Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles If Jack O'Connor was rifle shopping today...

Hell, all I'm curious about is what wood stocked beauty did you lug up a goat mountain in Alaska. Not a tough question and I even typed slow for you.

hell, im curious why a guy who says he couldnt give a chit what jack would bought then or now , keeps coming back to the thread and posting?
looking for some attention?

I'm wondering why you ever came back to the fire also Cohiba

Since he wasn't gay, I doubt he'd choose the 7mm-08.

the black ones are much easier to see.
I dont take pics of many target or keep many other than my coldbore target(s) but this one i did tuck away in the logbook...
the last shot was a called pull. I never can get that 5th one in. nerves I guess.
I would hate to advertise what kind of rifle it was, lets just say it has a .308 20" BBL and a 4 round mag. And says "MADE IN AUSTRIA" someplace on it. but as a production rifle shooting .36" groups with soft points, i'll take it.

After 9 years of being between Flippant and Glib, all you have to show for it is 50,000 posts at about 5600/year. It is clear most of your time is at a keyboard and not hunting. The most you ever shoot is your mouth, why don't you give it a rest???

ALL my rifles shoot tiny groups...as long as I can ignore all the flyers I don't like.

counting the flyer i think thats not to bad. thats an outside measurment written on there. not CTC.

You did own one in the past ... didn't you?

I recall an episode where Swampy had to shoot a dink multiple times with a 7mm-08 and seems like he had to finally beat that poor critter to death with the gun. Doesn't sound like it was a pretty scene.

With that horror story, a statistical sampling of one, he concluded that the 7mm-08 was incapable of killing deer. That forever changed the profile of that caliber on the Fire. I even got rid of the one I had.

DF

Given Jack's proclivity towards fine rifles he might well have gotten a new CRF Model 70 action or maybe a granite mountain action and had the David Miller Co barrel and stock it (cold rust blue and fine walnut. The cartridge?.....270 of course.

He'd go to Wal-Mart and buy a 770.

270? doubtful.
I think he would have continued the woods rifle but built it on a short action. since the 308 wasnt around till 52 (the year he left OL) he designed it on the common action and brass of the 8x57.
I think he would have been very happy with the 338 federal.

Jack was a sheep hunter. While he liked to hunt a lot of different stuff and did, sheep hunting was his passion. He liked rifles that were light in weight and shot flat. In his day, a light weight mountain rifle was something weighing no more than 8 pounds � he mentions that specifically in one of his books. He did like speed, the faster it shot the flatter it flew which made range estimation out to 300 or thereabouts not so tricky. However he did not particularly like rifles that kicked hard, so a fast, flat shooting, relatively light recoiling .270 was a natural for him.

So whatever he got it today, it would be light weight, fast and flat but not some hypervelocity Ultra magnum which would knock the snot out of you. Likely candidates would be a ULA or NULA , maybe a Kimber classic. He was one of the original proponents of �it�s where you hit�em, not what you hit�em with�, he wrote an article so titled in a Gun Digest of some years ago. Combine light recoil and flat shooting and he may have loved the new TSX�s and being able to go down some in weight to fly faster but kick even less.

He wasn�t really around when synthetics began to be widespread so we can�t really say if he�d hate them or appreciate their qualities of light weight and strength. He might have a Model 70 Featherweight in a Borden Rimrock stock. The original Jim Cloward design is basically a copy of Biesen�s stock design, so Jack would feel right at home handling it.

He�d probably carry a range finder but I don�t know if he'd twist turrets or not. He liked to place his bullets precisely so that could go either way. He wasn�t a big fan of high power scopes or fancy doodads, he valued reliability up in those steep mountains. Even at long range he figured a good 4X was good enough. He might gravitate to an FX II 6X, though.

Combine all of that:
NULA in .284 with 120 TSX
M70 Fwt in a Borden stock in .270 shooting 110 TSX (although he shot a 130 Partition so long he�d likely just as soon keep using that). He might even like a .270 WSM or a 7mm WSM with 120�s.
Kimber 84 or 84L, the former in 7-08, the latter in .270 or .280 AI.

I know he�d appreciate the practical advances that have been made and would eschew any of the foo foo stuff. He�d probably still accommodate you graciously at his home but tell you to piss off if you bothered him much at a gun show.

John - if that be the case (Walmart & M770 for JOC) that would mean his old "buddy" Elmer would want a Barrett .50BMG. After all, Elmer NEVER wanted to be under-gunned...and JOC would learn what LMFAO meant! Homesteader.

Really doubt that. As Idaho Jim said, JOC liked flat-shooting, high speed cartridges. Regarding synthetic stocks, perhaps like a lot of older guys, he valued traditional wood and blued steel.

OT--BTW, I was recently tempted by a gorgeous model 52 Steyr in a local shop. What stopped me was the steep rake of the Monte Carlo comb which looked like it could give a pretty good bruise. Any thoughts on that?

Jack would do exactly what he did in 1950. He would buy a Winchester M70 have the barrel turned down or rebarreled and dropped in a nice piece of walnut by one of todays's best makers.


ddj

Smarter than I thought......

A lot has been made about Jack shooting a 270. So much so I think the name should be changed to the 270 O'Connor. The fact is he used a lot of different calibers, including a 458. He also liked the 7X57 for some game. I bet he would do the same today.

Probably something similar to this.