Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors "And Gosh aint it Pretty"

Well no it's not. Looks like a ten pound bag of smashed A$$holes if you ask me! And if you want a cartridge that reaches near 308 balistics, why not just get a 300 savage or a 308 and skip the wildcat all together?
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<br>http://www.gunbroker.com/auction/ViewItem.asp?Item=3534989

Damn I wish I knew which logs these people came out from under, i sure would hang out alot more in there neck of the woods.

Well, it was bound to happen sooner or later, now I've got it out of my system, the double post that is.

Looks kinda like a Rolls Royce convertible with red and white vinyl tuck and roll, dingle balls and a skunk tail on the antenna. The listing should also say "only 24 rounds fired through it since it was defiled".
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<br>NY,
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<br>Good thing you use the same handle on AA. I almost bid against you on that ugly 99 with the white dots and the Redfield receiver sight.

Yup, I was gonna nail that inlaid beauty too until I looked at the bid list. For that money someone has to buy it, might as well be one of the forum guys.
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<br>I looked at the 30-30 the other night and almost shook my head off my neck. Why oh why would you do that!!! What an incredible waste of money. KInda like soupin' up an old VW! What's more incredible is that someone is willing to part with $800 for it AND that's below the reserve!

Well guys the thing is you don't know what it looked like before rebuilding. I also rebuilt an old straight grip 30-30 /99. It came with a severly pitted, bulged and bent barrel and no sights. Both butt and forend were cracked and it took two days careful drawfiling to remove the pitting from the action. It now sports a 26" medium heavy Douglas air guaged barrel, Lyman 17 front sight, mount on the tang holes Lyman micrometer receiver sight (not a tang sight) and all new wood. It shoots like no other 30-30 I've ever owned or used and I've used a pile of them. It was a case of either rebuild or break it down for parts. That may have applied to the rifle pictured as well and if so he's created something useful from a piece of junk. Whether you like his style or not is immaterial. He sure as hell isn't trying to pass it off as an original that's been cobbled together from parts from 4 rifles which seems to be a practice too common amongst the collector genre. Judge not, unless you be judged etc. etc. , Have a good one .

JUdge the death out of me Stocker! I have never built such an ugly gun in my life, nor have I ever assembled a parts gun and tried to pass it off. The guy built an ugly gun that is selling for an ugly price.

NY. Well I don't care for his style either but it wouldn't take much sweat to change it. He obviously built it to suit his own preferences . The sorry part of the situation is that Savage dropped the 30-30 chambering much too long ago and now the rifle is gone. Most of them are tired, tired , tired in that chambering. So, if you want one to shoot you find a non-collector rifle and rebuild it. As for parts swapping it's all too common amongst the Winchester collectors and it will creep into the Savages too as guys try to "enhance" their collection or resaleability to the unwary. I'm a long time fan of 99's but I am primarily a shooter and don't concur with a lot of the thoughts that the pure collector group espouses no matter what they collect.

we ain't tinkerer's, we collect to own and invest, not to
<br>throw $$ in a hole,. Soup up a 99 all you want, I'll take the 300$ 77rl shoot it and sell it when I'm sick of it.

I think taht the sorry part is that the 99 is gone while Winchester, Marlin and even Browning are still making money with them. The "old" 99 probably was too expensive to produce, but it was a technological marvel. As far as I can tell, they never needed the 30-30 at all. The 300 Savage and 250 were both superior rounds. If the 99 had been produced by any other manufacturer it would still be in production and be widely touted as a superior weapon.
<br>A 300 WSM model 99 would be nice wouldnt it?

NY- The 300 Sav. was a marvel of its day. It got trampled unfairly by the 308. If the 99 was available in 300WSM it would kick the daylights out of 308 sales assuming still available. The 30-30 is still with us because it never had any pretensions and suits a lot of guys. Perhaps the 300 Sav. started the trend to obsolesence because of it's early want to be a 30-06 hype. Who knows? I still like the 300 and do most of my deer hunting with it. The 30-30 was rebuilt because I wanted a fun rifle at the range and wanted to be able to shoot spitzers. The 30-30 is actually a very accurate cartridge when shot from a rifle built to shoot accurately. luck to you all in your quests but leave a couple of good shooters on the market for me.

