Who made the Western Field rifles sold by Montgomery Wards 20-25 years ago or more?. I just picked up a pretty nice one in 30-06.Didn't need it,but price was too low to pass up

Depends on the Model.

Heym, FN, Zastava, and many others.

Ha! I remember these, I knew an old dude that killed a pile of deer with his Western Field bolt action 30-06 back in the day......Hb

Could also be Mossberg

The shotguns were definitely Mossbergs, and probably some of the last Western Field rifles, too, by that time, the Mausers were drying up. It's been a long time since I saw a Montgomery Wards catalog......

Yeah, it's been awhile. The last Mongomery Ward's catalogs were put out in 1985.

I’ve got one made by Heym, it’s a pretty nice rifle, shoots good too.
https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbt...-westernfield-mauser-revived#Post5203306

It has a slide type serrated safety on the right side. appears to be a Model 732

Looks like this.

That is a Mossberg 810 house brand rifle.

Some, maybe most, of the Mossberg 800/810 series rifles have plastic trigger housings that can become soft and distorted if they get too hot, like they can if left in the back window rack in a pickup truck. You might want to take the barreled action out of the stock and check for any distortion in the trigger housing, if for no other reason than peace of mind.

Yep. Mossberg made that one, as noted. Their model 810 series. My dad bought one from a guy years ago for the same reason as you; low price and decent truck gun fodder if nothing else. I refinished it for him a couple years ago and shot it a bit, trying different loads. His has cast trigger housing and bottom metal. Even with the best load I worked up for it, that thing won't do better than 2" at 100 yds consistently, no matter what I tried with stock, etc. Lipstick on a pig began to come to mind, so I quit messing with it and left it be. I reckon that's as good as can be expected and since he'll never shoot it beyond 100, anyway, I suppose it doesn't matter, anyway. He's hunted with it a few times, particularly the first couple seasons after I refinished it for him. No thing of beauty, and not even close to his nicest or best rifle, but it always works, no issues. This is the only picture I have with it:

The 1st gun I ever shot was an old Western Field bolt action 410. Couldn't reach the trigger with the stock against my shoulder, so resting it on top of my shoulder proved to be a mistake. Dang thing busted my lip and my nose. After my Papaw and Daddy got through laughing, and got the bleeding stopped, I grabbed Papaw's new (at the time) little Browning 22 auto takedown and never missed a beat. But it was a while before I shot the 410 again. Unfortunately, when we were picking which offspring wanted which firearm, it was going to be my 2nd pick but my brother grabbed it. Couldn't blame him as it was the 1st firearm he ever shot as well and we killed a few squirrels with it until we got our 16 gauges.

The trigger guard is metal, part of the bottom piece. It is marked Model 730 on the barrel

So is my dad's. That's the Western Field "model". You asked who made it, so I was just giving you the background on who made it and what proprietary action it is. Same scenario as the Howa 1500 and all the other labels applied to that action over the years.

The Western Field 730 is a Mossberg.

Yes,Thanks.Appreciate all the replies. I'm doing a good barrel cleaning now

I tried several things to improve the accuracy of one in .243. My gunsmith talked me into full length bedding it. It worked like a charm.

My stepbrother had an 800 Mossberg in .243 that killed a few deer for him, and another guy carried an 810 with iron sights when he came down the hill to try to run us off a patch of ground across the fence from his place.

I think he was trying to keep us out of his dope patch.

We had permission to be on the place across the fence from his place, in any event. He sure was nervous when we walked that patch of woods..

I've owned 6 or 7 Mossberg 800 series rifles in 22-250, 243, and 308, mostly the mannlicher stocked 800AM (308), 800BM (243), AND 800CM (22-250) versions. One of the 800BMs was just a shooter and a pretty good shooter at that despite the crappy trigger and square forearm geometry.

Interesting. That'd be one of the things I considered, but stopped short of for reason given. If Dad was worried about it, I might try it and see, but he's not. Maybe a "someday when I'm bored" project to add to the list.

How much did it tighten it up; i.e. what before and what after?

I saw one for sale today in 243 for $399, not a bad looking rifle for the price.

I'm going to take this one out and shoot it Tuesday. I spent all day cleaning copper fouling out. Barrel looks pretty good now. I took the see thru scope rings off and set the same scope back on with std. Weaver rings .The scope is one of those $20 Bushnell Banner 4X that were being sold back in the mid 70's.I had one on a Model 88 Win. in the 60's and killed a few deer and elk with that scope. That was back when there wasn't any self centering reticules.

If the gun shows promise, I might do the full length bedding. The trigger is pretty darn good the way it is

I remember the Wards stores, I liked to go in their sporting goods depts when I was little.

I remember back in 1966-1967 they had racks of old military rifles. I bought a 1903 Springfield for $12 that I shot in DCM matches for several years

Having owned a few Mossberg 800s, I think that the Marlin XS-7s that CDNN is closing out for $240 are both a better rifle and a much better deal.

Yep, definitely agree. But, Dad paid $75 for his; no rust, no damage, just an old hunting rifle; so, you know . . . kinda' had to be done, I expect.