Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Winchester Collectors 1953 M70 restoration

I got a 1953 Win M70 at a gunstore for $400 in 2012.
It would have been worth twice as much but it had a broken stock wrist.

Someone must have run over the rifle with a car in 1953 and never used it again. The rifle has almost no wear.

I had bought a re-barrelled 30-06 1956 M70 in 2005 for $585 and put a 270 pac nor barrel and Bordon Rimrock stock on it...... I still had the 1956 M70 Walnut stock.

So I performed a stock transplant... and produced a lovely 308 M70.

nice wood.

My 1953 M70 FWT .308 is one of my most accurate rifles and one of my favorites.

"53 was at the very peak of Winchester quality, definitely a keeper, and you were so lucky to find it at any price.

Phil

I see the stock didn't pass sticks barrel break in method, but the Burris XTR rings and scope held up great on that "featherweight"!!!.

My 53 FW wears a receiver sight and has never had a scope mounted on it. It shoots far better than I can!

im sure one of the gun heads here on the fire could resurrect that broken stock for you Clark......

Happy pre '64 Win 70 ending! Love 'em! Now if the barrel doesn't 'shoot around corners', presumably it's not bent!

I can't agree with the statement that '53 was the "peak of Winchester quality", but I suppose that could be definitional. The pre-wars & early postwar iterations in my opinion were the about the quality peak. But then too, they were all with clip accoutrements (magnum chamberings excepted) and without scope bridges tapped. Perhaps some folks might claim those features depreciated functional quality. For smoothness, definitely the earlier genre! The integral milled ramp a quality plus too! Functionally as 'rubber meeting road' they were all great rifles. Though especially my '63 300 Win Mag, M 70, elevator 'down button' already 'pushed' in respect of the stock... Oh my!
Back to the O/P, how about a 'range report?'
Best!
John

Now that is sweet as hell. I love a good shooting rifle. And a good looker too... Thanks for sharing!!!!!

Clarkm: I may recognize that Rifle?
I was the POH-lice in a large Puget Sound area city for 29 years and back in about 1982 I was called to a "domestic disturbance" where the wife had taken her husbands shotguns and Rifles out to the curb of the street. Layed them onto the curb and then drove over them with one of the family cars!
He soon got home from work and saw the carnage and went apoplectic.
The insensitive act harmed all the guns (about 10 of them including Browning Citoris, Weatherby MK-IV's and a couple of pre-64 Winchester Model 70's!) - destroying some and just breaking a few others.
Anyway that state was/is a "community property state" and if the bitch wife wanted to break/destroy her husbands property she was legally entitled to do so!
Personally I wanted to kick the bitch directly in the twat - but I left that for the aggrieved husband to consider.
Anyway your photo reminded me of that incident and either a horse rolled on that Rifle or it was victim of some weird incident.
Looks good now - and be nice to your wife.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

There's a self-assured man.

Clark M & 160User: Damn - my pre-64 Winchester Model 70 collection includes 11 "Featherweights" and only ONE of my Featherweights has the relatively rare "solid bolt" feature!
And here on one thread we have two of them.
Good for you's guys.
Enjoy.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

Interesting!

In 1984 I had a neighbor [800 feet away on 5 acres near Snohomish] whose wife threw his guns in the woods. He had collected Win M12 shotguns and told me it took many years to collect the 28 gauge.
In 2000 he was long gone, but the new neighbors cleared land to build a barn and found a gun [m70?]. It was a blob of rust. They mounted it on the barn wall. I was able to give them a story to go with it.... like you have given me.

Clarkm: Another story from the Pacific Northwest and my memory dates it to about 1980 - 1985. Maybe you remember it also?
Seems a logger/construction type guy down in Enumclaw, Washington (the locals refer to it as "Enumscratch") got wind of his wife taking up with another man and she was planning on meeting for the first time with a divorce lawyer!
So as a preemptive act of defiance/anger he took out his bulldozer and drove it through the family dwelling a couple of times - totaling it!
I am sure once the lawyers got into the "property settlement" phase of the divorce that the husband was directed to "reimburse" the cheating bitch for her loss in the value of the property.
An old saying comes to mind - "hell hath no fury like a woman scorned"!
Sad about that Model 70 being subjected to the incessant rains out Snohomish way.
Stay dry.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy