best bolt action for dangerous games

[steve white]

Has anyone taken up for the Sako action?

 

[BeeMaa]

Has anyone taken up for the Sako action?

@Dr Ray

 

[OldnLazy]

You might want to look at the 375 ruger in a ruger m77! The action is the same as a 30-06 with the same ballistics as a 375 H H magnum! Just a suggestion.

 

[Doug Hamilton]

Doug, I think you are right about reloads for DG hunting. I think you are wrong to call out and insult Philip, who is, in fact, and experienced African hunter. Better to agree to disagree than to pick a fight.

I did not pick the fight. Other responders caught the insult to me, maybe you missed that. I would not tell anyone that their opinion was invalid and that they needed some experience to have one unless, of course, they were so self important that they thought telling me that I was too inexperienced to be intitled to my own.
I couldn't care less whether he hand loads or not, but he cannot tell me that factory produced ammunition is better than what can be precisely hand crafted by someone n hat knows what he is doing. He also went on to say in another response.that other hand loaders just dabbled at it and none of them were as competent as a mass produced box of shells. When I said he was naive, I was being kind.

 

[1dirthawker]

I also ritualistically cycle all my ammo I take with me for the day through the rifle before I go for coffee....each morning

I think IvW has the right idea and is doing something that many people do NOT do, but should. before my brown bear guiding i take every shell out of the box and run it thru my rifle as fast as i can work the bolt. i pull the firing pin first, and then run every reload (i shoot north fork reloads) thru the box and the rifle. if i have a problem, it is with a cartridge that has already been in the rifle and exited properly. you can only do what you can do.

so, at least if things go wrong, i tried to make sure it went right. IvW, well done!

 

[mark-hunter]

By doing so, and doing it continuously with same actual box of ammo, have you guys ever experienced, that bullet was jammed in chamber, and when extracting the powder was spilled all over the action, and magazine?

 

[John Telford]

By doing so, and doing it continuously with same actual box of ammo, have you guys ever experienced, that bullet was jammed in chamber, and when extracting the powder was spilled all over the action, and magazine?

Sounds like the ammo was loaded too long …

 

[Tanks]

According to bunch of guys here the Blaser R8 action.

 

[mark-hunter]

According to bunch of guys here the Blaser R8 action.

I am not blaser fan, but I respect that opinion, and see advantages of this platform.
Also, I have never seen a negative feeback on Blaser r8. (I did for blaser r93)

So, there are two groups of hunters on the forum, discussing this topic.
Blaser fans
CRF fans.
Third group is double rifle fans, but doubles are not subject of this thread

Generally, push feed rifle fans, are quiet on subject of DG bolt action rifle.
So, the bolt action rifle for DG, will be either CRF, or blaser R8.

 

[BenKK]

I am not blaser fan, but I respect that opinion, and see advantages of this platform.
Also, I have never seen a negative feeback on Blaser r8. (I did for blaser r93)

So, there are two groups of hunters on the forum, discussing this topic.
Blaser fans
CRF fans.
Third group is double rifle fans, but doubles are not subject of this thread

Generally, push feed rifle fans, are quiet on subject of DG bolt action rifle.
So, the bolt action rifle for DG, will be either CRF, or blaser R8.

Or both. I like both. They both work just fine.

 

[BeeMaa]

I am not blaser fan, but I respect that opinion, and see advantages of this platform.
Also, I have never seen a negative feeback on Blaser r8. (I did for blaser r93)

So, there are two groups of hunters on the forum, discussing this topic.
Blaser fans
CRF fans.
Third group is double rifle fans, but doubles are not subject of this thread

Generally, push feed rifle fans, are quiet on subject of DG bolt action rifle.
So, the bolt action rifle for DG, will be either CRF, or blaser R8.

Forgot to add in the lever rifle and single shot. I know there are a few here on AH that have used both of these up to and including DG. Maybe thow in the semi-auto hunting (sporting) rifle for applications where it's legal, like hog hunting in the US.

As for the Blaser R8, it deserves to be called a push feed. Don't get me wrong because I mean no disrespect. It's a revolutionary bolt action operating system...but still a PF. I'd call it a push feed with an asterisks.

Lots of choices out there to suit whatever you hearts desire. Just make sure the rifle and ammo are reliable along with the shooter being capable.

 

[mark-hunter]

Lever action rifle (not a bolt action rifle, but repeater for sure), and single shot (in most cases not a bolt action).
The percentage of DG hunters using these platform is rather smalls. Possible reasons:

The lever action rifle, will have disandvatage of not having standard DG calibers.
Or, if having a DG caliber, most probably those will be custom rifles.
So, in general, the small percentage of hunters using lever action, will have very limited options.
The calibers that comes first to mind are 45-70 govt, 45-90, and maybe 405 winchester. everything else is, custom gun, i guess, this makes the small market, thus lesser popularity of lever actions for DG hunting. There are few reports on this forum of buffalo hunted with lever action. I dont recall elephant hunt report with lever actions.

Single shots.
Mostly, that would be ruger r1. No lack of good DG calibers here. For this reason, significant number of hunters choose r1 for Dg hunt (but still in far less numbers then bolt action DG hunters)
This is very special rifle that has apeal.
But second thought would always be: how many buffalos have been brought down with single bullet? How fast it can be reloaded? As a back up, there will be at least PHs rifle. Shall I rely on my PH rifle and his follow up action? I am sure, some people can reload fast. Will hope for luck or back up by PH
Popularity. in my wider group on hunting acquaintances, i know exactly, only one that has r1, and wants to hunt buffalo with it.
So, numbers will be always small in single shot DG hunters community, and in the same time tolerated by PH (as Ph will always have something more serious for stopping the charge, while hunters can still afford some "liberties" in their weapon of choice, .while PHs much less.

