I guess that I have owned close to 100 different Mauser hunting rifles over the past 48+ years, my first was a Brno 21H, 7x57. among my favourite rifle makes/models.

I have HAD alloy BM on many of these and have had various issues with it, so, long ago, I started changing out to steel only and this CAN be lightened, should one wish to do so. It is MUCH more rugged, an important factor in remote mountain backpack and horsepack hunting and one can get within about 3 oz.of alloy items, to me, that is preferable.

Case in point, a while back, a friend gave me a stonemint F.I.E. FN Musketeer in .308Norma, among the "best"cartridges for BC use I have ever seen. It had alloy and cheap alloy sights. so, I pulled that crap off, installed some steel Recknagel sights I had lurking in one of my parts bins and found a pre-owned Blackburn steel BM here.

I sent this to Martini Gunmakers,who installed a Dakota 3-pce. safety and cleaned the Sako trigger these came with and then sent to a guy who has done about a dozen of my recent synthetic stock jobs. I found a used Bansner, he put it on, painted it and GunKoted the Blackburn and THERE is a NICE "mountain rifle" at just over 8 lbs. scoped with Leupy QRWs and a Leupy small variable.

I decided to use one of the older Leupy 3.5x10x50 scopes I had sitting in one of my safes, bought years ago, for hunting Blacktails on Vancouver Is. when most shots are at dawn and dusk and this now is so nicely balanced, seems just under 8.5 lbs and is about "perfect" for the round it chambers.

I like Pachy Decels. for Bansners, have three customs so stocked now, one is the 21H-7x57 I bought from you about five years ago, it is now modded by Martini's and the stock is much changed and this rifle, now a .280Rem. is absolutely WOW in handling, balance and overall suitability for our usual hunting here.

So, for me, I would use one of the old "pushbutton" FN steel BMs, have it modded to lose weight, put it in the Bansner, a fine stock, IMHO, NOT a Micky Edge, but, a helluva lot for the $$$$ and you should be happy.