Innholdsfortegnelse for November/December 2022 i RifleShooter

Savage Love I never thought I would live long enough to see an article about my favorite rifle, the Savage M219! That little gun is the ugly duckling of the rifle world that, with some TLC, can grow into a lovely, sexy swan! I have one each of the original four calibers in excellent condition, which I will preserve for posterity. However, I have several others with issues that have been treated to rechambering; resighting; and restocking, using high-grade Turkish walnut. They turn into the nicest kipplauf-style stalking rifles! Clete Davis, Illinois A Man’s Got to Know His Limitations I have been reading RifleShooter for many years now and have always enjoyed the many articles written by the various authors. Craig Boddington has always managed to write such interesting, thought-provoking…

In one of those strange fates of history, Henry O. Peabody’s name is left off the most famous version of the rifle he invented during the American Civil War. The Peabody had a hammer on a sidelock in addition to the signature falling block that made the rifle world famous. The Peabody as made by the Providence Tool Co. of Providence, Rhode Island, served with several American National Guards, Canada, Spain, Mexico, France and others. In Britain, a contest was held to choose a smallbore service rifle—back when a bore under 1/2 inch was considered a “smallbore”—and the winner was the American Peabody as modified by Swiss mechanic Friedrich von Martini. It featured a simplified breechblock and coil-spring striker. A separate contest for rifling systems was won by Alexander Henry.…

The first bolt-action centerfire repeater introduced by Winchester was the Model 1883 Hotchkiss. A rear-loaded tubular magazine housed in the buttstock held six .45-70 Gov’t or .40-65 Hotchkiss cartridges. Back then, lever-action rifles ruled the roost among hunters, and only a small number of Model 1883 bolt actions were built before production ceased in 1899. Winchester also introduced military and sporting versions of the Lee straight-pull rifle in 6mm Lee, and while the U.S. Navy purchased a few Lee straight-pulls, hunters ignored it like they did the 1883 Hotchkiss, and Winchester ended Lee production during the early 1900s. Moving forward to World War I, Winchester and Remington built more than 2.25 million 1917 Enfield rifles in .30-06 for the U.S. Government. With the sudden cancellation of contracts in 1918, both…

RIFLE REPORT The release of the Rugermade Marlin 1895 SBL .45-70 Gov’t rifle last year was very well received, and Marlin is following that up with the 1895 Trapper. It has the same chambering, satin stainless finish and gray laminate stock as the SBL, but the Trapper version has a shorter, 16.1-inch barrel. Its barrel is cold hammer forged out of 410 stainless steel, has a 1:20 twist and is threaded 11/16x24 for mounting a suppressor or other muzzle device. With its shorter barrel and reduced overall length of 34.25 inches, the Trapper is ideal for anyone who wants to add a can to their rifle without making the gun so long that it becomes unwieldy or for those who hunt in tight cover and want the shorter barrel…

LANDS & GROOVES VG2 stands for Vertical Grip. It’s Stocky’s Stocks’ flagship model in the company’s own line of carbon-fiber stocks. Offering modern features designed to support precision shooting, it’s made right here in the U.S. of A. In Florida, to be precise. Weight of the actual stock I tested is a scant 26 ounces. That, along with the excellent butt-stock and grip profile, is impressive. The square-sided for-end with shallow-arch bottom are likewise made to optimize precision capability when shooting from field positions. At the time of this writing, stocks are inletted for Remington 700-type actions only. However, you can get a VG2 in right- or left-hand and inletted for BDL or A5 bottom metal and with your choice of several different barrel channels so you can fit anything…

A well-known player in the shotgun world, Benelli turned heads in 2020 when it released its first-ever bolt-action rifle, the Lupo. Lupo translates to “wolf” in Italian and represents the nation’s fiercest predator. Though its looks aren’t necessarily traditional, my experience with the rifle is that it is both highly functional and user-friendly. For 2022, Benelli has released an upgraded Lupo called the BE.S.T (Benelli Surface Treatment) that adds new features and options. I have some history with this design. I was fortunate enough to be one of a group of writers who traveled to South Africa with the Lupo alongside Benelli employees in 2019, several months before its public launch. Due to the volume of game that we took, through traditional hunting and during a drought-related culling operation, we…

