whats your thoughts??? I've never seen or held one but I understand they are a little heavy which aint a bad thing.

How well does the stock "transmit the recoil without causing pain...and reduce perceived recoil by over half"??? The reason I ask is I'm planning a tuskless elephant hunt for 2007 and in preparing for that hunt I've just read "Ndlovu - The Art of Hunting the African Elephant" and Will's book "Hunting Africa's Dangerous Game". (BTW Will I enjoyed your book very much) But after reading both, with a tuskless hunt on the menu, I came away with the feeling that my 375H&H wouldn't be the caliber of choice by either author. So I'm thinking a 404jeffery or 416remington might be more in order. The only problem is I'm somewhat recoil shy, ok so I'm more that a little recoil shy and at this point I'm having to learn how to manage the 375, there, I said it. My plan is to work with the 375 all summer, shooting several hunderd rounds, with the hopes of moving up to "enough gun" by next spring and thats why I've been looking into the A-Square. Its reported ability to manage recoil and its available in a couple of calibers I like, the 404jeffery and 416remington, at a resonable price.

I've never liked them much. The stocks are like a club and are ugly as hell and if I recall correctly they are built off of Enfield actions which cock on close which is a little different.

If it were me and I was worried about recoil I would probably buy a CZ or a Ruger 77 416 Rigby or a Win M70 in 416 Rem and have a good gunsmith like Mark Penrod bed it and install a mercury recoil reducer.

well.,...
in my opinion
1: the are way over priced
2: the stocks are CLUBS
3: they are ugly
4: there are better guns for less money

the ruger RSM in 458 lott requies very little effort to be perfect. if you want one perfect, it needs
bedding, wrist pin, crossbolts

perhaps feeding work on flatpoints (though the new ones appear to have been corrected)

3/16" tigged and shaped on the end of the safety

LOP adjusted with a GOOD pad, I suggest limbsaver grind to fit.

you are looking at like 1500 for the gun, and less than 500 for smithing.. way less in most places.

jeffe

Mark,

If you stuck a barrel out of the end of one of the planks pictured above, you would be very close to what a A-Square rifle looks like.

I've seen and played around with a few (but have not shot one), and IMO, calling their stocks "clubs" is an understatement!

quote:

Originally posted by jeffeosso:
well.,...
in my opinion
1: the are way over priced
2: the stocks are CLUBS
3: they are ugly
4: there are better guns for less money


jeffe

Yup...I never could see them at all.....and ErikD hits it well also.

In my opinion if you are going with a bolt action i would look at the weatherby mark V deluxe in 416 weatherby or a double rifle in 470ne or 500ne

Coil-chunk.
------------------------------------------------
"Serious rifles have two barrels, everything else just burns gunpowder."

Just come to Mississippi and borrow my 600ok. You will probably be the first person to take an elephant with the caliber!

quote:

Originally posted by Mississippian:
Just come to Mississippi and borrow my 600ok. You will probably be the first person to take an elephant with the caliber!

Ah, NO! Thanks but I'll pass.

Interesting comments so far. Based on looks, stay away from them. Based on picking one up, stay away from them.
No-one so far has said anything about ever shooting one. I think the original question refered to how the stocks functioned. I have owned and shot a rifle bedded in one of A-Square stocks (yes it is an Enfield action) for years. The load uses 119 grains of H-870 in a .338 caliber, and i love to shoot the rifle.
The stock isn't pretty, they are big and have a feel all their own, but IMO the stock does exactly what it was designed to do. Because of the size, and they way the stocks are designed, a heavy recoil rifle becomes a pleasure to shoot. I have shot thirty full-house rounds in a setting without any ill effects. If you are looking for a functional stock in a heavy recoil rifle, as opposed to purdy, then go with the A-Square style.

Thanks for the thoughts and advise guys!

This morning I got up at 6:30am. I pulled out of the diveway at 7 on a bicycle, rode 4.5 miles in 25 minutes, came back loaded up the car, drove 25 minutes and by 8:00 I was at the rifle range. Who says hunting isn't an obsession! I'm getting ready for a Canadian caribou hunt in Sept. so I took 3 rifles this morning. My Remington CDL in 35whelen, pushing a 225gr TSX at 2600fps, the Whitworth 375H&H loaded with some 270gr Hornadys at about 2600fps and a 8.25 pound stainless Winchester 300wsm shooting 180gr TSX's at 2925fps. I shot all three about 16 times each using various field rest, prone, sitting, short and tall shooting sticks and offhand, from 25 yards to 100yards. I did learn a couple of things, one is the trigger is too heavy on the Whitworth and secondly it don't kick near as bad as shooting that 8.25 pound 300wsm prone! While I can do it, rather well I might add, putting 6 shoots into a 1" or so group, shooting the 300 off a bipod aint fun! But it sure did make shooting the big 375 a lot better. In fact, after the 300, shooting the 375 offhand at 50 yards wasn't bad at all. So maybe there is hope yet!

Since we are on the A-Square subject.
A friend of mine is thinking about having a .460 A-Square built. He has had a very difficult time contacting the company and when he finaly did the owner seemed shadly by their converstion. A gun smith in Flagstaff said that A-Square is having some issues. Do any of you have any experiance with this company?

