I was hoping I could get advice on purchasing a new rifle for my kids to use, preferably from those of you that have gone through this process with your kids already. I have calibers that are adequate currently but was thinking of getting a compact rifle for them to use with a shorter length of pull. I looked at the Ruger American (already have a full sized .243) but I'm don't think I want any more rifles with an 18" barrel. The new tikka compact has a smaller stock and 20" barrel which is appealing. I already have a .308 and .223 rem in the tikka t3 platform so I know what I'm getting there as well. I'm debating on getting either a .243 or .308 in that package or cutting down one of my current stocks to a shorter length of pull and buying a BC medalist when I need to go back to a full size stock. Will it be too barrel heavy with the cut stock? I have Cabelas gift cards to buy the new rifle and have an extra scope or two around.

Options I'm looking at:

1) Cut the stock on a current rifle (spend cards on other stuff)
2) buy a tikka t3 compact
3) Which caliber .243 or .308 (I already reload both)
4) Put 3x9 conquest on the .243 RAR and not worry about them crawling the stock. Mine seems to have +4 inches of eye relief.

I'd go 243 in whatever rig you like. Probably a 6x42 Leupold too.

If you have a Remington 700 or a Weatherby Vanguard/Howa in your safe you can simply buy a Blackhawk Axiom stock for it and be able to adjust the LOP from kid size to adult with the flick of a lever. The stock also has some spring loaded recoil reduction built in too. I put my Weatherby 243 action in an Axiom, mounted a Minox ZA3 (plenty of ER) scope on it and started my 9 YO with a gun that fit him great and kicked very little. The bonus is that I can still use the gun by pressing the lever and extending the stock to full length. I am 6'4 and he was about 4'8" when he started shooting it. The pistol grip is easy to control and the fore end is flat for easy shooting from a rest. The barrel is 100% free floated and no bedding is required. 5 minutes w/ a screwdriver and a supplied Allen wrench and you are ready to shoot. I have never had it to the range yet when Someone hasn't asked to check it out.

I've bought several 110s at the local Pawn shop with cheap scopes for $250-$285 out the door(no tax),some on the plain non checkered wooden stock.I would go this route ,and throw on a decent scope if was gonna cut one down,because kids grow fast,and when he out grows the cut stock you can get a thumbhole stock ,or whatever type he wants pretty cheap...Assuming your talking rifle for deer hunting I would choose 308,or similar over 243 because even if a kid shoots great off a bench he,s likely gonna be a little shakey on his first few deer.

i'd check out boyd's stocks, both for weight to kill recoil and for the ability to cut one down and then put the adult stock on later.

.243 will kill deer fine. go with a 4x or similar low power scope so the wobbles don't distract.

Which ever caliber and brand, length of pull is the most important to get perfect.

You can buy a RAR compact stock from Ruger for $50 as I did last week.

DEERE, me too. As a matter of fact you could probably get your money damn near back at the pawn shop for it when the kid outgrows it.-Muddy

Buy a 700 youth or a Vanguard youth or a Howa Ranchland Compact.

When they get older, finding a more bigger stock will be no problem. Or better yet, order them a McMillan now and bed the barreled action into when they're grown.

And be UBER sure that a youth stock is even needed.



Travis

My oldest daughter just bought a M700 youth .243 package gun for $350. Cheap 3x9 scope, 20" barrel and a plastic stock with removable spacers for LOP, matte black finish. She loves it, and a 700 is...well...a 700, so we can always add a stock or whatever later. I did add a Timney trigger rather than dealing with the XMP recall. I'll send the old trigger in so I can put it back on the gun if she wants to sell it. That seemed like the best way to go for us over one of the economy bolt actions.

RAR Compact in 223

My choice for my 12 y/o daughter.

Marlin compact XS-7 in 7mm-08. I started her on 100 gr bullets with unique and know she is on full power loads.
She can shoot it well also!

200 yard group here.

That might be the way I go with my son, or I may just buy the full size rifles, trim to 22" if need be, and buy youth stocks. Chances are my kid will end up being a pretty tall specimen, as dad is a genetic freak and he's pretty tall for his age.

BTW, I'll get him a .223/6x42, .243/4x28, and 7-08/4x28 Leupolds.

Especially if he or she inherited your gorilla LOP....


For the OP, I'd roll Remmy youth model in .243 Win. Dump it into a nice McMillan after he grows a bit. Would make a great rifle.

From 17 Mach 2 to 45/70 + shotgun barrels in 410 or 28ga. Youth stocks abound.



DMc

+1 ... Order a Boyd's stock with short LOP and cushy recoil pad for one of your existing .243's. Fixed 4x Leupold scope. Go kill deer. When he outgrows the youth stock, swap it out for the original adult-sized factory stock.

Just did this to an XL7 in .270Win for a grand daughter last year. Gave it to her for Christmas. Loading reduced recoil loads for practice to get her ramped up.

If this is truly for kids, get a RAR Compact in 223. Put a Leupold 2.5x or 4x on it.

