I must have missed that - I'll have to pay more attention.

Most folks seem to have a real tough time getting 458's to work with cast bullets, especially the lighter weight bullets.

Can you elaborate on how you get rifles with long throats to shoot well with cast?

Gotta tell you, I really don't like heavy barrel mannlichers. To me, the point was always to protect an incredibly light barrel profile. The last one I did, I tried to copy the general look of an old original that had been adapted by someone to a KAR98 actiom. I had to remove over 2 pounds of wood (by actual scale) and still didn't get to where I wanted to, but I was afraid to go any farther. To me, that's the look, not a heavy barrel. The problem is that the 458 bore by itself is almost the size at the muzzle as a really nice trim mannlicher. There is no place for the actual metal to go. In the 45's, I always prefered the shotgun look. I have a custom stocked Ruger 458 from the 70's, which I did in Dark red french walnut, made everything oversized and it looks a whole lot like a shotgun. However, its weight is ideal to carry in the brush, and it is maybe the best handling big bore I own for quick shooting. If you are going composite, I think Ruger got the concept pretty close with the Alaskan. Cut the barrel to 20" and trim it down to about 8-1/2pounds if you are only going to shoot 350's. Keep the barrel relatively large at the muzzle and take the weight out of the back half of the barrel. A longer shank, quick taper and relatively slow taper to the muzzle diam will do it, keep the weight down, but make it point better and give less muzzle jump.

Art - At the moment there is no intent of having a really heavy barrel. The whole gun, without scope is supposed to weigh between 8.5 and 9 pounds. Springfield actions aren't exactly light, especially with their original bottom metal.

A full-length stock is no featherweight either, with a metal forend tip assembly and a barrel-band type front sight.

At the same time, it IS a .458 Mag, so it will be important to me to have it weigh enough not to jar my dental crowns loose if I go big bear hunting with it and want to use heavier bullets.

As with all rifles, it is a compromise between weight, size, power, weather-proofing, and so on.

It is not going to be a full length conventional rifle because I have way more of those than I need, in all sizes of bores and weights.

I guess what it is, it is, and I just hope I am happy with it, let alone anyone else.

When I speak of a light mannlicher, I actually mean light looking. To me, the trim, wand like look is what makes a mannlicher beautiful, even though they tend weigh a little more than normal. With a 45 caliber bore, enough metal around the bore to make the barrel pressure worthy, and enough wood to surround the barrel, you are way past trim, IMHO.

Well, to each his own. I don't expect any .458 Mag to look particularly petite, nor particularly desire that visual effect either.

I expect I will be quite satisfied with what I end up with. If not, c'est la vie....it'll just give me an excuse to build something else.

Everyone else will have to create rifles THEY will be happy with and which suit their own tastes. I won't tell them I think their guns are ugly, even if......

I have received my composite mannlicher stocked .458 rifle back from MPI.

I am throughly disappointed and will not recommend sending any work to them in the future.

I spent numerous days exchanging emailed specs with MPI before I sent them the gun. They assured me they could do everything I wanted...in fact, when I asked them for barrel profile specs to fit their mannlicher stock and muzzlecap, they suggested that it would be cheaper and easier if I just let them do all the metal work.


What I asked for was to have:

The barrel shortened and profiled to a 20" straight taper to the muzzle

A matte finished OD mannlicher stock, with matte black leaves on that background to create a camo finish like the ones on my other two MPI stocks, The butt was to have either a limb-saver or a Kick-ease brown pad, from whichever company brown was available from,

An adjustable ghost-ring rear sight, and NECG classic front base with the orange tube insert sight.

I did not want sling swivel studs...especially not one right in the middle of where your hand goes on the forend, which is where there now is one,

Total gun weight without sights was to be a bare minimum of 8-1/2 pounds.

What I got I would be embarrassed to show anyone, even if I did have a digital camera now (my old one walked away during our move here).