A2 is now owned byu james(?) smith, and art is not even an employee ...

hard kicking rifles don't have to be ugly



or you can go to my website and see some better pics of the AR rounds and 550 express

That is interesting I believe he said that he spoke to Art. Art told him to send a $800.00 personal check and he would start making a rifle for him. Should my friend pursue this rifle based on what you know? I personaly do not care for the A-Square rifles only from what I have seen. They look bulk and clumsy. But I have no experiance shooting one.

In the last few months, the company has reverted back to Art Alphin. Jim Smith is out. I am sure that he talked to Art. But I don't know how well the company is doing. Your friend may have to wait a long time to get his rifle.

quote:

Originally posted by 458Lottfan:
That is interesting I believe he said that he spoke to Art. Art told him to send a $800.00 personal check and he would start making a rifle for him. Should my friend pursue this rifle based on what you know? I personaly do not care for the A-Square rifles only from what I have seen. They look bulk and clumsy. But I have no experiance shooting one.

Trust Art Alpin at your peril. He was removed from SCI for taking deposits and never producing any product.

Alpin invented a new stock concept that helps improve felt recoil. He made his stocks bigger, heavier and wider.

Any 338 that weighs 14 lbs will feel pleasant to shoot. If you can pick it up.

I am not recoil shy, but I am smart enough to know that it shakes my already loose brain like it's in a mason jar.

I would recommend one of two things, and both of them are cheaper than going through A-Square.

1. Try a thumbhole, yep they are different looking, some folks think they are ugly, but shoot one and see how you feel about it. It not only spreads the recoil to 2 places, but it gives you the best grip of any type of stock.

Harry Lawson's are really nice, but the Boyd thumbhole works well enough. I had it on a 338 Winchester I took to Alaska. It was a pussycat to shoot with a De-cel pad.

2. You don't have to go to A-Square to buy a A-Square stock. MPI synthetic stocks in Oregon, is the maker of the A-Square fiberglass rifle stocks. They will sell you one for $500-650 installed, painted, bedded, and ready to rock. The downside is that the Coil-Check was only designed to be used with 2 actions, the M700 and the P14 Enfield. His stocks do work, I shot a P14 custom in 416 Rigby, it wasn't bad at all.

3. THIS ONE IS THE MOST IMPORTANT A mercury recoil reducer in a 416 Remington will slow things down enough to make it a usable firearm. Always use a kick-eeze or de-cel pad on every big gun. And Magnaport will chill things out enough that it's worth the $150.

3.

I remember looking at one of the first ones at the SHOT show years ago. It was in a walnut stock and I remember thinking that I had done better inletting work when I did my first Fajen at the age of fourteen.

www.njfg.com has a 416 Rem Mag on hand and a 416 Rigby on hand as well.

New Jersey Firearms Guild posted them on www.gunsamerica.com go there and search A-Square.

quote:

Originally posted by jeffeosso:


hard kicking rifles don't have to be ugly

They would have looked even better by far with the bolts closed. Club rules? well to be fair the double should be broken and the Marlin open also. I thought there for a minute someone had cleaned out my gun safe.

Well, that's bad news. I had hoped that, with Alpin gone, A-Square might become a player in the big bore rifle market. When Smith took control, he retained Alpin as a consultant, which I thought was a terrible mistake. If Alpin is in control of A-Square again, stay away. You don't want to do business with that guy.
------------------------------------------------
"Serious rifles have two barrels, everything else just burns gunpowder."

Did Art have trouble with the ATF and basically can't get an ffl? That might be just a vicous rumor, but i remember hearing that somewhere.

JAL,
and there should be an empty case, stuck sideways into the loading port on the 458 socom, just show them ALL cleared... though you are the first one to notice that all of the bolt guns are cleared.

we tried with the double opened, and it just didn't make theh photo's composure... so, you have to assume the marlin and the double are loaded

The 500A2 I have shot had a nice piece of American walnut with good bit of feathering pattern on both sides of stock. For couple weeks following this shooting event I flinched every time I popped open a bottle of Corsendonk.

Jeffe:

Yeah ATF raided both the business and his home. I seem to recall that he was charged but eventually beat it.
------------------------------------------------
"Serious rifles have two barrels, everything else just burns gunpowder."

I shot eleven rounds of the 577 T-Rex chambering in an A-square one afternoon(standing). The owner foolishly offered me all of the 577 I wanted to shoot...FREE!!! At eleven rounds he rescinded the offer. I am a fool that way. It had a mercury recoil reducer in the buttstock, and was fitted with a Vais muzzlebrake, weighed thirteen pounds...empty. The butttock end is tremendous in size, a reason it kicks less, and enfields are homely, no doubt. But, they are readily converted to cock on closing, and the Model 30 or 34 Remington commercial models are rather nice looking. They also endure pressures that take model 70's apart, read Ackleys books.

They are an NFL linebacker compared to a Whitworth 375-458's ballerina. They do work very well, although vastly overpriced. Buy an MRC PH model this fall, and go happy.

Rich