Hello, gents!

I have not been on this site in quite some time. Never was a regular but posted from time to time. The last couple of years I have been mainly playing with big bore single action revolvers.....475L and 500 JRH. Now the big bore rifle bug has bitten again.

Anyway, I was scanning back several pages and read the thread about at what age most quit shooting their big bores. It made me think, at what age did most of you start with the big bores?

Over the years I have owned a number of big bores. The first one I purchased was a 460 Wby back in 1993 at the age of 21. So, when did you get started?

I was 30 or 31.

George

I was 44 when I bought my .458. I started my .404 project last year and hope to have done by my 47 birthday next year.

I was 17 in 1951 when I bought my first big bore RIFLE I had owned a 44spl Colt New Service for 2 years then. The big bore was a 450/400 double that came with exactly 5 rounds of ammo which I promptly shot up never to find any more. My last big bore, a 458WinMag on a 1903 action built by Atkinson & Marquardt, I bought last year. Quite probably my LAST big bore.

I cilled me a bar with one I borrowed when I was only three. Wrote a song about it.

I was in fact 19, however, before I actually owned one.

12 years old when I bought a Trapdoor Springfield and 16 years old when I had my first .458. Bought a Mauser barreled action from a place called Federal Firearms for $110. A gunshop I worked at donated a commercial mauser stock, the gunsmith donated his labor for inletting, bedding and stock reinforcement, and I used a set of sights off of a Remington 700. Left the barrel in the white, (the action came blued, it was just like a Mk X Interarms action), and my boss handed me a box of Remington 500 gr. solids loaded ammo, and off I went to the local shooting location.
Never been without a .458 since then. That was 1973.

I bought a 416 Rigby when I was 25. It sat in the safe for a long time before I finally took it on an elephant hunt 18 years later.

I was 46 when I bought my 375 H&H and 54 when I bought my 458 Win mag.

You try to find left handed big bores.

I bought my CZ 416 Rigby a couple of months ago & it was 20 years late!

quote:

Originally posted by Fjold:
I was 46 when I bought my 375 H&H and 54 when I bought my 458 Win mag.

You try to find left handed big bores.

Of course, a 375 H&H isn't a big bore!!

I was 19 when I purchased my first big bore rifle. A super grade, push feed, M-70 in 458 Win. Mag. Damn thing never did feed soft points correctly, even after numerous trips to numerous gunsmith shops. Finally sold that rifle just a few years ago. Never hunted with it other than to stop a few chargun rabbits and armadillos!!

45/70 as a kid. That doesn't usually count here. So 34. And haven't looked back

I guess a 300 Weatherby doesn't count. I was 12 and my Mom didn't bat a eye when I told her I wanted one.....what a Mom.

Mid to late 20's started out with a 45/70 then bought my first .375 H&H. Then in my mid 30's I bought my first .458.

M70 push feed 458 Super Grade for myself for a high school graduation present, I was 18. I still have it 22 years later and a few more too.

Matthew

I got my first 375 H&H in 99 or 2000, then bought a 416 Rigby. That would put me at 32 or 33. Currently have a Ruger No 1 Tropical in 405 Winchester and 404 Jeffery.

Ruger #1 458 win when I was 21. It came with 17 rounds of ammo and 3 once fired brass.

BigB

CZ550 .458 Lott at age 22.

quote:

Originally posted by BigB:
Ruger #1 458 win when I was 21. It came with 17 rounds of ammo and 3 once fired brass.

BigB

Winchester Model 70 458 win when I was 38. It came with 17 rounds of ammo and 3 once fired brass.

3 fired cases seem to be the go
with the 458 Win !!!

Thirty-one when I purchased a lever action .45-70. Interestingly, the next rifle I bought was a 22-250.

22 - 375H&H, although not technically bigbore

25 - 416 Rem Mag

25 - Eyeing a 500 Jeffery - Probably going to buy it by 26

51 years old.

Because it took Winchster almost an entire lifetime to eventually make a Model 70 Safari Express in Left Hand.

I feel the Real Need for a .416" something, too - don't know if I'd ever actualy use it on game though ..... but WTH?

I bought a Remington rolling block 44-40 when I was 10 and then got a Ruger 44 magnum carbine at 11 if that counts. Marlin 1895 45-70 at 16.

40 something

I bought a Marlin 336 in .45/70 as a college student at age 22 and shot a spring bear in Maine with it right after graduation. It took me over 30 years to get my next big bore, a lever rifle in .375 Ruger.

I was 31 last year when I bought my first .458, a Lott. Also picked up a .375 H&H, Model 70 Safari Express. This .375 meant a lot to me, as it was the 100th anniversary of the .375 H&H cartridge and the 75th anniversary of the Model 70. Also picked up a .454 Casull last year. I seem to be developing a sickness... No thanks to you bastards!

