Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Browning BAR LW Stalker CARBINE!

Chill.

Right now, the onus is not on me to present the potential of or documented problems of alloy receivers.
I've made no comment supporting their perfection or documented lack of failures.

Simply because one has not "heard" of a failure means little about their existance or not.

I HAVE firsthand evidence of two failures of alloy .308 receivers in AR platforms.
Bad enough the receivers were scrapped.
Each were of different manufacturers.

I'm not making any snap judgement against the lightweight Browning rifle.
I do hope they give good service to their owners.

I have this exact gun in 30-06; mine is a grade II with gold trigger; made in belgium in 1971; It's not a light weight;
It shoots lights out; I reload my own rounds for it; I load up
39 gr. of IMR4064, with a hornady 150 gr. BTSP; It's right at 2800 fps, and as well as being VERY accurate, I shoot 40-60 rnds at the range every time; shoots very smooth; No ill effects; It is easier to shoot than my 3" mag. shotgun;

did you guys get mixed up here? I thought we were talking about BAR; I saw some post's about a BLR, which is not the same gun; A BLR is a LEVER ACTION GUN; BAR- BROWNING AUOTMATIC RIFLE' BLR - BROWNING LEVER ACTION RIFLE

Both the BAR and BLR use an aluminum alloy receiver.

My 1971 Browning 30-06 BAR (auto) has the same bolt and action as the
WWII version of the infamous G.I. BAR, only in a sporting gun;
EXACTLY THE SAME ACTION;
Shoots the exact same round;

You could take ANY 30-06 BOLT action rifle, and shoot it, and it will kick the [bleep] out of you (just like my 7mmrem weatherby);
But you put that 30-06 round in an autoloader, and its a different story; The recoil is taken up, and dissipated by the gas action used to re-chamber another round;

MY muzzleloader in 50 cal, shooting a 250 gr. barnes 45 cal. sabot with 110 gr. of 777 kicks harder than my bar 30-06;

My gun has a steel receiver; A bit heavier, which will eat some of the recoil;
bottom line is, that if you are scared of the gun, you shouldn't be shooting it;

I have a savage lever in 308 that will kick like a mule; also have a win 30-30 that kicks like heck; I would much rather shoot my 30-06 BAR, if i'm going to shoot 40-60 rounds;

Any auto rifle chambered for 308, or 30-06 or greater should have a steel receiver;
Remember that Browning went to Japan; Quality is being sacrificed
for the bottom line;
I just sold a 1969 belgium browning auto-5 shotgun for $1,200;
I will never sell my belgium browning BAR 30-06;
They just don't make them like they used to;

I had a gunsmith cut the barrel off of my Lightweight Stalker several years ago. We cut it down to 16 1/4 inches. I absolutely love it. It is my favorite gun. I have not found any negative side effects with the shorter barrel. My gunsmith did not want to cut it that short at first, so he cut it down to 18. I had to jump up and down to make him do what I wanted. After he cut it again, he actually told me that I was right and that the 16 1/2 looked better and also balanced better. I tried to tell him that I knew what I was talking about. I wish that they made one in .223. That would be the perfect walking varmit gun. In my opinion.

jtate,

What caliber is your BAR in?

I saw a 30-06 cut off to 16.5 inches once in the older steel receiver version. A 308 or 708 cut off to 17 inches would be cool. If you dinged the crown it would leave you some room to work on it.

EXACTLY THE SAME ACTION... I don't think that is accurate. I sometimes hear that from guys that own Ruger Mini-14's that think they have the same action as the military M14 rifles. Just isn't so with the Mini 14 and I'm pretty certain the commercial Browning BAR action isn't the same thing as the BAR of the military.

Mine is a 270. I looked for several months trying to find one in 308, but they are awfully hard to find. I had the gun in the safe with a piece of tape marking where the barrel would be cut for at least three months while I was building up the courage to "ruin" a perfectly good gun. I finally cut it and have never regretted it one bit.

Well I got my BAR Stalker Carbine 308. I topped it off with a Leup VX-3 1.5-5x Heavy Duplex (my favorite scope for years now).

Gave it a thorough cleaning, got the base and rings mounted this week. Went out today to get things in the ballpark and on the target. Shoot, clean, and repeat for the first three shots while getting centered on the paper at 25yds.

Once happy with where I was for scope adjustment at 25yds, I move back to 100yds for my first 'group' out of the new gun:



This was with plain old factory Remington 150gr Core-lokt ammo! Needless to say I was quite impressed. Best group I've ever shot out of ANY semi-auto rifle outside of a rimfire. I cleaned the gun again after that group and shot one more which was slightly bigger, but similar.

I was always wishing Browning had put out a carbine version of a deer rifle, so when I stumbled across this limited run of 150 guns of this 308 with an 18" barrel, I couldn't pass it up. And if it can put out groups under 1" like this..... Say what you like about these newer BAR's, but for now I'm a very happy customer.

Sweet rifle for the thick stuff.

And like most BARs, it's a shooter.

Enjoy it!

Blackfrog,

Did you weigh it before mounting the scope? I was wondering if it has a little heavier barrel than the 20" model or if they just fluted and shortened the 20".

Dang you BlackFrog!!!

I have wanted a light, short BAR for a while myself.

I had a couple ShortTrac models in 308, and although the stock fit me well I never could like the look of them.

And, the 22" barrel was more than I wanted for the deep woods.

So when I saw that they only made 150 of them, I hunted one down and bought it.

Another unexpected purchase.

I did not weigh the gun before putting on the mounts/rings.

I'm thinking they fluted and shortened the 20" version, probably use the same contour so forend parts all fit the same...

I like the gun, shoots great! My only gripe is the trigger seems kinda mushy though. Other than that, thumbs up so far!