I have a couple weatherby vangaurd rifles, one in 270 win and the other in 7mm rem mag. now I have a friend with a mossberg which is Identical in every way except his says mossberg on it. now recently I was looking at a new sako 75 in a store and the action on it seems to be very much the same. now I have heard that after roy weatherby died the patent ran out on the action and it was used by some other companies for a short while. this vangaurd action though is a 2 lug action I believe (maybe 3 havn't looked for a while) now whos action is it really? and how similar is it really to a sako 75? and does it have potential to build and accurate rifle out of it if rebarreled and trued?

The Weatherby Vanguard, Mossberg, and S&W rifles were all made by Howa of Japan, that's why they're so similar. Since Howa didn't make any of these in lefthand, I have no experience with them, however the guys at GGVG are saying they're have with the varminters Howa is selling here under their own name.

The Sako M-75 is a completely different rifle made by Sako in Finland, although there may be similarities.

George

George is correct. Weatherby had nothing to do with the Vanguard action, they just marketed it as their "popularly priced" gun. The Howa was also marketed by S & W, but Mossberg also at one time used its own action in its 800 series, so not all Mossbergs were Howas.

Many years ago there was a direct copy of the Sako L61R manufactured by Howa and called the Dickson-Howa. In fact, they even copied the Sako rifle right down to the stock design. It was completely unlike the Howa mauser-type action on the Vanguard, and I believe that Howa had to quit making it due to patent infringements. The current Sako Model 75 is completely different from all above.

By the way, patents are not attached to lives of their owners, so the death of Roy Weatherby would have no effect.

does the howa action have much potential to be tuned into a good shooter with a premium barrel?

markus,

They are extremely common in Australia and are frequently used for very accurate rifles. I am not sure if it is still made but at one stage we also had 3 lever 2 ounce triggers for them.

The action is very similar to the Sakos before the Sako 75.

Until the introduction of the Ruger Stainless, I think they were the most popular centrefire rifle in Australia.

It is a few years since I have had one apart but they use to have a trigger with sear engagement adjustment and would come down quite light.

The disadvantage with them is that unlike a Rem 700 or Model 70 the front screw is into the recoil lug and the lug is right at the front of the action. With the Rem 700 and M70 the front screw is right through the middle of the bedding section and this is the way to go for a full floated barrel which is better if any switch barrel set up is wanted.

Actions like Howas and the older Sakos frequently need to have some bedding under the first inch or so of barrel if they are to give long term accuracy.

Mike