Who are we to judge ones want to gussy up an old shooter. Seems to be a worthwhile hobby, I reckon. Not my bag, but to each his own.
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Stocker, you have confirmed me in a long dormant plan to make a 26" 30-30 on straight grip carbine no. 332003, will replace battered original stocks with set of stocks from postwar "straight grip brush gun" as Doug Murray calls it, use Parker-Hale tang sight and most probably a Lyman Alaskan in a G&H mount. Actions with ser. no. over 266,000 are most suitable as in the 50s Savage would rebuild these, if they were in rimmed calibres, to .250 and .300 without requiring you to pay an extra ten bucks to retemper the receiver, if between 90,000 and 266,000 they were not quite as strong and they heat treated them first. I rather like the maple stocked .30-30 Ack Imp but don't handload so the wildcat is lost on me - serial no. according to seller is 142969 range, medium strength not the strongest as it apparently was not factory reheat treated.

Miki: I wouldn't worry too much about the heat treating for a 30-30. The weak link will always be the cartridge case. My action has a 5 didgit #. I used a 1/10 twist on mine just to see how it worked. I think Remington used the same on their 788 in 30-30. I've no regrets at using the faster twist. When I do my part this rifle will place 10 shots in a anch and a half. I often wonder how much better it would be with a scope but I won't be finding out. For a new forend I pirated some aspects of the Ruger #1 Alexander Henry style. Raised panel on the bottom rather than the sides which blends nicely with the side panels on the butt, slightly backsloped tip with the groove. Butt a little fuller and higher than original stocks. Major checkering coverage. To my eye it looks just fine but the collector people might look askance at it.
<br>For your info the most accurate bullets I have shot in it are 130 grain. The hollow point by Speer won't feed from the magazine but the soft point will. Cast bullets are also very accurate although I think the 1/12 twist might allow slightly higher velocities. However all 150 and 170 grain bullets are also quite accurate too.
<br> best regards.

Stocker, your gun sounds nice. Post a picture of it. Just to let you know I am no collector purist. None of my 99's are even worthy of being mentioned in the same sentence as the word collector!

NY_ I wish I could but don't think I have the equipment and don't know how in any event. Just a basic bare bones computer and cheap printer. besto.

NYsavagefan: If you care to e-mail me your home or business address I could mail you a photo. My e-mail is on the profile. besto.

OK, here's a question I've been wanting to ask.
<br>I have a late 1950's 99 in 358. (SN 92x,xxx) Everything is original but at some point the stock has been refinished (very nicely I might add)
<br>But the stock is still a cheap factory light walnut with pretty poor factory checkering.
<br>I would like to have new wood on the rifle with nice checkering and a lenght of pull suitable to my needs (14.5").
<br>This is my main deer rifle so I'm going to use it every year out in the woods.
<br>The maple stock looked nice, but I really want walnut. Any body out there know where I can get this work done?

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr><p>The maple stock looked nice, but I really want walnut.<p><hr></blockquote>
<br>Your stock IS walnut. Finding replacement wood is tough and expensive. It's possible to find someone who can refinish it properly and recut the checkering, but that's not cheap either (if done right).

Not that hard to find. Cost is relative. Keep the original wood. Even though it's been refinished it still is the original wood and should stay with the gun. If you restock the gun and you have both the old and new wood you can always put the old wood back and return the rifle to its original condition for resale. No matter how fancy,pretty, etc. your new wood is, as long as it is on the rifle the rifle is nothing more than a good looking shooter and has little or no collector value. Try these folks if you're looking to upgrade your wood.
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<br>http://www.gunstocks.com/2-pc_$2.html