Innholdsfortegnelse for July/August 2023 i RifleShooter

A Polarizing Rifle I read J. Scott Rupp’s article review on the Christensen Arms Modern Hunting Rifle in the May/June issue. I was amused when he compared using the MHR to dating a supermodel. Indeed, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” I personally see the MHR as being “six-pack ugly”! Granted, the MHR is constructed from state-of-the-art materials, and I have no doubt that it shoots well—as it should for its asking price of $3,500! But it is one of the ugliest rifles that I have ever seen. My idea of an appealing supermodel rifle is one containing fine exhibition walnut and blued steel like the Weatherby Mark V Deluxe or the ultimate in beautiful factory production rifles, the Colt Sauer by J.P. Sauer & Sohn—both of which…

A big change in the past couple years affecting a lot of whitetail hunters has been the new attitude some states are taking toward centerfire rifles. Some states that were shotgun only—or shotgun, muzzle-loader or handgun only—have relaxed their stances to allow straight-wall rifle cartridges. One such state is Illinois, which incidentally produces some monster bucks. Effective this year, hunters will be able to use centerfire rifles in certain calibers—mostly straight-walls but also a few bottlenecks like .300 BLK. The catch? The rifles have to be single-shots. Ruger was quick to seize on the opportunity afforded by the new law and has designed the One-Shot Sled ($25) for its popular American rifle. It’s for short actions only and handles such deer-centric, Illinois-legal straight-walls as .350 Legend and .450 Bushmaster, along…

Several key characteristics contribute to the overall success of Mossberg’s Patriot LR Tactical: the Patriot action, the MDT stock and the bull-profile barrel. Or as old-timers put it, “lock, stock and barrel.” Let’s take a closer look. Patriot bolts have a floating, pinned bolt head, so the dual locking lugs find a natural squared-up equilibrium—important for accuracy. It’s a system that provides most of the benefits of hand-lapped locking lugs on a trued-up traditional action, without the cost. Further, the action features Mossberg’s LBA trigger, which is crisp and clean and user adjustable. A robust M16-type extractor is dovetailed into the right-side locking lug. It reliably yanks fired cases from the chamber. A stout plunger-type ejector heaves them out the ejection port. Thanks to the three o’clock positioning of the…

Bill Wilson, the founder of Wilson Combat, is well known for his exploits in the handgun world and beyond. What many don’t know is that Wilson is himself an avid outdoorsman. He has hunted worldwide, and these days spends a great deal of time chasing feral hogs on his Texas ranch. Due to the sheer number of hogs in the U.S. and the laws regulating their taking, a hog hunter can get more action in a day than a deer or elk hunter might get in an entire season. Since he hunts hogs about 300 days per year, Wilson takes that to a new level. It was this mountain of real-world hunting experience that led him to develop his company’s new rifle, the Wilson Combat Ultralight Hunter. Wilson does most…

LANDS & GROOVES Collecting firearms helps preserve the past, teaches appreciation of the skill and craftsmanship of our forebears and is a tangible way of preserving wealth. Pristine guns—those of exceptional rarity and condition—should be carefully preserved and admired as is. Done well, they appreciate the fastest in value. Rifles with some finish wear—what I call the “Shoot once a year on Sunday” type—have too much original finish for everyday use but just enough wear that a box or so of ammo won’t depreciate value. They’ll appreciate, too, but not as fast. Rifles with lesser amounts of finish can be enjoyed more often. These guns don’t appreciate as fast, but with care they won’t lose value like a new gun will, which might lose half its value out the door.…

An old friend of mine had a terrific custom .30-06 rifle built. He chose top-shelf components and had it built by a gunsmith who really knows his craft. The rifle wouldn’t shoot. It wanted to, but it regularly threw fliers that opened up tiny groups. After several unsatisfying range sessions, he contacted me. We headed to the range together for a little accuracy therapy session to see if we could determine the issue. While observing my friend at the bench, watching for signs of human-induced inconsistencies, I checked out a few rounds from his box of hand-loads. All the signs indicated he was doing everything right—until I looked at the cases’ headstamps. In the five or six cartridges I held, there were three different stamps: Winchester, Remington and Hornady. When…

