Who makes it?
True short action bombproof durable.

Remington 700 or 7.

This should be interesting.

FWIW, and I'm no expert on the topic, but I've long thought that if I were in a situation where parts and help were scarce ,and I had to rely on my rifle for food and protection from critters, I'd choose a Ruger MKII. Simple and strong.

i've never broken any brand. they are all good

I've not used one but the Tikka T3x Arctic might be in the running.

The Ruger Scout rifle might be as well.

The Remington 700 action is the one most copied by custom gun builders. That says something.

there was never a complaint about Remington's silver soldered bolt handles coming off or trigger issues, ever

It’d be tough to beat anything in a synthetic stock and based on a stainless Remington 700 action or one of its clones

Which action's bolt is one able to disassemble, clean and service without tools? To me, bomb-proof doesn't mean "never needs cleaning/maintaining", it means "simple to clean/maintain".

Bolt guns are like vehicles. No matter the wrapper, they'll all gitcha to work and back. Your preference is the determining factor.

Bulletproof? Wby Mk V.

Nothing wrong with aftermarket Remington 700 clones. Nothing wrong with most Remington 700's on the commercial market. Howa 1500's are a good safe bet. Ruger 77's & MK II's are flagships in their fleet.

I currently have an affinity for Sako 85's. Been keeping my freezer full for several years now with the Sako 85's I hunt with.

I like that idea, but it'd have to be a model with iron sights in case scope gave up.

Unless someone has done destructive testing, any answer anyone gives will be them talking out of their ass.

Ruger, or Winchester. In my 30 plus years of guiding professionally I've seen more Remington's fail in the field than all other brands combined. Bomb proof certainly doesnt describe them.

Agreed.

The Savage Model 110 has been around a long time (since the late 1950's) which should tell you something about durability and it's design.......

I would definitely disagree.

As a guy who managed embassy armories, I can tell you that their extractors are a very weak link. Terrible things that were prone to failure under heavy use. The only thing less reliable than a Remington extractor on an M24 is a Leupold's ability to track properly.

Years ago, while having argument with some other teenagers about which was best, Ford or Chevy, I asked a guy who worked in an auto parts store this question............do you sell more parts for Ford or Chevy, and me being a Chevy fan at the time, was expecting him to say Ford, which would prove that Fords broke down more often than a Chevy. He answered this way...........I sell more parts for Chevrolet, and when he said that, the Ford fans went to laughing.............until he went on to say this........because Chevy's are a lot more popular than Fords, which they were at the time.


Not questioning what you have seen, but the Remington 700's have far outsold any other bolt action rifles over the past 50-60 years, so it only stands to reason that you have seen more Remington's "fail" because you have seen more Remingtons.

The Mauser action is pretty tough. The Ruger Mk II seems to be the best clone except for maybe the Winchester pre 64's. Right now I'd be looking for a Ruger Scout should the AR's become illegal.

kwg

I would go with a Tikka. Only weak point is the plastic bolt shroud, easily remedied, and won't disable function.

Like most on 24hr. I have accumulated many different brands of bolt guns.

One of the most durable owned by me is the FN FNH PBR with the controlled round feed.
This action is built around the Winchester CRF.

I like my 700 actions with the 5R milspec platforms, the FN's quality is just better.

...or they break more often.

Any rifle with a Sako style or M16 style extractor, or Mauser type is fine for me. I have used the Tikkas in lots of late season hunts in sub zero temps and they work have never had any issues.

How many angels can dance on the head of a pin? Same answer.

It certainly does. It says the Remington 700 is the easiest to copy!
For a rugged hunting rifle which can be disassembled and assembled in the field, without tools, and which is most likely to function as it should, the Mauser 98 is still the best. Since the OP specified a modern short action, he is willing to compromise a bit.
The Ruger 77 is a good choice. In the years I was gunsmithing, in a busy store, I saw very few come into the shop because they had a problem. Of the top four sellers, (Remington, Winchester, Browning, and Ruger) they were the least likely to come into the shop. I had one brought in which had been an Eskimo rifle, used for polar bear, walrus, seals, etc. It was rusted on every surface, the stock was beat to hell and the barrel was bulged in three places, but it still worked! I bought the action and I still use it, forty years later. GD

I guess you have to define bombproof. I've seen very few actions blown apart due to pressure but the few I have seen have all have been Winchester 70's. I'm not saying this is anything other than a coincidence.

