Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters JB, ever mess around with Browning rifles?

I have only owned 2 bolt action Browning rifles besides a couple of BLR's. The first is a 7mm-08 micro medallion that I bought for my son when he was 9. He still uses it on occasion and he is 23. I bought it used and never did a thing to it. It shoots around 1 MOA with my handload of 45 grs of Varget and the 120 gr NBT. We have taken it out to 550 yards and shot steel plates with it. That 20" barrel and wood stock will turn heads at that range.

My other Browning bolt action is a Hells Canyon McMillan long range X Bolt in 6.5 Creedmoor. The only thing I did to it was put a Timney trigger in it. It will easily shoot 1/2 to 3/4 MOA. The first day I brought it to the range I shot steel at 550 yards with Hornady factory 143 gr ELDx's.

There does not seem to be much love on the fire for Browning rifles. Is it because barrels are hard to replace (so I am told)? Is the bolt/trigger/receiver of faulty design?

I would buy another one without hesitation, but what are YOUR experiences with them?

Got a 1967 FN Safari 270 that’s gorgeous. She also is the only rifle I have owned that’ll stack bullets almost on top of each other (quarter inch groups at 100) with zero modifications to the rifle. No floating of the barrel, no glass bedding, no trigger adjustment....I was astounded.

If it shot 5 moa I’d probably still her because the wood should have been on an Olympian grade.

Probably will never be for sale.

The reason usually given here for dislike of modern Brownings is that they have complicated actions and triggers, making them prone to malfunction under harsh field conditions. Perhaps that's true. For my part, they're just kinda oogly. Don't like the angular trigger guards, nor the flattened bolt knobs. Don't care for DMs on hunting rifles either, though at least the Brownings have flush ones that can (I think) be topped off without removing them. Miroku makes good barrels, and quality stuff, but for the hefty price you pay for a Browning, there are other, better options IMO, that also don't offend my Luddite style sense.

Interesting because I have never heard/read about a mechanical failure on Brownings. On the other hand, the walker trigger and bolt handles coming off and bolt timing have been written up a bunch on the Rem 700 (which I also use).

I would love to hear about specific mechanical failures. JB?

I have three A Bolt's for the last 30 years or so... never had any problems and they are all very accurate... 3/4" to 1/4" three shot groups. I did lighten the triggers on all three.

That is not going to happen. People sure keep them for awhile.

Browning barrels thru the Hawkeye borescope look a heap smoother than Rem or Salvage. I wonder how those two shoot as well as they do with so many tool marks. CZ is another smooth barrel thru the Hawkeye.

The acid test is at the range, not thru a scope. Just giving my observations.

DF

A couple of guys on here from Alaska and maybe Montana have reported some. Don't recall the details, as I have no dog in the fight. If they were more seemly, I'd not worry about it as I'm prone to malfunction under harsh conditions myself anymore.

I regard malfunctions caused by dirt and ice etc differently than the mechanical failures you describe.

Well, the only way to really prove a rifle went tits up because of conditions is if the same person was carrying 2 different rifles at the same time under the same conditions, in the same manner and one failed (browning) and the other one didn't (take your pick). Not a very realistic scenario, but more proof positive.

BTW, I am not a Browning fan boy nor a detractor. The few that I have owned have been out of box accurate and reliable.

Another complaint I've read here is the barrel threads gall easily and getting the barrels off is more difficult. The only problem I've had with my A-bolt is the duratouch coating turned into a sticky mess which was a pita to remove.

Like Pappy, I just find the modern Browning rifles fuggly, and for the same reasons, just to add gold triggers. I really don't like gold triggers on a rifle...I can live with them on a fancy shotgun.

The only Browning rifles I have first hand experience with are my Belgian .22 Auto which, for this discussion, I'd consider in a different light than the CF's, and my brother's and a couple of friends' several BLR's. They are '80's era rifles, all .308's and I would have to say they are nice handling, accurate rifles. For a while my brother had a "long action" BLR in 7mm RM, but even he realized it was an ungainly, weird in some way, rifle. I think it went down the road. On a few occasions over the years I've had to fix issues with those BLR's, primarily caused by dirt, rough handling and lack of maintenance. Once you get some foreign matter in those actions there's often no easy way to get it out. Just my experience.

It's no secret that enclosed, complicated triggers can get futzed up by stuff, and obvious that simple ones are less prone to that, no side-by-side scientific testing needed. Still, I have a several Timney's now, plus Howa factory that serve me well and have great pulls. Same is true of my sole remaining Ruger LC6 (out of the box), and the old M70s I've used. Whatever works, works. Have a hard time with oogly though.

Once had an A bolt in 25-06 with a boss system. Rifle was astonishingly accurate. On the chrono it was found to be a little on the slow side compared to other 25’s I have seen but it still worked like a charm on PA white tails. I traded it off in favor of a shotgun for trap shooting. The boss system shortens the barrel about 2 “ so part of the reason for being slow. But it had trouble getting to 2800 with 115 not bullets.

I can't comment on the functionality of Browning rifles because I could never get past their fugliness and the price. These are purely personal observations, but I would have to carry it! You don't see many around my neck of the woods. Most of the people called them girly man rifles because of the trigger, so I suppose, for that reason, sales were doomed around here.