 

[Dukeisok]

I view sharing handloaded ammunition like sharing another man's underwear. Maybe necessary in a pinch but generally a no go. I make my ammo for my rifle and do so meticulously. I wouldn't trust anyone else to do so.

 

[1dirthawker]

By doing so, and doing it continuously with same actual box of ammo, have you guys ever experienced, that bullet was jammed in chamber, and when extracting the powder was spilled all over the action, and magazine?

NOPE. unlike IvW, i do it once before i pack the ammo for flying out to the bush.

regarding hung up bullets, one, you did not crimp the bullets (i like a crimp on them all) and they were loaded too long.

that should all be verified before hunting with them, but by cycling thru the gun, any round that is long and would do that should be fixed before you ever need to count on it.

i HAVE had cartridges get longer (bullet pulled) and shorter (recoil bashed the bullet deeper in the case) under recoil duress. that is why i crimp every round. also why i full length resize all my ammo, tight tolerances are not optimal for smooth, fast cycling for your rifle.

as an aside, i do all this because of murphy's law. for an example, this last spring a guide shooting a 378 weatherby and a client shooting a 375 h&H BOTH had their rifles fail at the same time on the same bear AFTER it was initially shot! the guides rifle had a failure in the magazine box leaf spring that broke! i can't remember what the clients failure was, but it rendered his rifle a single shot as well. this after shooting a 9" plus brown bear at 45 yards. things were interesting for a bit.

i'm not saying my way is the best way, it just makes me feel better knowing i did the best i could to keep "issues" to a minimum.

 

[John Wasmuth]

NOPE. unlike IvW, i do it once before i pack the ammo for flying out to the bush.

regarding hung up bullets, one, you did not crimp the bullets (i like a crimp on them all) and they were loaded too long.

that should all be verified before hunting with them, but by cycling thru the gun, any round that is long and would do that should be fixed before you ever need to count on it.

i HAVE had cartridges get longer (bullet pulled) and shorter (recoil bashed the bullet deeper in the case) under recoil duress. that is why i crimp every round. also why i full length resize all my ammo, tight tolerances are not optimal for smooth, fast cycling for your rifle.

as an aside, i do all this because of murphy's law. for an example, this last spring a guide shooting a 378 weatherby and a client shooting a 375 h&H BOTH had their rifles fail at the same time on the same bear AFTER it was initially shot! the guides rifle had a failure in the magazine box leaf spring that broke! i can't remember what the clients failure was, but it rendered his rifle a single shot as well. this after shooting a 9" plus brown bear at 45 yards. things were interesting for a bit.

i'm not saying my way is the best way, it just makes me feel better knowing i did the best i could to keep "issues" to a minimum.

Like you I’m meticulous about doing my own quality control on all my reloaded ammunition. Each and every round is inspected throughout the loading process. Anything that isn’t up to snuff gets recycled or disposed of. If it doesn’t cycle smoothly through the rifle it gets recycled. Everything is measured to match exactly the dimensions of the listed case. It’s easy when done correctly.

 

[Tanks]

...
But second thought would always be: how many buffalos have been brought down with single bullet? ...

Every one I have shot, last one being this past August. Double lung shot combined with a large caliber soft seems to work real well. I was tempted to fire the other barrel at the one this past August but held off at the last second as it was passing in front of others (80 yards out by that time) and I didn't want to possibly spend another $6.5K trophy fee.

 

[Witold Krzyżanowski]

Mauser M98.

 

[Paul G]

Heym

 

[geoff rath]

Lever action rifle (not a bolt action rifle, but repeater for sure), and single shot (in most cases not a bolt action).
The percentage of DG hunters using these platform is rather smalls. Possible reasons:

The lever action rifle, will have disandvatage of not having standard DG calibers.
Or, if having a DG caliber, most probably those will be custom rifles.
So, in general, the small percentage of hunters using lever action, will have very limited options.
The calibers that comes first to mind are 45-70 govt, 45-90, and maybe 405 winchester. everything else is, custom gun, i guess, this makes the small market, thus lesser popularity of lever actions for DG hunting. There are few reports on this forum of buffalo hunted with lever action. I dont recall elephant hunt report with lever actions.

Single shots.
Mostly, that would be ruger r1. No lack of good DG calibers here. For this reason, significant number of hunters choose r1 for Dg hunt (but still in far less numbers then bolt action DG hunters)
This is very special rifle that has apeal.
But second thought would always be: how many buffalos have been brought down with single bullet? How fast it can be reloaded? As a back up, there will be at least PHs rifle. Shall I rely on my PH rifle and his follow up action? I am sure, some people can reload fast. Will hope for luck or back up by PH
Popularity. in my wider group on hunting acquaintances, i know exactly, only one that has r1, and wants to hunt buffalo with it.
So, numbers will be always small in single shot DG hunters community, and in the same time tolerated by PH (as Ph will always have something more serious for stopping the charge, while hunters can still afford some "liberties" in their weapon of choice, .while PHs much less.

I'm a No 1 enthusiast, with only one D.G hunt to my name, used a CRF rifle. If the opportunity arose again, it would be with a similar rifle, in a 40 caliber, and a lot of practice. Common sense?

 

[Hunting Hitman]

I never liked the quality of the big name ammunition companies and so eventually just bought a company for myself. Professional Hand loaded ammunition from the hands of a Master loader is a thing of beauty and reliability.

HH