Ruger Gunsite Scout Rifle

[Suwannee Tim]

......I will stick with my Winchester Model 70s with the far more rigid action......

How do you figure a Model 70 is stiffer than a Ruger bolt action?

[Jake'sDad]

The vast, vast majority of military and LE snipers over the years have been equipped with bolt action rifles with fixed box magazines. It ain't like the DBM was invented in the 21st century and unknown to arms makers before then. This method of feeding a rifle has been well known since at least the BAR. Well known and dismissed. I did not originate the form of the perfect bolt action rifle, I merely concur with it. The DBM on a bolt action rifle is a fad. The fact that it is popular strengthens the argument that it is a fad. The necessity of removing the magazine from the rifle to load it is a major disadvantage. This is a very useful feature in rifles designed to put a hail of bullets on target, rifles like the AR. This is not a useful feature on a bolt action rifle. It unnecessarily complicates the rifle and the manual of arms.

For a number of years, popular bolt action sniping rifles have been designed with, (Steyr SSG, Savage, etc) or been converted to DBM (ala the M24). It is not a "fad".

As to your other argument about the Mauser claw extractor, how many of the bolt action sniping systems have incorporated that in the last 30 years?

[Jake'sDad]

30-30? 35rem? 45-70?

I own rifles in all three cartridges, (6 or 7 .30-30's and 5 45-70's), all great cartridges, but they aren't as versatile as my .308's. If I lived in the outback of Alaska or Canada I might think differently.

While none are the "sexy" choice and dont have the range of a .308, are you really going to be shooting long range with a scout config. rifle? Is that its purpose?

That's up to the buyer. Cooper's concept was a rifle that could hit a human at 500 yards or "wreck a truck". .308 is capable of doing both. I'm a pretty mediocre shot these days, but even I can makes hits pretty far out there with a .308. My .30-30's, not so much....

Out of the cartridges i've mentioned above, i'd take the 30wcf. Good power, low recoil, and can be found EVERYWHERE...cheap.

Not as cheap as .308 ammo, lousy BC, and it lacks the range of bullet choices in .308.

Or if you have to have it in .308, how about a BLR? You get a Lever action, detach mag. AND you can get one in a take down model.....hmmm

I've had several BLR's. Trust me on this, the BLR will break before the M77 gets broken in.

[Jake'sDad]

I'm not a fan of the Ruger investment cast action. It certainly works, as thousands of rifles have been sold with it, but that's what lots of shooters say about their DPMS and Olys, too. I will stick with my Winchester Model 70s with the far more rigid action.

The Scout scope may work very well in daylight, but I understand that in low light the small objective scout scopes pretty much crap out. Sometimes you need a rifle in low light conditions, so that has been one reason I have stayed away from scout rifle configurations. For myself it's much more practical to use the normal receiver optic mounting methods using Talley steel rings or on heavy barrelled rifles, Badger Ordnance mounts.

However, I'm always willing to learn something new...what exactly does the scout offer that would be considered an advantage over say a regular "practical" rifle?

Using the forward mount on the Scout for the first time, was quite amazing for me 25 years ago. Being able to easily shoot a moving target through an optic was pretty revolutionary.

Today, with RDS's, TR24's, etc., it's lost most of it's shine.

[deadduck357]

The Scout scope may work very well in daylight, but I understand that in low light the small objective scout scopes pretty much crap out. Sometimes you need a rifle in low light conditions, so that has been one reason I have stayed away from scout rifle configurations.

I have used the Burris Scout scope in a scout rifle set-up in low-light frequently and find it useful, it still magnifies light, not as bright as a larger optic but nevertheless brighter than surrounding light.

[MountainRaven]

The vast, vast majority of military and LE snipers over the years have been equipped with bolt action rifles with fixed box magazines.

You ignored the other part of the argument:

The action.

Don't get me wrong, I love the Mauser control-round feed action with its giant fixed claw.

But there are, at present, only four reputable mass production manufacturers that utilize Paul Mauser's "perfect" action: Ruger, Kimber, CZ, and Winchester. Three of them do it out of nostalgia and the fourth does it because it's the only thing they know how to do. (All four also manufacture 'dangerous game' rifles, for which a control-round feed action is essential.)

Most production rifles use other actions: Remington, Savage, Sako, Browning, Marlin, Thompson Center, Smith & Wesson, Weatherby, &c. And for every custom production and semi-custom manufacturer that build their own control-round actions, there are at least three who do a push-feed.

And the detachable box magazine not-Mauser bolt action did quite well against the Boers, the Germans in two world wars, and the Japanese in the hands of the soldiers of the British Commonwealth. These rifles served with distinction in a variety of roles, from battle rifle to sniper rifle, from the 1890s to the 1980s. When it was replaced with another rifle fed by a detachable box magazine and utilizing a not-Mauser-style action. A rifle fed by the very same magazine that this new Ruger uses.

[usmcvet]

Has anyone seen the Ruger M77 Compact rifle?

http://ruger.com/products/m77HawkeyeCompact/models.html

You can get it in a variety of popular calibers from .223 to .308, with a 16.5" barrel, lightweight and you can mount a scope in the conventional location. I'm thinking a variable 1x4 scope like the Millett DMS II or similar would make a handy combination for around the farm gun to dispatch hogs and coyotes.

