Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Colt Sauer rifles

Is this the one you looked at?
http://www.gunbroker.com/Auction/ViewItem.asp?Item=59032733

I walked away from a Colt Saure, NIB, 7 mag last year. The action is really slick, but the stock finish is like a mirror. I asked the seller to weigh the rifle. We used a baby scale and it came in at 9 lbs.+. Also, if you look at an exploded drawing of the rifle, you fill find it has about 64 separate parts. Anyway, I could have gotten the rifle for a grand. Maybe I should have bought it to add to my closet queen collection. Stoney

Thanks for all the help guys, Al that was a great report and what I was looking for!

I like the 60 deg. bolt, the tang saftey and the barrel length is about what I'm looking for. The down side is the weight and price. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> I'm looking for a rifle to carry on deer and caribou hunts, plus may be a moose hunt. I walked 19 miles in 3 days on my last caribou hunt, a 9 plus pound rifle don't sound like fun. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> I've thought of replacing the wood stock with a high tech stock but I'm thinking at best that would only save me about 1/2 a pound. Oh well, they sure sound like neat old rifles but I guess they are little heavy for what I have in mind, too bad...

Claret Dabbler,
that looks like a version I have, mine is called the "Europa" .
Does yours have a set trigger, by pushing the trigger forward??

Very nice photos, BTW.
Bill

You can put a Colt Sauer into a glass stock -I've done it several times by modifing other paterns.It will lighten the rifle up a bit and still balance well. It is a lot of work but worth it.
Glenn

There is a guy in Minn. or somewhere in that part of the country that has dealt in Colt Sauer rifles for quite a few years. I know this as I have sold him a few. (3or4) Strangley enough, his name is Gary Sauer. Anybody know him?

Does this guy have a shop called Guns of Specialty (or similar)? I think he's in Appleton, WI.....if we're thinking of the same person.

Chris

Once loaded for a .300 WBY in a Colt Sauer, IMO a damn fine rifle even though I'm ambivalent about the caliber. Very smooth function, excellent fit and finish and the first Roy chambered gun I'd toyed that shot scary good. Most any load in the higher load density range was good for 1/2 MOA with RX22, IMR 4831 and 165-180 grain bullets of three different types, including the Swift Scirrocco. Very impressed with the quality, but not enough to cure me of my SS addiction at the time.

That sure just might be the guy. He was very good to deal with whether buying or selling. He paid me more for those Sauers than I could get at the gun shows, and I was a dealer.

I've had a Sauer 202 and I regret selling it. Have also handled and owned other Continental rifles. In general - which means there are exceptions - the difference between them and most of our domestic offerings is the same as between Audis, Mercedes and Ford Tauruses.

The Colt Sauer rifles are a classic example of an attempt to prove things can be done differently. Not better, just different. There was not a single feature which one could point out as being a good solution to an existing problem and a number of features which might be thought of as being of questionable value.
The actions were/are very smooth in operation.This is less a function of the design than of the excellent job of polishing. This was probably the only positive aspect of the rifle from a function standpoint. Now let's look at some of the special design features which make the rifle and actions unique.
The first and most obvious feature is the lack of conventional locking lugs. Instead of integral lugs as are found on virtually all other bolt actions, the Colt Sauer used a set of struts which were activated by a camming system within the bolt. The system was a success only in that it did hold the bolt in the receiver. Because the struts were located at the rear of the bolt, the action was inherently springy. Add to this the deflection of the struts themselves and you had an action which was one of the worst for producing short case life with reloading. In addition, the cam ring was a tiny thing and a bit fragile.
The trigger. The trigger was different in that it was a toggle system. There was no engagement between a sear and trigger laver as in overriding sear types. Instead, the trigger lever was a toggle affair. When the toggle was pulled past center, the striker was released. This is a real example of doing something differently just to be different. It didn't work better than a conventional trigger. In fact it didn't really work as well. In addition, the finger piece was made of aluminum which was a bit out of place on a rifle which was fairly high priced at the time.
There was a little indicator which showed when there was a cartridge in the chamber. A superfluous feature which served no real purpose. What it did nicely was take flight in the event of a case failure. Hardly a safety feature.
The detachable box magazine was very well made and feeding was superb. One advantage of rear lockers is that the cartridge does not have to bridge the gap formed by the lock lug recesses.
I saw one pretty good example of the strength and durability of the Colt Sauer in comparison with a more conventional design. A customer brought in a Colt Sauer in 270 in which he had inadvertently fired a 7x57. The rifle was wrecked. The stock was split, the mag box destroyed. The mag latch gone. The locking strut cam ring was broken and the action locked up. Ultimately, the rifle was repairable at a cost about 110% of a new one.
At the same time another customer brought his rifle in to have it checked out. He was concerned because he had also inadvertently shot 7x57 in it. In fact he had shot three until he noticed the fired cases had very little neck. His rifle was just fine. His rifle? A savage 110.
In the end I think the Colt Sauer is worth having if you like the look or just want to have one because it is different. I think it is a great example of a poor design very well done. GD