My mannlicher .458 now has a stock which appears smaller and lighter than the one MPI put on my .243 Model 600 Remington carbine. The pad is a black Pachmayer Decelerator. The stock is painted a sort of glossy bottle green, with big glossy black leaves airbrushed on top of that

Total rifle weight is WAY under 8-1/2 pounds. I haven't weighed it yet but my guestimate at this point is below 7 pounds....just a HUGE tad lighter than I would ever want to shoot with any .458 magnum factory load.


Originally, MPI said they would do the barrel taper work, make the stock, obtain and fit the sights, etc., and that turn-around for having the whole gun back to me would be about 60 days.

They received the gun in early February, I finally got it back yesterday.

I also received a call from a "gunsmith" half the continent away from MPI about the end of June, beginning of July, wanting to know what kind of metal work I wanted done on the gun.

Apparently MPI had sent the rifle to him without any copy of the specs I had sent to them. They ended up doing NONE of the metal work, and their "farm-out gunsmith of choice" didn't do what I asked for (I sent him copies of the emails of specs I had agreed to with MPI)
To cap it all off, they put two padlocks on my Kalispell shipping case when they sent it back to me, but locked the keys inside with the rifle. I found the rifle sitting on my front porch. UPS didn't wait for me to come to the door, or require any signature for the rifle, just left it on my front doorstep in plain view of God and everybody. That suggests to me that the package was not insured, but I don't know that.

AND THEN

When I got the gun back yesterday, I sent MPI an e-mail as to how disappointed I am. Their response this morning was that the colour was what I had requested and that they were disappointed that I don't appreciate all the work they did on it. Luckily I had kept copies of all my e-mail messages to and from them, so was able to send them an exact copy which shows that the finish they provided is not the one I ordered.

They also said in this morning's e-mail that they only make one size of mannlicher stock, which is why I got such a small one on my .458 magnum. Of course they never mentioned that in our original e-mails back and forth...they just assured me they could do everything I wanted. Turns out IMO that is not true. They don't make a mannlicher stock suitable for ANY magnum IMHO, and they don't do ANY metal work.

So, now I am going to have to take it to one of the better local gunsmiths and ask him to please correct this disaster for me, including building up and refinishing the stock, putting on the sights, etc.

I won't suggest that you guys not use MPI for stocks or other work. But I will not recommend them, either.

You can make up your own minds.

Well, I'd be pretty peaved that they offered no form of reconcilliation for their coming up short on their (documented) promises. Have you no legal recourses on this? I'm sure that work cost you a good bit of money. I'd hate to fathom the thought of a sub-7lb .458WM.

AC

Sorry it did not turn out exactly the way you wanted it.

However, before you send it off, I recommend the following.

Load up some of those 350 Hornady RN bullets over 60, 65, 68, and 70 grains of IMR 3031.
[Or any suitable powder that gives similar velocities.]

Shoot it with these type loads first. After all if it is not going to Africa there is really no reason to ever need to shoot full power 458 loads.

You just might find this Light Weight 458 a joy to carry and hunt with.

It might not be fun to shoot off the bench, but there are "few" benches in the field.

quote:

Originally posted by N E 450 No2:
AC

Sorry it did not turn out exactly the way you wanted it.

However, before you send it off, I recommend the following.

Load up some of those 350 Hornady RN bullets over 60, 65, 68, and 70 grains of IMR 3031.
[Or any suitable powder that gives similar velocities.]

Shoot it with these type loads first. After all if it is not going to Africa there is really no reason to ever need to shoot full power 458 loads.

You just might find this Light Weight 458 a joy to carry and hunt with.

It might not be fun to shoot off the bench, but there are "few" benches in the field.

450 No2 - I know you are right in everything you say in your post quoted here.

The first thing I am going to do is just put it back in my vault for an extended period until the sour taste in my mouth goes away.

Then I'll probably try it out. If I like what it is then, I'll have Robbie Barkmann put a matt finish with a blu-ish coating of nickle on it (I think he calls that "Roguard" or something of the sort?)

Thanks for the advice. After a few months I probably won't be so irritated with it, I suspect.

quote:

Originally posted by FFemt5287:
Well, I'd be pretty peaved that they offered no form of reconcilliation for their coming up short on their (documented) promises. Have you no legal recourses on this? I'm sure that work cost you a good bit of money. I'd hate to fathom the thought of a sub-7lb .458WM.