Good thread , lots of good answers. I was thinking my ss M77 mk2 boat paddle with an extra scope and rings pre zero ' d in the kit might be the tits. Unless he sold it I think hookeye has one he wants to sell. Mb

If Kimber would do a minor re-engineer of their 84M/8400 short-mag footprint adding a 3.1" SA mag box (and of course the proper mods to bolt-stop/ejector) then add an "open-style" old-school M70 type trigger we'd be in cotton so tall it'd hide Andre the Giant.

Sako 75's.....................

Ringworm: Remington 700 is the answer to your question.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

I have killed a pile of animals with my Ruger MK II S.S. 280. Focused solely on the spot, stalk & kill, the rifle never ever gave me pause or distracted me task at hand. It is always a point & shoot tool.

Hard to believe there is a factory bolt gun out there tougher or more durable than a Ruger MKII stainless with boat paddle stock.

I thought a similar thread was done a few years ago. except w/o the SA stipulation. I think the consensus of most of the opinions based a lot on Alaska members was a Ruger 77.

I've had stellar luck with my R700's. I don't burn military armory level of rounds but we shoot a considerable amount most every week. I've got one old 700SA that went through 3 22-250 barrels including at least one set-back-a-thread- and-rechamber when I was mad at the pasture poodles. It still lives as a 250 savage mountain rifle clone now - thing is smooth as glass and total parts breakage is zero. I can't eve begin to estimate the number of rounds through that thing. I might be missing something but before our canoe accident we had R700's from 22-250 to 300RUM to 375 H&H.....I can remember a BDL floorplate pin falling out and that's the only failure.

Or just a front sight and NECG rear peep.

No chance. But probably the Ruger action,

This^^^^^
With Savage 110 following

greydog;
Top of the morning to you sir, I hope the winter has been as mild in your part of the world as it's been here and all in your world who matter are healthy.

Thanks for sharing that story and your real world experience. For sure you would have seen a bunch of stuff back in the day. I still recall you were able to help me with a Sako from that era with a bum trigger, when most others said I was hallucinating.

Way back in the day I recall a Ruger advert where they'd bought a .308 back from some Australian buffalo culler or something like that. It had been documented with a huge amount of rounds and was still ticking along just fine.

As some have mentioned, the T3 Arctic is likely quite decent, but again it was partially picked because Berretta would allow it to be built here in Canada and my understanding is that Ruger wasn't interested in outsourcing to anyone, so the Scout was eliminated from the trials then and there.

Thanks again and all the best to you all 4 valleys east.

Dwayne

I’d lean towards a Ruger 77 myself but just my opinion.

Anyone recall how many rounds Nosler put through one (N)ULA action testing their ammo and bullets?


M7

Too much emphasis is placed on the "advantages" of SA actions.
All things being equal, you're talking about 3/8"-1/2" difference in length and 1-2 oz in weight, hardly worth fretting over in practical terms.
And as to the stiffer action argument for SA's, quantifying that will be difficult to determine, again in any practical terms.
More trigger time will trump technical minutia in most cases.

Go with the action that is most robust for your needs and if its a SA fine, but if a standard action is a better option given the parameters, pull out the wallet.

I’ll fudge a little. For strength a weatherby Mark V.
For accuracy. Remington 700 or Kleinguenther k-15. ( lock time )
Hasbeen

I'd vote for Ruger. I have a stainless synthetic Hawkeye in.308 that fills the bill. I have several earlier Rem 700's that have served me well, but for durability in a factory rifle I would pick Ruger.

Remingtons fail in the field? In what way exactly? I know their triggers suck.