If you’re primarily a varmint hunter, deer hunter or target shooter, then versatility doesn’t mean much to you. I’m all of the above, but none exclusively. When I say I want a versatile, “all-around” caliber and cartridge, I’m not thinking about prairie dogs or about competitive disciplines. I’m not always hunting, but I’m always a hunter, so I’m thinking beyond paper and steel targets. Deer-size game comes first, which includes pronghorns and gazelles in open plains, and sheep and goats up in the rocks. Big bears and thick-skinned game are excluded as specialized pursuits, but I include elk, caribou, red deer, even moose—plus larger African plains game. In that context, we can cut the field down to just five bullet diameters or calibers. They are: .257, .264/6.5mm; .277/6.8mm, .284/7mm and…

There was a time when the ’98 Mauser was king. I’m not talking about the period between 1898 and 1945 when the ’98 Mauser was the martial arm not only of German forces but of 29 other countries around the world—a time period when it’s estimated that as many as 100 million ’98s were manufactured. No, I’m talking about the 25 or so years following World War II, and especially prior to the 1968 passage of our Gun Control Act. It was a time when individuals could purchase firearms directly through interstate commerce, no FFL needed. Literally millions of surplus arms of all kinds were imported, but it was the Mauser that was the most sought after. There have been many importers over the years (see sidebar), but to my…

The turnbolt rifle wasn’t new in the 1860s; it was just patiently awaiting development of suitable ammunition. The arrival of U.S. Gen. Hiram Berdan’s .42 Berdan centerfire cartridge soon had nations worldwide rearming with a variety of single-shot, turnbolt models using drawn brass cases, many suspiciously similar to the .42 Berdan. Ferdinand von Mannlicher revolutionized the payload quest by putting five shots of Austria’s 11.15x58 ammo—another cartridge suspiciously similar to the .42 Berdan—into a sheet metal clip. The whole packet was pushed down to quickly charge the rifle, and the clip fell out the bottom when the last round was chambered. Mannlicher’s equally revolutionary straight-pull action required but two motions to eject and feed another cartridge, rather than the four of the turnbolt, resulting in the highest sustained rate of…

Lifting the Savage Model 110 Classic from its box took me back a few years. That first Savage bolt gun I bought back in the 1960s had a walnut stock with cut checkering. The asking price of the hardware store owner who had it was only $100 ($989 in today’s dollars). It had a 22-inch barrel in .270 Win., and as best as I can recall, the long-range wonder weighed only a few ounces more than my Marlin lever-action woods rifle. Like my Savage of yesteryear, the new Classic has a walnut stock. Its 22-lines-per-inch checkering is machine cut rather than hand cut, and while there is less coverage, it is nicely executed, with no border runovers and only a few flattop diamonds waiting to be pointed up. With a…

You may wonder why I’m writing about hand-loading when we have a perfectly good reloading column every issue in “All That Brass” and a perfectly good reloading writer in Joseph von Benedikt. It’s because that column is for those of active, experienced reloaders, and Joseph—certainly an expert in this field—writes from the perspective of a precision long-range shooter as well as a hunter. Me, I’m a duffer—albeit one who still has all his fingers—so I’m the most qualified to write some words on “Why the hell aren’t you hand-loading?!” You shooters who find it hard enough just to carve out the time to head to the shooting range can go now, but those of you who do have room in your life for a rewarding new hobby should stick around.…

RIFLE REPORT While the .22 Hornet seems to have fallen out of favor with many small game hunters, it is still a viable varmint cartridge, and rifles—both production and custom—are still out there. One company that has stayed the course with the Hornet is Anschütz with its Model 1771. Backed by more than 160 years of rifle-making experience, the Model 1771 line is as up to date as you can get. You will see a mix of old and new worlds. Take the stock. My sample is the mainstay of the line, called appropriately the “German stock,” which is all trimmed out with the flavor of Bavaria. Other stock choices include a thumbhole and the DJV, the latter a target type with adjustable comb and enlarged fore-end. [Ed note:…