I was looking at a Browning 458 Safari Grade today (long extractor) in very good shape with an exceptional piece of wood on the butt stock.
This particular rifle has two cross bolt and a bolt going through the forearm in what would appear to be a barrel lug.
I did not take the action out of the stock to check for salt yet or as to whether the barrel lug was an after market addition.
This gun is pretty light as the barrel contour is minimum.
Just kicking around the thought of a purchase.
Any experience with these guns in 458 win mag on this forum and how would you rate them against a mod 70 or Dakota for reliability?

EZ

EZ,

There is no comparison. The Browning Safari Grade built on the controlled round FN action was in my opinion the highest quality OTC rifle every sold by an American company. They are very light and a little stiff on recoil but what beautiful hunting rifles. They need no tweaks if they have been taken care of.

Mark

I have one. I assume when you say "long extractor" you mean the FN mauser action?

Mine feeds well, maybe a little trouble with some flat nosed 45-70 bullets that I've tried, but any bullet specifically profiled for the 458 has cycled perfectly. Doesnt eject with the authority of a model 70, but I think thats typical of mausers.

It shoots extremely well, the trigger is great, good safety. Its a little light for full power loads, but it handles like a deer rifle and is still shootable. If you want a fast handling big bore its a great choice.

That screw does go into a barrel mounted recoil lug. Helps with stock cracking, but I have seen one or two with cracked stocks.

As far as price goes, these are great buys in my opinion, nothing newly made with this quality for the money.

very high quality CRF rifle. I would stick a recoil reducer in the butt stock and go happy!

Rich

Buddy has the .375 version. Sweet rifle with great handling.

dean119

You probably already know this, but I have found that the 350gr Round Nose Hornady SP feeds great in the 458 Mags I have tried it in.

Not in 458, but just rebarreled same rifle in 300WM at some cost, but action, stock, trigger, safety, overall quality was well worth restoring to useable conditon. As for the salt issue, believe that misfortune took place in the late 60's, say 65-69, but quick call to Browning and they will confirm one way or the other. Mine was built in '61 pre salt. The Browning Safari's are in a league of their one, "top drawer gear."

I have one in 458. It handles like my deer rifles, very smooth action, good trigger, safety slides easily. It is also very accurate. I picked mine up used, it was ported and had a mercury recoil reducer in the butt (which I didn't know until I changed to a decelerator pad). I plan to take it on my next trip to Zim.

Very good guns. Like a few others have said a bit light in weight, but that's easy to change.

quote:

Originally posted by N E 450 No2:
dean119

You probably already know this, but I have found that the 350gr Round Nose Hornady SP feeds great in the 458 Mags I have tried it in.

Funny, I just bought a couple boxes of these, never tried them even though they are a classic bullet. I'm thinking about 2200 fps should be a sweet load for this particular rifle.

Right now my favorite loads are 400g SAF at ~2200 and 400g Hawks at ~2000

Well, I picked up this shootin' iron yesterday. Took it apart and thoroughly cleaned it last night.
I have two other Safari grades (243 & 22-250) and over time the laquer coating over the wood will crack (very fine cracks) so I think I am going to have some one who works well with wood remove it, swell out most of the character marks and put a very nice oil finish and then glass in the action.
The grain is straight through the wrist but has very nice figure in the butt. I will probably go ahead and install a mercury tube and add a Pachymer decelerator.
I have not began to look if Talley has bases for a nice low power scopw. I did notice Cabellas had their Swar Z6 1 x 6 on sale the other day for $1,200.00 but I will probably just add an old leupold 1.5 x 5

I agree with Mark H. Young's post. The Browning Safari Grade is the at the pinacle of factory produced rifles. I don't conern myself if they are salt wood or not or long or short extractor.

I have a Browning Safari Grade in .375 H&H and it is easily the nicest factory rifle i have ever owned. It does everything well, and its a shooter.

I have had four Safari-LE rifles since 1967 and currently have a 1964-.458 and a 1961-.30-06. They ARE a fine rifle, but, NOT the best factory rifle ever produced; I would give that accolade to the Brno 21/22 and ZG-47 rifles, then the actual FN sporters which are, in some ways, superior to the Brownings.

My .458 has a muzzlebrake some genius has installed and I am having it cut off, Recknagel banded ramp front and a good rear iron installed and a Duane Weibe dropbox to replace that pos alloy factory unit. I will also use a Micky stock, Talleys and a Leupy., probably a simple 2.5X HD.

I will shoot 400 and 450 SAFs over AA-2230.

I do not believe I will ever shoot an Elephant so I am thinking 450 Swifts when I get around to it.
I will probably run some of the Hornady's new HE loads through it and chrono them. They claim 2250 FPS with 500 gr loads. We will see in the not too distant future.
I do not really like the rear sight. Anyone know who may offer a unit with a shallow V that may retrofit easily?

EZ

Dean

I have used that bullet at 1890fps out of a 45/70 Ruger No1 on several deer, and at 2330fs out of my 450 No2 on deer and several pigs, with erfect results.

I have only recovered one that struck a pig head on in the face at @45 yards.

I have shot a bunch of them in the two 458 Bolt rifles I had, but I do not remember shooting anything with them. They feed perfect however.

Luv them,esp since they run light! My First BIG Rifle was one,LE and it served me well.Took several Cape with it and with Barnes 450X's,got complete in/out penetration some! Then I had it customized with 2 stocks,cut barrel to 22",engraved,etc...then lost it in Katrina!