I'll hazard a guess that for a guide in the Yukon, failure to fire would be the 1st and biggest 700 Headache. It's not really the fault of the rifle, it's the fault of the owner for not cleaning the gunk outta the bolt and trigger occasionally. That said, unless you have a 700 bolt disassembly tool, they're a pain in the rear to clean, so, nobody does it. The bolt stop can also get gunked-up and get hung up in the down position, causing the bolt to come out while cycling it. Not a big deal to folks who are familiar with the rifle but it'd unhinge some folks who aren't.

If I were a guide, I'd have a M700 bolt disassembly tool in camp. If your client can't give you an acceptable answer to "When was the last time you had your firing pin out and cleaned the bolt"?, then it gets done here and now.

I had a "That's never happened before" with a M70 floor plate accidental opening fall of '18. I'm sneaking on an elk I'd shot, dropped, and he popped back to his feet then laid back down. Rifle is on bi-pods and as I get to where I want to shoot again, he gets back on his feet and starts to run off again. I hit him a 2nd time, doesn't phase him. Go to run another round home only to realize that the floor plate had popped open and scattered my "belly-rounds" at my feet. Now he's not going very fast having 2 extra holes, and the country is open so it's no biggie to nab a cartridge @ my feet, run it home and the 3rd one anchored him for good. Which reminds me, I still need to use a file on the floor plate and get a little better engagement from the latch.........

I wonder why the lowly Mossberg MVP series gets no love here? Daughter got one for a pickup rifle during calving time a few years ago, it has had a very rough childhood, living in the pickup for 4 or 5 years. She is not much on maintenance, I think it gets a squirt of Break free once a year, whether it needs it or not. She likes the big magazine for the running shots.

Weatherby does not make a true short action MK V; the 6 lug for , like, a 7mm-08 is a long action with a block. That being said; i have one in 7mm-08 and it is an excellent action and lighter than most people realize.
If my terminology is incorrect ;somebody may explain it better.

There was a thread that was basically like this in a rifle section just a few months ago. Tikkas voted on several times& with some confirming harsh condition photos from Mackay.

I voted the MKII Ruger & I'm not known as big 77 fan. But have been fiddling with one some & do like them better than the tanger. I pushed the idea of the Scout & I like the platform. But the controlled round feeding seems to be a hindrance in some cases. The Scout uses the AICS mag & if that's lost, Ya can't just drop a round in the chamber & use it single shot as the extractor won't go over the rim. It seems that with out a mag, I'd have fish a shell under the extractor on the bolt & feed it that way. A con IMO.

A thought on Rem bolt handles. Never seen one fail in person so not sure of the time of failure or how long it lasted. Have seen rifle bolt handles of many brands get kicked, stomped, & beat on due to stupid loads or dirty chambers. Did most 700 bolt failures happen when new or soon after? If so, I have an idea of the cause & it seems it only happened during a certain time frame. Whatever the cause, it seems that the bad ones were fixed & the problem solved afterward.
Or, did this problem persist over a period of time??

Oh, & the walker triggers? Until I accidentally kill the wife's cat or worse, I'll stand by the trigger. Yes I've seen some quirky ones, ones that some jackass had been messing with adjustments & didn't have a clue what they were doing. Or, another jackass that didn't know how to clean a rifle, much less lubricate it.. To touchy if things like that make it dangerous, fix it to keep jackasses from screwing it up??? Make it like some Ruger triggers I 've seen, make the trigger where it takes all the effort a jackass has to make it go off. About 8-9# is about par for the course. Not exaggerating. Trigger pulls that my gauge couldn't read. So just weight the rifle & scope combo & then see if ya can pick up the gun with the trigger. Now that's a safe trigger. Hard to vote unreasonable stuff like that.

Most factory rifles can be made even better. I've been using a Remington 700 Classic for 41 years and have never had a problem. I bought an old 721 a while back with a broken extractor. I'll machine the bolt for a Sako style. That would be a good mod to do on any 700. If oil is present inside the trigger assembly in cold weather you might have problems. the pre 64 model 70 trigger is simple and easy to clean. I never cared for the tang safety on the Rugers. Just too much linkage. Weahterby. Excellent. We've got allot of fine choices to pick from!