You made an interesting post with some good points, greydog, but I'm not persuaded the Colt Sauer is "a great example of a poor design very well done." Some aspects of the rifle were unique and maybe didn't have to be, but they didn't cause me any real problems in use.

What's up with two of your customers shoving 7x57's in .270's at about the same time? Quite some coincidence that you'd have two fellows inadvertantly doing that. I hope you advised them to improve their practices.

Any design which uses a complex array of parts to accomplish a simple task -in this case, bolt lock up- is a poor design. The whole rifle was an engineering exercise to no real purpose.
The two customers lived 500 miles apart and didn't know one another. Just a co-incidence. One was an avid collector and shooter while the other was just a casual hunter. It wasn't that strange really. I often saw a half dozen "wrong cartridge" incidents per year.
I don't say the rifles can't work. Obviously, they have worked and have satisfied their owners. All I'm doing is pointing out real shortcomings from my point of view based on my experience. Plainly, not all will agree! GD

I've been debating between a Colt Sauer in .25-06 and a Sauer 202 Supreme in .25-06. You've definately given me some food for thought! With so many parts, and the fact it isn't made anymore....maybe I should stick with the 202?

Thoughts?

Chris

Greydog, I agree with you on all points.

The Colt Sauer is a high-quality rifle that is built from superb materials and exhibits fine quality, finish, and workmanship throughout, but it's grossly complicated and over-engineered, and it's vulnerable to hard-use, and even serious range use.

Back in the early 1980s, we had a transplanted German industrialist as a member of our local gunclub, and he was not only an excellent, well-practiced rifleman and experienced hunter, but a real connoisseur of fine European hunting rifles. He owned an amazing battery, which is to put it rather mildly, and as a young kid, I was always astounded at the armament he brought out of his guncase when I ran into him at the range.

One of his rifles was a Colt Sauer 375 H&H, and in time he developed some rather serious problems with it. At first, he started to have a hard time opening the bolt on a fired case. Later on, the cases he extracted from the chamber were decidedly bulged just ahead of the belt, which would indicate lug setback, or else those complicated retractable locking lugs were not full engaging -- for whatever reason! At that point,. he sent the rifle back to Colt or possibly JP Sauer for repair or replacement, and I'm not sure how it all worked out.

Colt and Sauer would have been much better in every way off if they would have offered a fine rifle based on a slightly updated Mauser 98-pattern action, complete with modern steels and heat-treating, rather than to try and re-invent the wheel with a more complicated, inferior design............

If it ain't broke, don't fix it! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

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Every Sauer 90 I have ever seen had a single set trigger - that is why the mechanism is complex. If you set the trigger and do not fire the rifle, it automatically unsets to safe position when your lift the bolt handle. The bolt will open with the thumb safety engaged, so you can clear the chamber and magazine.

Clatin, the 202 is a great rifle. It has six forward locking lugs direct to the barrel. The action bears no pressure on firing. Triggers are great and you can add extra barrels.

Don't miss one if you can manage it.

Regards.

Allen,
One customer left a Colt Sauer in 375 H&H in Tanzania after having similar extraction problems on a hunt. He was pretty down on them after that.
The Sauer 200 series rifles are nice. A look at the bolt face shows what a Remington 700 extractor can look like. everything is beautifully machined and fitted. A trifle more spendy, mind you! The rifles are a bit heavy and the stock kind of clunky but at least there are no real design flaws. GD

That is why they made the 202!!
<img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

There are small boutique builders in Germany and Austria of new Mauser 98 actions that are better than any in the past, because of modern heat treating.

Sauer's switch barrel designs, like the swappable scopes, address the high taxes imposed on anything but small collections of rifles. These innovations permit the owners to have many calibers but only a few taxable receivers.