They have offered to re-do the existing stock to make it a bit bigger, and they have offered to add some weights to it. They have also offered to redo the paint in a flat finish rather than semi-gloss.


But I have been told by a gunsmith who knows them well that the fellow who handled/built my stock is not a shooter, but is a surfer and gymnast. He told me some other stuff too, but I will not publish that here. Anyway, I will not be returning it for rework which would be overseen by the fellow who led their first effort.

I can see where that could lead to the stock going back and forth until we both were so angry as to just make a bad situation intolerable. I am too old to waste my time dong that. What was done cost me some money ($1,270), but not enough to impair my life.

So, I will just move on. Any future stocks of mine will be made locally...I mean McMillans is only a few miles away from my house, in Phoenix.

AC

Have you actually weighed the rifle yet?

If it is well balanced it just might feel a lot lighter than it is.

quote:

Load up some of those 350 Hornady RN bullets over 60, 65, 68, and 70 grains of IMR 3031.
[Or any suitable powder that gives similar velocities.]

Shoot it with these type loads first. After all if it is not going to Africa there is really no reason to ever need to shoot full power 458 loads.

You just might find this Light Weight 458 a joy to carry and hunt with.

This is really good advice. Hornady 350s in my about 8lb Browning Safari with the right length of pull are really fun to shoot. They get your attention but in a good way. And they surely kill anything I'd possibly expect to shoot in the next 10 years---Africa and Alaska both are unlikely in that timeframe. If that changes, I'll think something up.

LWD

quote:

Originally posted by LWD:

quote:

Load up some of those 350 Hornady RN bullets over 60, 65, 68, and 70 grains of IMR 3031.
[Or any suitable powder that gives similar velocities.]

Shoot it with these type loads first. After all if it is not going to Africa there is really no reason to ever need to shoot full power 458 loads.

You just might find this Light Weight 458 a joy to carry and hunt with.

This is really good advice. Hornady 350s in my about 8lb Browning Safari with the right length of pull are really fun to shoot. They get your attention but in a good way. And they surely kill anything I'd possibly expect to shoot in the next 10 years---Africa and Alaska both are unlikely in that timeframe. If that changes, I'll think something up.

LWD

As I mentioned back in February when we all discussed building this rifle, I wanted it as a .45-70 level bolt gun which could also occasionally be used to fire a few full loads.

I have long used 59 grains of IMR 4895, VV N-135, or TU 5000, with both 300 & 350 grain jacketed bullets from my .45-70s, so that charge and those bullets should be a good beginning load point in this cartridge case as well.

A little more info on the rifle, I finally found my scale and weighed it just a few minutes ago. My guess of just about 7 pounds was not off by much...it weighs exactly 7 pounds and 0.5 of one ounce....in other words, 7 & 1/32 pounds.

To me, that is too light for a gun intended to fire ANY .458 Mag full factory charges with 500 or 510 grain bullets in an emergency.

7 Lbs, 0.5 Oz.

I'm bitching because my 458 Win mag is 8 Lbs, 9 Oz. which is too light for me.

quote:

7 Lbs, 0.5 Oz.

Wow. That hurts to think about. Mine goes about 8 and I can't imagine less than that.

LWD

Yes, and I think it will hurt even worse than the lack of weight would suggest.

They made the butt plate area very small, in accord with the weight.... appreciably smaller than the buttplate area of the stock they built for my .243 Model 600 about 25 years ago.

Obviously there is some rebuilding and adding of weight to have done locally rather than up in Portland, Oregon where this stock was made. I want to be able to check things out in person here before I have it repainted.

Now I'm almost afraid to take the stock off to check to see if a barrel lug was added...I doubt it very much at this point. But I guess I'd better do that pretty soon. In this featherweight stock it will certainly need one I'd guess.

After 23 years of waiting, I would go with a Mannlicher-style stocked carbine.

Kinda silly to wait that long for just another .458.