I had one, it is a handy little gun. I had to add a space under the recoil pad to get the stock a little longer. Without it the scope was way too close to my eye.

[JStor]

Let's see...somebody wanted to know about the action stiffness. A google search will turn up a test whereas the Win. 70, Rem. 700 and Ruger 77 were somehow clamped and weights hung at the same point on the barrel. A dial indicator measured flex of the action, but I don't recall where the indicator was located. Ruger was the worst.

The Remy 700 was second worst. Why do you think one of the accuracy enhancements of the 700 is to use an action sleeve? You don't find Model 70 shooters trying to stiffen up their action. David Tubb and others have used Winchester 70s to good effect.

The Winchesters are forged and machined. The Ruger is investment cast and machined, and the Remy 700 is broached from a round tube and machined.

Also, before someone points at the military sniper rifles...it doesn't matter to me that the Marines use the Remy 700 for their actions. I am writing on the qualities or lack thereof of the action design and the flex in the action.

The military has armorers to care for the weapons, and in the heavier recoiling chartridges such as the .300 mag. the bedding loosens early. I presume this is because the bedding surfaces are round and offer little resistance, plus the recoil lug is added as a separate part between action and barrel. Also, I simply despise the extractor design...a weak link in the whole system if I ever saw one. Certainly they work, but the design was drawn up for less costly manufacturing, not because of perceived qualities.

Winchester screwed itself when they brought out the post 64 Model 70. It took until 1968 to finally get the post-64 action design to work better with an added anti-bind groove under the right side bolt lug. Finally, in the early '90s they brought back the controlled feed action named the Classic. I have some of both, and for real use there isn't much difference, except the controlled feed claw extractor is about as unbreakable as one can get. (as long as it is spring steel such as the Williams Firearms Co. units.)

The Winchester bolt field strips in under five seconds. Add the flat bedding surface behind the large integral recoil lug and flat sides that contact the bedding, the former open trigger design, three position safety and you have a foolproof system.

For those who must have a detachable mag, there are after market bottom metal assemblies that use the AICS mags.

If I were to deviate from a Model 70, I'd be looking hard at the CZ 550 actions and the Howa 1500 rifles. The only equation is not simply accuracy, but we want durability and reliable operation.

For after market stocks, McMillan rules. I wouldn't be afraid of buying a Manners stock, either.

I guess it might seem I am opinionated...well, yes I am. I don't apologize for what I like, nor am I expecting all to agree with me. Rock on.

[Rob Haught]

Having tried the forward scope concept on a couple rifles Ive decided that its just not for me. The concept of a handy but powerful rifle does have merit. My solution was to take a Ruger 77 compact, 308 with laminate stock and stainless action and add a Decelerator pad, Black Armor Tuff finish and do a trigger job. This little rifle is very handy in and out of the truck and Rhino and with the Trijicon 3x9 and Scout Light it just about is perfect for me.

As was mentioned earlier in the thread, I think if everything that is available today was there for Col. Cooper to use, the Scout Rifle may have turned out very different.

[okie john]

However, I'm always willing to learn something new...what exactly does the scout offer that would be considered an advantage over say a regular "practical" rifle?

A proper Scout is light, slim and handy. It's quick in the hands like a 30/30 or an upland bird gun, but it reaches out and hits hard like the 308 that it is. I didn't appreciate it until I started trying to hit things fast within 150m. After I carried it on a couple of long hunts on steep, brushy, wet Pacific Northwest terrain, I started selling my longer, heavier rifles.

I will stick with my Winchester Model 70s with the far more rigid action.

Fair enough, but a rigid action doesn't help much once you get off the bench. You can appreciate a rifle with a rigid action by using calipers to measure the groups it shoots. You need a stopwatch to appreciate a Scout.

The Scout scope may work very well in daylight, but I understand that in low light the small objective scout scopes pretty much crap out.

Low-light performance has to do with the exit pupil, which is the diameter of the objective (front) lens divided by the magnification. John Plaster explains this very well in “The Ultimate Sniper.” As I understand it, the human pupil can only dilate to 6-7mm, so you don’t gain much with a bigger exit pupil. The Leupold Scout scope’s exit pupil is 12.17mm (28mm objective lens divided by the actual magnification of 2.3x), so that’s not the issue.

The problems most folks have with the Scout scope is at dawn and dusk when the light is behind the shooter—glare on the scope’s ocular (rear) lens makes it impossible to use. It works fine once the sun is farther up or down, or if you can turn 90 degrees, but targets don’t always cooperate. The other issue with the Scout scope is the low power, which I found limited my ability to see targets past about 175m. Most people who have tried the Scout concept like the short, light part of it but hate these two aspects of the forward-mounted scope.

A lot of them ended up with conventional scopes on their Steyr Scouts. I went to a Model 70 Featherweight, though I'd get a Kimber Montana today. My M-70 is slightly longer and slightly heavier than a proper Scout, but I've learned to hit with it quickly from offhand, so I don't feel like I've lost much.

The Ruger Scout will have to be a LOT better than my M-70 to replace it, which I don't expect, but I'll definitely give it a try. Times have changed and so have I.

Hope this helps,


Okie John