I am in the market for a 338WM. I'd like to get a SS/Syn. My problem is that I have over-researched the various brands to the point of being completely gun-shy (pun intended). In reading the company websites and these forums, I have come up with the following reasons NOT to purchase a particular brand:
Winchester 70: Poor quality control
Remington 700 BDL: Poor quality control, rough barrels, excessive copper fouling, that damn safetylock but usually a nice factory trigger.
Browning A-Bolt: A bolt that is overly complicated and subject to malfunction in freezing weather.
Ruger 77: Poor barrels, lousy trigger
This has all become very disconcerting and confusing for me. I've got money burning a hole in my pocket yet I'm like a deer caught in the headlights. I don't know if what I'm asking is fair or not but here goes anyway. If you were buying a new 338 today which of the above brands would give the best Bang For Your Buck?

I think that if I were shopping for a 338WM, I would be looking at the used market. 338WM is a pretty popular round. A good used 338WM shouldn't be too hard to find.
Like others here I am not too thrilled with the new rifles that are coming out.

ZM

CHECK OUT CZ AMERICAN. HAS ALOT OF FEATURES AS
YOU STATED YOU LIKED. ALOT OF PEOPLE ARE VERY HIGH
ON THEM..GOOD LUCK

Just looking through a CZ catalog, they don't offer a .338winnie but do offer a 9.3x62 as the closest thing to it.

Over the years I have probably owned a couple dozen Mod 700s and literaly shot thousands of rounds through them. I've never had the slightest malfunction with any of them. Take a look how few parts one has. Less parts=less hassle.

I don't know were you got the bit about the 700 barrels. I presently have a factory '06 that shoots consistent .75 in. with full power hunting loads and my last 270 was a 700 and it would print
.50 in. all day. A simple cleaning ever 20 rounds or so kept them pristine.

I of course would recommend that you carefully work up handloads after you have the gun bedded and the trigger adjusted like you should with any factory rifle.

Speaking of 338s. I worked up loads for 3 factory 700s that belonged to friends. They all shot well with the 250 NP and IMR 4350. H 4831 also gave good accuracy and a little more velocity.

I can feel the Mod 70 and Ruger fans getting ready to jump but this is only my opinion.

In my experience the the Mod 700 needs less work in general before it becomes a real shooter than the other 2.

If you don't even consider other factors the Rem. trigger should sell the rifle. You can adjust it yourself the first try with a little patience. I can send you the inst. that Bob Milek wrote up in a magazine once. The Mod 70 trigger is simplicity personified but unless you know what to do with a stone you better leave that one to a gunsmith. Ditto on the Ruger trigger. I think your only choice is to replace that one.

Now after I have said all the above let me say that if I bought a new 700 I would get a after market magazine follower from Brownell's. That peice of junk that they use in the current 700s has been known to jump out of the magazine box after the last round is fired. This effectively blocks reloading until this is cleared. Not good when your brown bear is disappearing into the alders.

Let me say in closing that I have and have had Mod 70 type rifles that I love and I have some mausers that I will never sell but if I could only pick one rifle it would be a Mod 700 and I'm sure it would be in 338.

Now I'm wating for the controlled round feeding guys to draw and quarter me.

Good shopping!!

Mark,
Thanks for your in-depth reply. The stuff I heard about the 700 barrels was found here in this forum under the heading "Have you noticed the price fall of 700's?" To tell the truth this was the first I heard about it. I currently own a 700 BDL in 270 that I am very happy with. I bought it however in the late 80's and from what I gathered reading this thread, the QC at Remington has changed; apparently for the worse. Yet I have also read that about Winchester SS/Syn too. Ruger has it's following and seems to be a fine rifle for the bucks, yet I keep hearing about their trigger. I went out today and looked at all four (Rem, Win, Browning, and Ruger). All were beautiful and that just further exacerbated me. I have limited funds so I want to make the right purchase.
I know my initial question is not only unfair but unanswerable as well. I guess I just want to stimulate some conversation and get some insight of each manufacturer's strong points and weaknesses. Maybe I'm just putting too much into this Mark, but thanks again for sharing your knowledge.

JohnK007,

I think there at two basic approaches to buying a rifle and obviously some shades of grey between these two.

Firstly, is the person who will buy the rifle and intends to use it as it comes from the box, with perhaps trigger pull being reduced.

For this person, I think you simply pick the rifle you like. Accuracy will be luck of the draw but will adeqaute in any case.

The second person and I fall into this category, examines the rifle from the point of view of what you can do with it and how easy is it to do.

For me, my first choice is M70 and second choice is Rem 700. I out Sako, Browning, Ruger and other in the "don't want" department.

Reasons. The Ruger is restrictive on scope mounts and its bedding configuration is not as good as the M70 or Rem 700. Also, M70 and Rem 700 allow me if I want, to go all the way to the Jewell trigger. Sako is also restrictive on scope mounts and tapered dovetails can often have problems. The Sakos bedding configuration is not good, when compared to Rem or M70.

In most cases I would prefer M70 to Rem 700 because the M70's integral recoil lug is a much better setup for a switch barrel gun.