-John

quote:

Originally posted by Todd Williams:

quote:

Originally posted by Fjold:
I was 46 when I bought my 375 H&H and 54 when I bought my 458 Win mag.

You try to find left handed big bores.

Of course, a 375 H&H isn't a big bore!!

I'll just quote the header for this forum:

"Big Bores
For those who like the larger calibers, from 375 and up to the 1.008 Vincent Buffalo Thumper"

31, when I got my .458 Win Mag a few months ago. Can't wait to hunt with it this fall. Sadly I'll be hunting deer instead of buffalo, but I can always pretend.

Somewhere between 1961 and 1963 I accumulated a .375 Taylor (.375-.338), a .416-.300 Winchester and a .458 Winchester Magnum. I was 22 in 1961, and it was ten years before I shot my first African game, with a lot of cast bullet loads going down range in the mean time.

23 I think. Bought a Whitworth .458 with the intent to go to Africa for the black bulls. I bought 100 empty Winchester brass, 500 Hornady FMJ solids and got to shooting. Never made it to Africa. I have about 50 of those solids still sitting in the locker. I now use the Whitworth with Cast bullets and hunt fall whitetails and summer "elephants" here in Kansas. I have been successful on the whitetails but still looking for the great migration to fill my elephant tag.

I had a Win Mod 95 in .405 Win for a while when I was about 16, then a Sako .375 H&H when 19, built when they used FN actions. Then I got a .424 OKH Mag when I was about 25

Early thirties. Should have done it ten years earlier.

With any kind of horsepower I was 45 as a yougster I played with the .375 Winchester ,.444 Marlin and the 45-70.


Today I shoot my 9.3 and 404 Jeffery.

Cal30

I was 19 when I got a 375 H&H, and just picked up my 585 Hubel Express last weekend at 40.

57 years old when I bought a 375 H&H, 60 when I grew up and graduated to a 500 Jeffery

45ish before I shot anything bigger than a .300 mag... 50ish before I got to the .505 gibbs... I was recoil sensitive as a kid... i'd always been told how hard guns kick... finally figured out it wasn't as bad as it seemed...now I regularly carry a 10 ga when I hunt the river area, as it's shotguns only... i'm not a recoil junkie, as I have personal limits, and an older friend that I shoot with, likes my big bores...and I carry my chapuis 9,3x74 double when i can...

quote:

Originally posted by Fjold:

quote:

Originally posted by Todd Williams:

quote:

Originally posted by Fjold:
I was 46 when I bought my 375 H&H and 54 when I bought my 458 Win mag.

You try to find left handed big bores.

Of course, a 375 H&H isn't a big bore!!

I'll just quote the header for this forum:

"Big Bores
For those who like the larger calibers, from 375 and up to the 1.008 Vincent Buffalo Thumper"

Understood, but then again, it's in the header because the forum owner is a confirmed .375 guy!! Technically speaking, the .375 and .416's are medium bores, with Big Bores starting at .458. But what the hell? The more the merrier, right?

I was 30 years old: .458 WinMag Ruger No.1
A few months later I got another .458 WinMag, the pushfeed M70 with 22" barrel.
A 460 Wby, Weatherby Mark V from Japan was next, by my 31rst birthday: I was addicted.
It all transpired at John Wahl Mercantile in Blairstown, Missouri.
That place was like heaven, 1984-1985.

Big bores are a useful tool.

I've always been a 'one rifle' hunter type, even when having more than one rifle. In my 30's I tended to use 338's and borrowed 375's on occasion. I couldn't get too excited about a 458 at the time because of their rainbow trajectory.

At 41 I finally sprung for building a 416 Rigby. Now I'm in my 60's, four 416 Rigby's later.

Is the 416 Rigby a medium bore? Well, most importantly, it is the largest, flat-shooting, take-anything, anything-legal, comfortable cartridge for standard controlled-feed rifles. Some treat their 375's the same way, so they will understand my attachment to a flat-loaded 416.

I started deer hunting with my dad's 16 gauge double shotgun and slugs when I was 8. He gave me that shotgun a few years ago and some of the partial boxes of ammo we used 40 years ago.

Landrum my story is similar. I was 19, a 460wby lazermark. Knew nothing about big game rifles before that, thought semi-auto 308's and '12 gauge slugs" were where it ended for power.

Picked up a 1993 petersens annual, first one I had read in Australia. Flipped to the cartridge ballistics tables at the back. Eyes popped out of head, made a phonecall to enquire about buying one of these '50BMGs' I was reading about- but the cartridge was being banned in my state.The next call had secured me a second hand 460wby about ten minutes later