Light is in. Crazy, obscenely light. In the production-rifle realm, Howa’s svelte little rifle built on its “reduced” short action is the lightest of the light. It follows that it’s also extraordinarily nimble and lively in the hands. Built with a compact 20-inch barrel, the Super Lite is easy to strap to a backpack or stow behind the truck seat. It’s particularly appealing to small-framed shooters and kids, who may lack the strength to hold up traditional-weight centerfire hunting rifles. The Super Lite is built on a slenderized version of Howa’s proven turn-bolt rifle action. The receiver is machined with an integral recoil lug, and it houses a forged bolt featuring dual, opposing locking lugs up front. A backup lug is machined where the rear-swept bolt handle merges with the…

Seekins Precision was once a relatively small player in the rifle market, but as word of these guns made its way around backcountry campfires and shooting ranges, this Lewiston, Idaho, company was no longer an industry secret. Today, when you ask most gun writers and serious hunters to rank their favorite factory hunting rifles, there’s a good chance a Seekins model will be somewhere near the top of that list. The brand’s entry-level rifle is the Havak PH2, but this bolt gun is anything but basic. At the heart of this rifle is a Seekins Havak cylindrical action with Gen 2 bolt, which is made from USA-certified pre-hardened stainless steel. The action’s recoil and Picatinny rail lugs are integral to the receiver, and Havak bolt bodies are made from the…

RIFLE REPORT Few things in the shooting world are more fun than a .22 pump. That’s just one man’s opinion, and judging from the dearth of such guns on the market, it’s a lonely one. Regardless, hats off to Rossi for offering up the new Gallery 22, a 15-round pump that is one of only two such guns currently being manufactured, the other coming from Henry. Gallery shooting—recreational shooting with firearms in homes and businesses, as opposed to on formal indoor ranges—was popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and manufacturers produced guns specifically for this activity. They were commonly pumps, usually in .22 Short. I’ve been a fan of pump .22s since I shot my first gun at age 10, Mom’s Winchester 61. Years later, my second-ever…

RCBS’s new, refined version of its renowned Chargemaster just might be the most intuitive, capable, practical electronic powder charger ever made. Foremost among its many virtues is the “learn” technology it’s endowed with. The brain of the smart-dispenser analyzes how fast whatever propellant is in the hopper flows, as well as its propensity to overrun target charge weights, and then adapts. That’s right; it self-reprograms to minimize charge time and maximize accuracy. The Chargemaster Supreme is an electronic gunpowder dispenser built using monobody construction, a single flow tube, a touch-screen control interface and a hopper that holds about a pound of propellant. The body and the placement of the calibration weights and the shape and fit of the clear plastic cover that shields the working parts have been significantly updated…

The North American continent was cheated of pachyderms. A long time ago, we had mammoths, mastodons and more. None survived. So as firearms for self-contained metallic cartridges developed we had little need to develop cartridges suitable for thick-skinned dangerous game. Big bovines we had. Before our Civil War, the American bison existed in one of the greatest populations of large mammals the world has ever seen. The nadir, falling to just a few hundred by 1885, is well known. The peak is not. Those estimates range from 30 to 60 million. The high was likely around 1840, during a period of good rains and mild winters. This was before the slaughter began in earnest, and the herds were probably already in decline after drought on the Great Plains. Still, there…

When anyone begins discussing the merits of a $2,550 AR-platform rifle, some shooters—invariably those who don’t shoot ARs—are taken aback. Aren’t ARs, they’ll ask you, simply an amalgamation of assembled parts? Don’t cheap ARs run fine? Couldn’t you assemble a gun that costs less money or simply wait until AR prices drop and pick up a secondhand, barely used gun for a song? Sure, you could. And, yes, AR rifles are an assemblage of parts and don’t require the hand-tuning of, say, a 1911 pistol. In fact, in his book Gun Guy, Bill Wilson himself contrasts 1911s and ARs, calling the former a gunsmith’s gun and the latter a gun that could be assembled by a “reasonably well-trained Labrador.” What, then, makes the new Wilson Combat Tactical Hunter AR rifle…

Surely by now you’ve heard or read about the MVP—Mossberg Varmint Predator—because it’s been around for more than a decade. I know, it surprised me, too, but our review of the initial model appeared exactly 11 years ago. Through its lifetime the MVP has been offered in a variety of configurations, and these days the company has whittled the choices down to three series: Precision, LR and Scout/Patrol. The newest is the MVP Patrol in .300 BLK, and it is the epitome of the all-round utility bolt-action rifle. Hey, you say, isn’t that exactly what Jeff Cooper’s Scout rifle concept is all about? While the Patrol does share a number of characteristics with its Scout stablemate, it differs in one key area. Instead of a ghost-ring aperture rear sight and…