If look at guns that are made up and cost lost of money, whether they be real accuracy based guns or high grade custom hunting style guns you will 99.9% of the are based on either M70, Rem 700 or Mauser 98 actions and for good reason.

Finally, I suspect that on the average, out of the box performance with both M70 and Rem 700 is below other guns. I think this is a bit like Ford and General Motors in that all four companies know they can get away with a lot.

Mike

I understand you concern. The barrels of the new remingtons, rugers, and winchester are horrible. I always put rifle buying in the catorgory, of sometimes you get a lemon, and sometimes a winner. You can build a custom rifle with a older used 700 action, and high quality barrel from krieger, hart or Dan Lilja, for less than 700 dollars if you go lowball on the stock using the same junky stock that comes with the new guns. But the skys the limit. And then when people start building custom guns, they go an extra step and get a mcmillian stock, then they convince themselves to pillar, then glass bed. Then they say to themselfs, well, while we are at it, lets replace that trigger. And then while at the gun smiths, lets square the action. Before its over, you in for 1300 dollars. Oh, I am talking about myself. So if you have more willpower than me, you can get a good hunting rifle, for 700 dollars.

I'd support the contention that the current factory rifles are all a crap shoot. You can get a good one or a bad one from anywhere. If you are looking at the rifle with the best potential, I'd say it's the Remington.

You mention that you want a ss/syn, that's a good choice except that all the "synthetic" stocks on the lower priced rifles are really just un-reinforced injection molded plastic. No glass or kevlar anywhere in sight, therefore those stocks are not very rigid and are somewhat harder to bed and tune.

The solution IMO is a ss/laminated stock. The factory laminates are far stiffer than the tupperware, and are quite weather resistant. They DO weigh a little more than a factory "plastic" but not much, and the potential to "tune is far better.

JimF

Gentlemen,
All great replies that are truly appreciated. These were just the kinds of observations I was hoping for. I was hoping for some balanced opinions and have gotten just that!
Mike, I probably fall into your first category. I can handle having the trigger tuned up or replaced but I'm really looking for out of the box performance. Customizing beyond that is simply just over my head. Like Bigcountry points points out, it doesn't take long to have big $$$$ invested.
It's funny you mention the Ruger mounts. I was looking at a Ruger yesterday and remembered reading here on the site someone mentioning the difficulty they had keeping their Ruger mounts tight. Now the rifle I was fondling was a 308 and they're probably fine in standard cailbers, but I was wondering how they stack up to magnum recoil? The Ruger incidentally did impress me as far as it's price and it's safety.
To be honest I'm leaning towards the Remington as I already have a 700 that I like very much. That new bolt lock is not as obtrusive as I thought it would be and I like the trigger. Jim's mention of the laminates is something I hadn't considered and need to investigate further.

JohnK007: I bought a Ruger M77 MK-II in 1994. This rifle was one of those "semi-CRF" ones as follows: The bolt looked like a CRF bolt with a claw (extractor), but it was a push-feed one.

That year Ruger was converting their semi-CRF rifles to CRF for a small fee. I mailed it to them, and two weeks later I received the modified barreled action along a CRF bolt, and also the original semi-CRF bolt. Both bolts work fine, but I only use the CRF one.

This rifle may not be supper accurate, but as a big game hunting rifle it is accurate enough to allow me to take three fast shots within 1-1/2" at 100 yards. If I take my time to aim, I can get three shots to print within 1" (from a clean barrel). I have had several one-shot kill on moose from 100 to 250 yards for the past ten years, so I am happy with it.

You would have to pay a high price for a very reliable rifle nowadays, since most are shipped out of the factory pretty fast. I know of several people who have bought new and used rifles and didn't like how they shot, but were very pleased after replacing the barrels with better ones from Douglas, Pac-Nor, E.R. Shaw and others.

I left my .338's Ruger barrel alone, but a few weeks back I replaced the "boat paddle" stock with a Hogue Rubber-Overmolded one. Also, there is nothing wrong with the Ruger scope mounts (these are free). You can use rings and mounts other than Ruger, such as I have done. I had to use Leupold extension rings on my rifle, because the Leupold Vary-X III 2.5-8x is very short. This scope has been on my .338 since day one, and has not moved.

FWIW,
I bought one of those entry-level, department store rifles that everyone here loves to hate. Just getting back into shooting then and didn't know any better. It is the M700 ADL Synthetic Package gun in 270. Even came with the Trashco World Class 3x9 scope.

After I bought it I went ahead and did a barrel break in. One round, cool the barrel, clean, etc for 50 rounds. Used Sweets twice during break-in to remove the stubborn copper. After that cleaned every 3-5 rounds until 100 rounds. The barrel will copper-foul but only if I run the 3200fps barrel burners through it. If I keep speeds at/or under 3000 fps the copper racing stripes aren't that bad.

The plastic stock is so-so. I keep it on the gun because it fits ok and I thrash the gun around quite a bit. The stock was molded wrong. The stock touched the entire left side of the barrel. The groups were quite interesting until I took some sandpaper and free floated the barrel. Problem solved. Adjusted the trigger down to three pounds from ten pounds.

