Choosing a rifle

Choosing the right rifle isn´t easy. There is no-one that can tell you which one is the right one for you, and maybe there can not be only one. Though for me there is only one. One man. One rifle. You have to find out yourself what suits you best. Each rifle is made with a specific thought in mind. It has a purpose. Beside of shooting straight, which most modern rifles do.

Rifle categories

In general you can divide rifles into categories depending on which purpose they have. Is it light, weather-resistant but with high caliber, that would be called a typical mountain rifle. A rifle to carry for long distances and to meet nature elements. High enough caliber to take down redstags or Sikas in the hills of Ireland or Chamois in the Alps. I will here go through my thoughts on choosing the right rifle for me.

I devide rifles into these categories:

Mountain rifle
Forrest rifle
Target / field rifle
Driven hunt rifle
African rifle
Small game rifle

Choosing the right caliber.

The right caliber doesn´t exist. But the right caliber for you and your type of hunting does exist. Choosing a caliber is a little like choosing the right religion. There is nothing wrong with other religions and they all have similar purpose. I have tryed out many different calibers and have a special love for the .30 calibers.

The reason is simple, there is a big variety in factory bullets and you can buy ammo all over the world. I have used 30.06 for many many years and it has been the right caliber for me. Its a good all around caliber. Its simply does what it should. But as the years go by I have learned more, and my favorite .30 caliber today is .308 Win. It doesn´t kick as hard, which makes second shot easier to take, if needed. Its shorter which makes reloading quicker. Its can be silenced better with a moderator. Because of its popularity its possible to get many loads and many different weight bullets to it. My main game is roedeer and wildboar. I get occasional fallow deer, red deer and get invited to moose hunting as well. The .308 Win does perform very well on these species and on the distances I shoot at. The bigger game is typically within 100 meters. But a .270win, 6.5x55SE, 6.5 creedmore, 7mm Rem, 7×64, 8x57IS, 9,3×62 all do the same. They all kill effectivly these species and within the distance I shoot at. But all of them have a reason of existance and perform differently. As I mentioned before my favorite is the .30 calibers and I have moved away from using my beloved 30.06 into using .308 Win but when do I want to use .300 Win Mag? When I know Im going for a stronger animal or shooting on longer distances like 250-400meters. Then I would like to use .300 Win Mag. When I was in Namibia hunting plains game, I didn´t get a shoot through the animal with my 30.06 12gr Lapua Mega. Which made me whish for a .300 Win Mag for the strong African game. If I go for european bear one day, my choice will be .300 Win Mag. It has just that little extra power behind the bullet and you just get that extra meters with it. The right choice of caliber for you is truly something you learn with time. I never shoot through branches or trees, but I know that the 9,3×62 can handle that kind of task better than my .308 Win. Therefor its not just the stats for each caliber its also how you hunt to consider and there are as many ways of hunting as there are hunters. My succestion for new hunters is to get the cheapest, most attainable caliber within your area and rather small than to big. You learn alot the first 4-5 years of shooting and there is no reason for your body to becomme afraid of the kick.

The rifle barrel

There are couple of different barrels on the market. Typically dividet into hunting or match barrels. The match barrels are typically heavier and longer. Giving a more stable consistant shots on the target field. They are made for keeping every bullet within 1 moa even on longer distances. The thickness is typically 19mm or more.

Hunting barrels on the other hand are typically shorter and lighter. In calibers like the .308 Win, long length isn´t as important as some of the other calibers for accuracy. Therefor you can get at very good group of shots with a short barrel like 51cm. The rule of thumbs is the longer barrel, the higher the speed of the bullet, the better collected groups with the the right ammo for that barrel. Each barrel can have its “favorite” round of ammo and its important to test different types to find the best one for your barrel.

Now these where the rule of thumbs for barrels. But in modern hunting most of us are using sound moderator. What sound moderators do is to lengthen the barrel. So in real when buying a new gun you have to think of if you are legally allowed to use moderators on your hunting grounds and how it will affect your barrel. Typically moderators ad around 10-15cm to the barrel giving the bullet extra speed.

The rifle trigger

For great accuracy the trigger is very important. When we speak of great accuracy we speak of sub moa on 300m. For a hunting rifle this kind of accuracy is not needed. The trigger should be crisp and feel like you are breaking a peace of thin glass. There are mainly two types of triggers a match trigger with two levels of weight. One light one and one heavier. That is when you pull the trigger you will sense two weights. First the light one, then the last part of the pull, the heavier one. Then there is a straight pull trigger, which is more common. Typically a straight pull trigger weight lays between 750-1250 gr. On more advanced modern riffles like the Sauer 404 you can change the weight of the trigger with a simple turn of a screw. Understanding the trigger, and getting muscle memory, dry training is a very good and simple cheap way of getting good control of your gun.

Most hunters don´t need to shoot more accurate than the size of the heart of the animal they hunt. A heart on a grown fox is more than 2,5 moa on 100m. A rifle with sub moa on 100m is more accurate than needed for a normal hunting rifle as most animals in Europe are shoot at shorter range than 100m.

The rifle stock

Mainly the stock is divided into the material they are made of. Wooden or synthetic stocks. Then there are grades of wood. The higher grade the more expensive or rare the wood is. Synthetic stock are made of many different materials like carbon or plastic mixed with rubber like material. The material choosen is always chock absorbing material wich gives the best shooting experince. Wooden stocks need to get more care than synthetic ones.

The rifle scope mount

Modern hunting rifles are all mounted with a scope of a kind. The mount should always be of a quality matching the caliber. Higher caliber means stronger mount. I only use quality steel mounts on my rifles given a bad experience with aluminium. Most rifle manufactures have their own mounting system. Modern hunters often do many different ways of hunting with the same rifle. This creates the demand of being able to change scopes. Many have one scope for driven hunt, or short distances, one for longer distances and then many have night vision scopes. This makes the choice of mounting system even more demanding for high quality. To be able to change scope there are systems that promise sub moa when interchanging betwean. EAW swing montage is one of them, but they are build for mounting on two attaching points. These points are hard to get with some night vision devices and or Aimpoints since they are far apart. There is a standard system called Picatinny. Which almost every rifle and at least every modern rifle can get a rail attached. This is an old military standard and was actually not made for attaching and detaching devices without sighting in. It was made for attaching and detaching with a standard for many different type of items, but at least one mission at a time. Therefor if your hunting is made with different types of rifle scopes you should always take a control shot after attaching and detaching. Now this is the rule of thumb. But my experience is that with good scope ringes from Leupold or Innomount there is not that much of a difference in the sighting in. Somewhere betwean 1-3 cm on 100m and mainly on horizontal, not vertical level. For hunting purposes for something that has a heart bigger than 2.5 moa on 100m that is effecient.

My rifle choice

My rifle of choice is Mauser M12 impact in .308 Win, with its flutet 51cm barrel. Flutet for the lighter weight and quicker cooling and 51 cm because its a good length for carrying around without loosing accuracy. About 950 gr straight pool good trigger. Secure and good 3 position safety. Its possible to unload 100% safe. Very strong good bolt action. The Mauser M12 Impact has a great synthetic stock with kind of rubber coating wich makes it very good in wet and cold weather. I do hunt for many days in a row without any real shelter from nature elements therefor my equipment needs to be able to be tough enough.