I remember looking for a bolt action 22 Hornet many years ago, but the pickings were lean. I saw an ad at the LGS. They were having a Browning sale and had 2 Hornets! I was excited, until I saw their Browning display. I understood what the others meant when they talked about their looks. The stocks looked clunky and very shiny, as if they were made of glass or porcelain. They looked glitzy. Today, I would label them as 'meterosexy'. Just not personally appealing, because of the gold trigger, black forend tips and the "sale" price tags, I passed.

For me, it was the look and higher price. I realize they changed the look of them over time. I am sure they shoot fine, or else they wouldn't be making them.

Have owned a number of Browning rifles over the years, including a couple of Belgian made bolts, one of which was a "special run" .280 Remington, made for a hardware store in Billings, Montana. Have also owned one Japanese-made BAR, one BLR and a Belgian T-Bolt .22 LR. All were more than accurate enough, though the BLR .30-06 was among the most accurate .30-06 hunting rifles I've ever owned, regardless of action. My NULA Model 24 .30-06 is the only other one I recall right now that would beat it, and then not by much.

But your question is primarily about the bolt-actions from the A-Bolt onward. Have owned three A-Bolts, though the first was actually Eileen's. It was made in 1986, the year the A-Bolt appeared, and was sent to me for a magazine review--a .270 Winchester with a non-shiny walnut stock. It was accurate from the get-go, and also surprisingly light, 7-1/2 pounds with scope.

At the time Eileen had only been hunting two years, using my grandmother's old Remington 722 .257 Roberts, and not only wanted something a little more powerful for elk, but something lighter. Having no prejudices about what rifles should look like, she liked the A-Bolt, among other things due to the detachable magazine, which snapped inside the hinged floorplate. She always had troubles loading a magazine from the top in cold weather, due to some arthritis in her fingers, and could load the magazine at home, then snap it into place once we left the pickup to hunt. The writer's discount was also nice (around wholesale) and we didn't have much money back then.

We also didn't have many rifles, so I worked up three handloads for it, one for varmints using the 90-grain Sierra hollow-point, one with 130-grain Hornady Interlocks for derr-sized game, and one with 150-grain Partitions for larger game. With the 90 sighted-in an inch high at 100 yards, the other two loads were an inch or so higher, so we didn't have to dink with the scope. Over the next several years she killed animals from rockchucks to a bull moose with the rifle, at one point making 10 one-shot kills on big game in a row, including the moose, her first elk and a pronghorn at around 450 yards.

The only problem we had with it was early on, while I was still working up handloads for the article. It started misfiring, but switching to Federal primers from CCIs solved that--for a little while. It had to go back to Browning for a new firing-pin spring, luckily before hunting season opened, and never gave us any problem after that, even when hunting in below-zero weather.

I had two A-Bolts, both with a BOSS, the brake version. Both were test rifles, and while accurate I was never impressed by the BOSS, both because it was among the loudest muzzle brakes I've encountered, and because after dialing-in a load, accuracy could change with temperature. Back then the Hodgdon Extremes hadn't quite appeared, and factory ammo in particular could be very temp-sensitive--and the BOSS was partly promoted as a solution for making factory ammo shoot accurately. Otherwise the rifles worked fine, very accurate with good triggers.

The first X-Bolt I've fooled with was a .308 the first year they were introduced. It was assigned to me on an "industry" hunt for pronghorns, and was VERY accurate with the Winchester ammo supplied. (It did not have a BOSS.) But I was full up with .308s so did not buy it. Also borrowed a .243 for a magazine article, which also shot VERY well.

The only verified story I've heard about an A-Bolt/X-Bolt field failure came from a gunsmith I've known for decades. Somebody had taken a stainless A-Bolt on an Alaskan hunt, and partway through the bolt rusted shut, apparently because the guy never unloaded the chamber, and never oiled the bolt (or anything else) during the hunt. In fact the rifle came back on the flight from Alaska with the round in the chamber. On the other hand, the grizzly guide I hunted with in 2009 had a stainless A-Bolt .338 Winchester Magnum, and had never had any problem with it, apparently because he did take care of it.

Thank you for the detailed reply JB. It reflects my thoughts on accuracy and reliability and dispels the bad reputation innuendos from non owners.

That doesn't sound like a good idea...

No, it doesn't--but from what I recall the rifle wouldn't fire. They tried that, with no result.

Yes, thanks, John. A lot of great information documented here. I appreciate you writing it out.

Like others here, I could never get past the looks of them. A hunting buddy of a cousin of mine had one, it always worked, but it was kinda clunky to my eyes. I DID own a Belgian BAR in .30/06 that was 100% reliable and fairly accurate, too, but it was too heavy for my tastes, and I swapped it off for something or other.

I do know several people with the Micros in .22 Hornet that have nothing but good to say about them, but Browning has seen fit to discontinue those rifles, probably the best .22 Hornets ever made by anyone (and I own a CZ that is wonderful). If I could find one of those Hornets, I'd probably grab it, even though I don't need it at all.