I was fiddling around with this gun last night and it is my first FN Mauser Browning Safari grade. I have a couple of Sako actioned units and once had a 338 Safari Grade but was a later FN action that was push feed.
This one has a 3 position saftey. It is a slide action but has a center position like a Mod 70 that allows the bolt to be worked but the trigger still blocked.
The 338 I had did not have that functionality.
Is this common or has someone made some adjustments to this gun? I will say for the better if so.
The gun is clean beneath the stock and the serial # 4L 26179 which from what I understand means it was made in 1964.
This gun comes up perfect and fits me like a glove. I do not have the "search" to get the iron sights to line up.
Now, I have to get some ammo and test this baby out. I will chrono some Hornady Heavy magnum and let you guys know the results.
If it close to being sighted in, I may try and stalk a pig!

EZ

I was able to put a few rounds through this rifle this weekend. I had a hard time locating any ammo that I was interested in on short notice. I did pick up some Remington 450gr swifts ans a box of Federal trophy bonded 400 gr.
This gun is a cream puff. I do not believe it recoils much if anymore than my Marlin 45-70 with Buffalo bore 430 gr cartridges.
FAR FAR less than my Heym 88 470 with Hornady DGX loads.
I expect some Hornady DGS loads to arrive this week in the mail. We will wring a few of those out and see if there is a difference.
Also had a bit more fun; wacked a 200# pig and a 130 B&C 8 point, and had the dog on 6 coveys.

EZ

I looked at one back in the 1970's and I never forgot. It was a very nice classic design, back in the bad old days when Winchester was building these awful guns with pressed on checkering and just awful crap. Remington too. A race to see who could cheep out the gun more.

The shame of it was, the Browning 458 barrel was very thin and the hole was off center and it was very noticeable looking at the muzzle.

Are you joking?? Hole off center?

No, totally serious, looking down the muzzle the hole was off center! It was a Belgium Browning model model 98 clone in 458. Very plain gun in a classic style.

I did end up with an amazing finely fitted Japanese B92 lever from around that time period more or less. Still got that baby. Minus the high gloss, plastic like stock varnish typical of the day.

Hand fitted was one thing, but machining to close tolerances was another. The handwriting was on the wall, Japan was a serious manufacturing force. And the old established industry, usa or belgium better watch out.

I've got a short extracter 375. I bought it because the price was right, thought I'd try it out for a while. I'm a CRF Mod.70 guy but this gun is a keeper. I've got CRF .40+ guns for DG, not that I realy have a use for them. This is about perfact for B.C. Moose/northern hunting. To give you an idea of what I think about this gun, I sold my 22" Stainless Classic and kept this one. I did get a fair price for the Mod. 70 though.

Good decision.

I ran about 13 rounds through this rifle today. 4 to get it sighted in and then 9 more to check some advertised velocities.
I was very pleased to say the least with this rifle. Once sighted in (open sights) @ 25 yards it fired 9 rounds with 3 different loads (400 gr, 450 gr and 500 gr) into one jagged hole 1/4 high @ 12 oclock. The hole was smaller than a quarter.

The recoil was not all that bad in light of the light contour barrel although there was a bit of muzzle jump. I was sitting at the bench with the forearm just resting on the forward rest. I shot it typical bench rest style with my left hand back by the rear bags for consistency.
Not bad for eyes creeping up on 53 years.
It gave me allot of confidence in this gun.
This rifle has had no special attention such as aftermarket bedding of trigger work.
I think I got a "gem"!
I guess I will try at 50 yards now (open sight) and see where these bullets land and then to mount some Talley QD's and a 1.5 x 5 leupold.

EZ

quote:

This one has a 3 position saftey. It is a slide action but has a center position like a Mod 70 that allows the bolt to be worked but the trigger still blocked.
The 338 I had did not have that functionality.
Is this common

My buddy's .375 has the same type of safety.

And I would be interested in hearing how those Hornady 500 gr HE's do through the crony..

I agree on using 450 A Frames. I just recently bought a custom .458 Win and the 450 Swift is one-hole accurate at 100 with irons. I'm a dedicated A Frame fan, anyway. I'm getting 2111 out of them and that's a lot of kick in my little gun, so I'm going to add a mercury recoil reducer. I want to push them over 2200, or just right at it, anyway. I have a few left that were loaded by Larry at Superior and am going deer hunting tomorrow. Taking the .458 and the 450's. "This is a test."

All I've seen had the three position side safety.

Question for you Browning guys. My gun is P/F made in '64, it has steel bottom metal. Its engraved with no gold inlay. Why are some alloy, some steel from the same year?

I do not believe I have seen a Browning Safari Grade with alloy bottom metal. With regard to the engraving w/o the gold inlay. Most of the time it is just worn off. Someone may have used the gun over its lifetime. That gold is not real durable.
Are you sure you push feed is a 64 era? Perhaps 74? I do not think they made the push feed and the long extractor at the same time. It was some where around 1970 when they made the transition to a push feed action.

My bad. the serial # ends in L69 so I asume its a '69 gun.

please explain the "salt" wood stock problem and if it is insurmountable. i saw a browning fn in .458 at cabela's for $999 last year and passed because i was aware that there was a "salt" wood problem but didn't know how serious a problem it is . can somebody please explain.

thanx

In the late 60's and early 70's Browning used salt to dry out "some" of their firearm stocks. In that era it is always good to inspect a browning firearm. Take it apart. If there is a salt issue, you will know it immediately.
I have a T bolt with a salt stock. The metal is very pitted beneath the stock. I figured it is about worthless but still shoots good. I glassed in the entire stock about 20 years ago and keep the gun well oiled and that seems to have addressed the issue however if you find one of these guns for sale, I would pass up on it. It has been almost 40 years since this was observed so if you find a gun of this era and it is clean beneath the stock then you should be OK.
My understanding is that is became a problem about 1967 and went through the early 70's and again it was a fraction of the guns Browning produced.