 Rem. was sold by FN as the Model 1900 Caliber .35 Automatic Rifle. Browning applied for patents on his first blowback-operated, .22 rimfire rifle in 1912, and in 1914 it was introduced in Belgium as the FN .22 Caliber Automatic Rifle. Ten years later, Remington…

Recently, I came into possession of a number of vintage military rifles upon the passing of my father-in-law. Accompanying each gun was a folder containing bills of sale, pet handloads, articles cut out of magazines, handwritten notes and so forth. Over the years I’ve amassed a few rifles—more than I need but less than I want. However, aside from my notebooks containing chronograph results recorded over the last 20 years, plus a couple of articles on rifles I reviewed and subsequently bought, I’ve got very little in the way of records. It’s time to turn over that new leaf. As a public service to those out there who might need a kickstart in the right direction, here are the details I plan to start gathering. (And, please, if you have…

Most handloaders have heard of annealing, but few actually do it. And candidly, in normal times, few really need to. However, today there’s a new need, as shooters who are reloading more than usual due to the dearth of ammunition want to conserve their brass. In the past, annealing was mostly the province of competition shooters who fire thousands of reloads per year—and sometimes per month—and the occasional vintage cartridge shooter with a few really old cartridge cases he or she wants to keep in good condition for continued use. So just what is annealing? It’s the process of softening the granular structure of the brass in your cartridge case necks after it’s become work-hardened by several firings. This is accomplished by heating the necks to between 700 and 800…

Using a rifle that’s too powerful has consequences. Tasty venison may be damaged, and you’ll withstand more recoil than needed. Maybe worst of all, your hunting buddies will ridicule you. Using a rifle that isn’t powerful enough also carries risk: greater potential for wounding. The ideal solution is to use a cartridge that’s “just right” for the job. Not too much recoil or muzzle blast, not so much power that your buddies make fun of you, but enough that a reasonably placed shot will quickly have the desired effect. The problem is, nobody can say with certainty exactly how much power is “just right.” There are too many variables. Bullet performance and shot placement are big ones. We have better and more reliable hunting bullets than ever before. However, the…

By coincidence, the very day our March/April issue containing Jon Sundra’s article on straight-pull rifles—in which he bemoaned the lack of an American-made straight pull—went to press, we learned of Savage’s plans to build just such a gun. The new Impulse, available in three different configurations, was big news, especially in a year when few truly new introductions hit the big game rifle market. The three configurations include Predator, four chamberings from .22-250 Rem. to 6.5 Creedmoor; Hog Hunter, four chamberings from .308 to .300 Win. Mag.; and Big Game, six chamberings from .243 Win. to .300 Win. Mag. For testing I chose the Big Game in .300 Win. Mag. Famous for its Model 110 turnbolt action, Savage needed to develop a whole new action for the Impulse. The company’s…

The 1960s and early ’70s may have represented a high point in print-ad creativity for firearms, and no ad campaign surpassed Remington’s push for the Model 600 Carbine. It was aggressive, colorful and pretty darn cool: “Carries like a carbine, points like a shotgun, shoots like a rifle!” As a teen back then, I can testify it was catnip to me. But there was a lot more to it than a sexy 1960s aesthetic. If nothing else, the Model 600 rates a lengthy footnote in the scout-rifle saga. It was Jeff Cooper’s early interest in a couple of .308 Model 600s altered for a forward-mounted, low-powered scope that pretty much birthed the scout template. The Model 600 was produced from 1964 to 1968 and was chambered in .222 Rem., .223…

Many modern firearm manufacturers offer a mountain rifle in their lineups, but when Kerry O’Day founded MG Arms in 1981, the pool of dedicated _ mountain ______ rifles was much smaller. O’Day’s Ultra-Light, which he introduced in 1985, was one of the first go-to high-country bolt guns for dedicated high-country hunters. Despite the proliferation of mountain guns that followed the Ultra-Light, the MG Arms rifle remains a popular choice—and with good reason. Most MG Arms Ultra-Light rifles are built using a modified Remington 700 action, which O’Day and his team fine-tune for improved performance and reduced mass. Being a true custom rifle, the Ultra-Light also can be built on other actions. O’Day has a cache of remaining Model 700 actions that he still uses to build these rifles—with quantities limited,…

Thanks to my vocation, I usually end up flying with a rifle several times a year. Invariably, as I struggle through the airport carrying my gear along with a large rolling rifle case, I’m envious of the bird hunters with their small takedown setups. It always feels as though I’m dragging a coffin and they’re carrying pool cues. European hunters have this figured out, often favoring big game rifles that break down for easy travel. Among those European designs that have made it stateside is the Austrian-made Strasser RS 14 Evolution, a modular rifle that is both flexible and portable. The RS 14 is a straight-pull bolt action, similar in operation to models such as the popular German Blaser. Europeans shoot lots of driven game and are generally restricted from…