Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Does your taste in rifles keep changing

Nope,I'm 61 and they're all SS ACTIONS,BARRELS and composite stocks.I only change the color of the stocks and the Cerakote I have applied.I never have like wood stocks or blued guns,but thats me.They all have at least 26in. long barrels.

I've gotten further and further from stuff that kicks, stuff that doesn't balance, and stuff that doesn't fit me. Give me a well balanced rifle (light or heavy) in a stock that fits me, chambered for a pleasant cartridge, and I'm pretty happy. SS barrels, good triggers, turrets, and friendly eye relief only add to the package.

Other than that, I'm not too picky. (grin)

My taste in rifles does change, and it's a bit of a problem.

I find I like more and more rifles, and like them better and better...

Seriously, while I like rifles, I like to hunt better. Accordingly, I find my taste in rifles reflects this, so I find myself with stainless rigs with quality handles that shoot lights out and can take a lot of rough use and abuse.

That said, I made a great buy on beautifully stocked blued Kimber of Oregon 22LR, and I'm in love with that little rifle. It's silly accurate with most everything.

DJ

Mine tastes seem to be an evolving door always coming back to some kind of M70 Cant take life to serious, nobody gets out alive. Same with rifles

I use to change hunting rifles like socks until I bought my first kimber montana, now I just keep adding montana's to the collection.

When I was really young, I liked the more oddball stuff: white line spacers, shiny stock finishes, thumbhole stocks, and California Cathouse stocks. Now I don't like anything other than classic stocks - wood or plastic - tac stocks are OK.

I like about any kind of good rifle with the exception of pumps (slide action; Amish machine gun). That's funny because I grew up with pump shotguns, but I never had any interest in that type of rifle. I own too many guns to put in print, but not a single pump rifle.

My taste has never really changed, but my preferences seem to be more generic than some mentioned above. Other than hand-me downs from my granddads, which are all keepers:

1. Used or new makes no difference. Condition does - I don't buy beat-up rifles.

2. Levers and bolts are both good.

3. Functionality reliability and accuracy are important.

4. Collector value is of no concern except that I won't pay for it. If I can't shoot it I don't want it.

5. Modern steel (post WW1) is a must.

6. Other factors being equal, less expensive is better.

7. Fancy custom rifles are great to look at but my pocketbook doesn't care for them. (The custom rifle I am currently building will be rather plain. The laminated stock cost me $129.)

8. Mauser-type actions rule when it comes to bolts. That's why my safe has more Rugers than anything else.


Over the years I have sold exactly one centerfire rifle - a Savage 110E in .22-250 with a shot-out barrel.

Slightly, regarding handguns.. But not in rifles.. I've been a M70 man since my first one in the early '70s and nothing's changed since then..

Those Montanas will do that to you....grin.

DJ

Yes .... No, its usually a matter of the old beoming new again!!

My tastes and desires have certainly changed within the last two years.

After almost 40 years, I have scrapped the traditional attage of hunting with and carrying around 44"-45" + OAL rifles weighing nearly 10 lbs and sometimes weighing over that with scope and sling.

The two rifles I have now weigh less, handle better and are easier to carry on long hunts. One is 40.5" long and the other is 35.5" long, with very little sacrifice in overall velocity performance and with no compromise in accuracy.

I still have two problems when it comes to guns. I like, and I mean I really like, lots of them. But I only need certain ones. Or maybe I should say that if I don't have a real need for one, I'm better off not buying it. What happens is I'll play with it for a while, then it will become a safe queen. Sooner or later, it gets sold.
Then there are those which just didn't work out as I thought they would. That means I couldn't shoot it as well or better than what I already had.
With rifles, I've gotten into the habit of "tweaking" them. All of them have had trigger jobs. Some of them, more than one. Some of them have just been glass bedded and refinished. Some have gone all the way into making a full custom. I've got a .280 that came out as an 8.5 lb., "sorta long range rifle" and evolved into a mountain rifle of 7.5 lbs.
I've got one .308 that startedout with a wood, FWT stock, went to an McM FWT stock, and currently has an MPI Kevlar stock.
The whole idea is I want just a few rifles that I will use and shoot regularly for whatever I need to hunt. If something isn't quite right, I try to change it so that it is. Sometimes this doesn't happen. My custom Scout Rifle was like that. I was disappointed in the Scout Scope, and didn't like the synthetic stock at all. Keep breaking down from recoil. So it got sold.
Some of them I can't do much with. My old Browning BAR in 7mm Magnum is a case in point. Way too heavy, creepy trigger.
I've sold a few that I'm sorry I sold. My original Rem 700 in the then new 7 mm Rem Magnum was one. My old Marlin 336 in .35 Rem. is another.
Today my biggest problem is I know too well what I can get if I spend a few bucks and hire the right guy to do the job. To me, there is nothing having a guy turn out a rifle to just my specs, weight, lenth, chambering, action, trigger and scope. Then I've got it all. Something that handles smoothly. Something that kills w/o any doubt. Something that I can shoot well even under the worst conditions.
You'd think that by now I'd have goten there. I've only been at it for about 57 yrs. ( Got my first rifle, a single shot .22, at the age of eight.) I can't say for sure that my tastes have changed or I've grown older and wiser. Let's just say I haven't found so much satisfaction as to decide that "this one is it, the ultimate rifle." E

My taste in hunting rifles does indeed change, and has long done so. For me, its great fun to regularly try something different in the field, which could be something brand new and just out or something old and classic.

Last fall, I hunted antelope with a Ruger No. 1 in 9.3x74R, largely because I�d never before hunted with a single-shot rifle and certainly not with that venerable old cartridge. Both proved great fun. I also hunted a good bit last year with a Remington M700 Alaskan Ti in .300 WSM and a Winchester M70 Featherweight in .280 Remington. The diversity was a blast.

Sometimes, I think that the best hunts are those in which I learn something, and heading up a ridge with a different new/old rifle is one way to keep learning.

Hell, I just bought a lever-action .45-70. Time to sip some of that Kool-Aid. After that itch is scratched, I�d like to try a Savage 99. Then there�s some big Mauser bolt and there�s always a double rifle�

My bank account...or lack thereof...tends to keep my wandering eyes in check.

Nope. Anything that meets my accuracy standards in walnut blue -- that works! Always have been interested in accraute rifles. Likely always will be.

I am a died-in-the-wool walnut/blued man, but I did step outside my box and picked up a .308 Win. FN PBR XP rifle. I'm not converted to synthetic stocks yet, but this thing shoots like crazy! Everything is sub-MOA, some loads much under MOA. I can't warm up to the looks, but I can love shooting it!

Must agree with the shootist on walnut/blue.Some rifles have come and gone; but my Ruger #1"s are all still here! Oh, I do have Ruger Mk.2 S/S .25-06 for pronghorn hunting, but I do like the #1"s. Class rifles indeed; dont you think? My location: The Owens Valley area of Calif. Shoot straight.

I was infatuated with the first Weatherby I saw in a Wards store in 1962 but then fell head over heels when I held a neighbor's Al Biesen M70 270 a couple of years later. There isn't anything that can compare with cunningly shaped French walnut, rust blued CM steel, and fine Mausers or real M70's. My advise, own fewer but spend more on each. Plus have one synthetic stocked under seven pound (all up) 270.

When I was younger I wanted long barreled rifles. Nowdays I like the lighter guns, the Ruger compacts are my favorite bolt guns now, but have come to really like lever guns for packing in my older years. (56) Especially the trappers.
Virgil B.