When I bought the rifle I budgeted money for a new scope. After I worked out the aforementioned bugs, I dropped the rifle and bashed the scope pretty good. I was pleasantly surprised that the lowly Trashco scope held zero. I have yet to replace it.

I don't shoot for groups much any more. That last time I took it to a proper rifle range. I shot a five shot group and covered it up with a quarter. The gentleman next to me took great delight in bashing my "Bi-Mart Special" until I outshot his Remington Sendero and relieved him of $20.

The newer guns will work OK. But they need some TLC, decent handloaded ammo and a trigger job to make them shoot OK. I think I got lucky with this one.

Would I buy another entry-level gun from one of the big companies? Savage maybe, but not from any of the other big companies. Quality in the entry-level guns is just not up to par. I think I would buy a used rifle and rebarrel.

ZM

check out hunt america. classifieds. win 70 stainless in 338 with hs stock and a trigger job!
good luck
woofer

I had put some layaway money down on a new Ruger MK II stainless/synthetic 33WM - new stock not the old Zytel - but everytime I went into make a payment I had trouble liking that stock - hard recoil pad, narrow comb and balance - hollow butt stock. So I find this used MK1 in mint condition with a new - but cheap - Bushnell 3X9 (Ruger Rings) that the dealer stuck on it to help sell it - they kept the layaway and for $350 I went out the door with the "traditional" wood stocked/blued rifle. I put the Bushnell on a 22 I have and put on a new 3X9X40 Leupold. Now this rifle shot well with 210 NP and SC4831 = 3/4" 3 shot groups. I have since glass bedded the action and the forend tip of the stock and put on a 1" Accelerator pad. With RL19 and 210 NP or 180 gr NBT with IMR4350 - three shots make a big ragged hole. Used 338 don't show up often here in Alabama - I had been looking for one for years - but as far as the Ruger goes - no complaints.

The friend I met at the range today had his new .338 Winchester Mag. M-70 Stainless Classic and I looked at it. He really likes it and it shoots well. He adusted the trigger and it has an outstanding let off now.

The rifle functions perfectly. It has a 26" bbl but is very well balanced. I could hold it with one hand and aim it as it is not very heavy.

[ 08-27-2002, 06:05: Message edited by: Don Martin29 ]

Sako has always had a good rep. if you are looking for something other than a US product. If you can hand pick a rifle, look again at the REm. & Win. M70.

Hey'
SAKO,SAKO,SAKO,SAKO.Nough said!
1geejay
www.shooting-hunting.com

I think the Ruger is the best buy in 338's, and it would be my first choice. All factory rifles need trigger jobs, and any competent smith can clean up the Ruger trigger. Ruger put a stiffer trigger return spring in the M77 Mk II's somewhere along the line, and stoning will smooth up the rough surfaces.

As others have mentioned, all of the factory barrels are somewhat of a crapshoot, but I'd bet your odds are much greater of getting a barrel that will put 3 shots under 1 1/2" then over. If you're looking for 1/2" groups, then you should factor in the cost of re-barreling. It just depends on your criteria.

I'd venture to say that the Ruger M77 Mk II ss/syn is one of the most popular hunting rifles in Alaska, they are well designed durable rifles, sufficiently accurate, and moderately priced. It comes with scope rings, and the bases are integral, one less thing to go wrong. When you have the smith tune the trigger, have him lap the rings at the same time. Top it with a good 6X, 2-7 or 3-9 and you're set.

Hey

How about a tikka or a nice used sako? If not get a well made mauser 98. How much dosh have you planed to spend

Cherrio

/ JOHAN

Sometimes you do and sometimes you don't. I have a second generation Model 70 Classic Super Grade in .338 that is one of the most accurate rifles I have ever owned. If you don't like the brands you mentioned try Sako. I think they make a really fine rifle. I think Sako would definitely be better out of the box than any of those you mentioned.

What about a used rifle? The 338 has been around since 1954, so there must be some good ones out there. Your initial investment is far less, and you get a donor action if you want to rebarrel later. I live in Seattle, and right now things are tight. I see lots of cool guns people are forced to sell--guns you never would see if times were good. I've scored a couple of very slick used rifles that way in the last few months.

Seriously, consider a used rifle. Okie John.

John, Tell me when you're ready and I'll call Tony Jablonskis, who'll bring over a pair of CZs and settle the question. Or, just send me your cash.

Go with the Ruger M77 Mark II; just hold it and inspect it before you buy it.

[ 08-30-2002, 06:42: Message edited by: Dogger ]

tikka!!

hey john, i know how you feel, it's like try'n to buy a new 4x4 truck,ford, dodge, chev.etc.every body hate's them and some people love them. I, am looking to buy a new 300 ultra,so i am going to get what nobody talk's about,a savage 116fss, 26 in. barrel,laminated stock.(probably get it to shoot as straight as any of them) Good luck on your deccision, i'm sure you will be happy no matter what you pick. Rick.

All the big gun manufactures let sub par merchandise out the door. High volume and cost makes it happen. Most of the time it does not. Pick one that you like and buy it. If it does not shoot into your requirements rebarrel or sell it.