Hello back to you,
This has been absolutely, the easiest winter we've had in the last thirty years. I don't think we have ever had a year where, at some point, we didn't have at least ten inches of snow on the ground. This year, we might have had five and it didn't stay. 23F right now, so a little cooler but still, not bad.
I have, indeed, seen a lot of used and abused rifles of various types but the bolt actions which stood up to the abuse better than any others were the Mausers; followed closely by the Lee Enfields. Of course, neither of these are "modern" actions. They are just stone reliable.
One thing which has always impressed me though, is how well, in spite of their complexity, the Winchester Model 94's continue to function in spite of neglect and downright abuse.
I know one fellow ,up in Barriere, who has probably killed more cougars than most others will ever see. His cougar rifle was a Winchester 94, 30-30. It had probably never been cleaned, the barrel was rusty and bulged near the muzzle and the rear sight elevator was a matchstick. This thing rode in the back of his Bronco with the hound stepping all over it and, as far as I know, only got taken out when there was a cat to be killed. But it always worked. Another one I saw was at a ranch south of Calgary. This one, a 25-35, was leaned up in the corner of the corral and spent most of the time right there, rain or shine. It was there to shoot any marauding coyote and I would have bet money the coyotes were pretty safe but they were not! They were usually at 100 yds or less but he accounted for quite a few.
One customer of mine flat loved Mausers. He liked them because parts were interchangeable, regardless of where they were built, and he could replace a firing pin with no tools. He admitted he has never broken a firing pin but if he ever did, he was ready! He hunted on horseback all the time a spent a lot of time in some remote camps. He had a kit with parts he thought he might need someday and always carried it in a saddlebag. He never used anything but the cleaning stuff in that kit.
I have another customer who hunts all over the world and he likes his Remington 700's. He has missed out on a big ram when larch needles in the trigger caused the rifle to fail to fire. He has had ejection issues. He broke a handle off. He still likes them. He told me of one incident which was a bit of a cautionary tale.
He was carrying a rifle which I had built for him; built, of course on a Remington 700 action (though that had no influence on the story). It had a Brown Precision stock which I had put on and painted. Like any gunsmith making a semi-custom rifle, I inletted the bolt handle nicel into the stock with, maybe, 1/32 inch clearance all around. He was hiking into a basin when he saw, coming toward him a good sized grizzly. He was carrying the rifle with an empty chamber and rushed to chamber a round. Now, he was using those rubber scope covers which were attached to a rubber band and he flipped this off as he went to chamber the round. The damn rubber band got trapped under the bolt handle and wedged into the nicely inletted slot when he tried to close the bolt. He couldn't close the bolt and, since he had tried mightily, had it wedged in well enough that he couldn't open it either. The bear was just ambling toward him. The breeze was blowing down the hill so the bear had no scent of him but he figured it would have to see him pretty soon. I he struggled with the stuck bolt a little more and finally, with the bear less than 20 feet away, he just stepped uphill, off the trail and stood there. The bear went right on by, in no hurry, until he caught scent, whereupon, he jumped down over the hill and could be heard, still running, for quite some time. There were a few lessons here: Don't panic, stay calm, stay away from rubber bands, and, if you build rifles, maybe a little more gap can't hurt. I don't have rubber bands on any of my own rifles so I should be OK. GD

I hunt some pretty rough terrain(young oak thickets laced with multiflora rose and blackberries, ravines, and the like, in all sorts of weather) and use a Ruger Hawkeye AW in .308 for that. It takes a beating and suffers not at all, from what I can tell. If I had to pick one to walk away with for the rest of my days, it would likely get the nod.

The rifle is deadly with a 150 CT ballistic tip, which works great for anything around here. Got plenty of those, buddy got a big box of them from an Olin plant he was installing cranes in, said one of the guys told him they had an overrun on some bullets and did he want some. He brought them home and gave them to me because he knew I loaded, and he didn’t. Been using them for years, got enough to hunt and shoot with for the rest of my life, barring a war or similar heavy use.