Thank me later, as I've tried just about every other config with my kids and others, and this is the type of setup that will bring smiles and good shooting real quick.

Heres a little unorthodox set up for kids that has worked fantastic for my son who is 7 1/2.
Remington 700 SPS Varmint cut down the barrel from 26" to 22" and cut the cheap SPS stock to fit (I think 12.5"). He has one in 7mm-08 which is hard to find but I know they make the same gun in .308 which is virtually the same caliber just different bullet.
This might seem a little on he heavy side for a kid but he never carries the gun by himself at this age and when shooting we always have a good rest. The weight combined with some reduced recoil loads makes the recoil on the gun almost nil.
Remington makes a great managed recoil factory load for 308 and 7mm-08 that are perfect!
As they get older you can drop it into a better stock that fits and gradually increase the loads until they can handle full strength.
Last year he hammered 3 mid sized whitetails and 3 hogs inside of 115yds. Pass throughs on all.
Also, this eliminates going through 3 different calibers and guns as they grow. Can't say enough good things about the 7mm-08 with reduced loads for a youth gun.
Good Luck

I would get the RAR in 308 and an additional youth stock. Then work up some reduced loads. I'm talking the truly reduced ones possibly using non rifle powders.

Either that or The same in 223 if the guy here on the fire gets the mags worked out for longer bullets.

Here's my son's setup. Rem youth 243 with McSwirley, 13" LOP with 1/2" pad. Not much recoil with light loads. As he grows we'll go to a 1" pad...

Savage has rebate right now. Buy Savage Axis in youth stock from Bud's. See the instruction on internet how to lighten trigger pull weight. When your youth grows out of the rifle sell it for more than you paid and buy another adult size rifle. The Axis is light and youth stock is 12 1/2' lop. Axis can be very accurate after correcting trigger pull.
If money is no factor buy Howa youth.

You didn't say how old the kids were or how tall.

I started my son at 5 years old and the youth stocks on most guns were still too long for him at the time.

I had bought a .243 Handi-Rifle about the time he was born as I found a great deal on one in my local gun shop. When it came time to get him started I found a youth butt stock with an 11 or 11.5 inch LOP. I filled the butt stock with lead weight to manage the recoil for him. He was a little under 40 pounds at the time. He killed 3 deer with that gun over a 2 year period.

I also cut the butt stock down on a Ruger 10/22 to match the Handi Rifle and he shot a lot of .22 LR in preparation for hunting with the .243.

He hit a little growth spurt at age 7 and wanted a gun with a handle on the side (bolt action) like mine. While he was taller then, he hadn't gained much weight, and was still sub 50lbs. We found a Remington youth sps with camo stock and got one in .243. I pulled the recoil pad off and filled the butt stock with copper plated BB's to help with recoil, and he can hold 1 inch groups at 100 yds. with a bipod and rear rest.

The scope is a Redfield Revolution 3-9x40 with the accu-range reticle, the same scope we had on the single shot. The Leupolds, and the Redfield Revolution are just easy scopes to get behind and are forgiving of less than perfect cheek weld to me. They have the eye relief needed for kids, although with a .243 that is not critical. Some people prefer fixed powers for kids and I started with a fixed 4x myself. But my son has never tinkered with the scope at all, he just shoots it on whatever power I put it on and has never asked about it. The first couple of years I kept it around 4x just to help him find the target in the scope and now we usually hunt around 6x and use the 9x at the range.

The 20 inch barrel has a noticeable muzzle blast to me but he never shoots without hearing protection (electronic muffs, so he can hear me talk to him but not the gun going off). With him, I think the noise bothers him more than the recoil.

For ammo, we are using 95 grain Fusions now, but have used blue box Federal 100 grains also. I was going to hand load for his gun, but both of those loads shoot right at 1 inch with him shooting and I don't think my hand loads would be much of an improvement on that.

If I was starting over with him, an AR type rifle in .223 with the adjustable stock would be on my list as it would be a gun he could use the rest of his life. The suggestion of the bolt action with ar style stock would also work well as they grow.

Bob.

Model 7 or 700 youth in 243 or 308. Easy to find. Can find replacement stock very easy. Will last a lifetime.

I am still a firm believer in the compactness of a contender w/youth buttstock. An added feature is the ethics that a single-shot mandates from it's handler. A principle lost on today's high capacity firearms.

Ethics is shootin' that [bleep] until it stays down.



Travis

I had built a Faux TI in 22/250 that I use myself. Also have a beater factory Mountain Rifle stock here that will be cut down and fitted to the aforementioned rifle. Loaded with 53gr TSX, it should do fine for the grandkids when the time comes.

Get a compact Tikka T3 in .308
Put a nice muzzle brake on it.
Load some lighter loads and let the kids get used to the gun.
Make it fun, shooting over hunting packs, shooting cans of corn pop cans reactive targets etc.

I did something similar for my scrawny little 12 year old daughter and she loves to shoot rifles.