Monday, April 04, 2011

Bag Day Gun

I bought my BAG Day gun today, a little early. Like a sad puppy, I've been watching this rifle languish in the used rack for about six months, and today I just couldn't stand it any longer. The counter guy took pity on me, and his inventory and sold the rifle to me at a wonderfully reduced price.

It's been abused, the poor thing, but I didn't realize how abused it had been. It's been mall-ninja'd all to hell and gone. It's got good bones, though and I've been looking for a project action.

According to the serial number, it started life as a Model 11 FCNS, which is a centerfeed action with a detachable box magazine. It isn't like that now.


I'm a big fan of floated barrels. The Choate Ultimate Sniper stock has a full-length bedding block and it's cut for heavy barrels. Putting a sporter barrel in this stock gives us some weird floating action on the front of the stock. I could actually put my little finger betwixt the barrel and the stock.


Of course, the mall ninja had to go crazy with the Krylon. I can't even identify the scope that's on the rifle, but that matters not. The scope will soon be dismounted and become a plaything for the grandkids. Young boys love spy scopes, especially if they have crosshairs.

The poor rifle only had one action bolt. When I started measuring, I found that this jazzbo had tried to fit a centerfeed action into a staggerfeed stock. Of course, the magazine is hopelessly wedged into the stock. I don't know if it can be saved, or if it is worth saving.


If you look at the image (and you can clicken to embiggen, you'll see that the action holes don't even line up. The counterguy told me that when the customer brought it in, he had a target with a group that measured about six inches. He was really proud of that group.

I've still got to decide what I want to do with this rifle, whether to re-barrel it, return it to stock configuration, put a heavy barrel on it, or keep the current barrel. If I decide to switch barrels, then the question of caliber comes up. I've been yearning for a nice 7mm-08 sporter. Or a .250 Savage. I've got some thinking to do.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it yet, but I'll give it a good home.

6 comments:

Rich Jordan said...

Have fun with it; it sure sounds like an 'interesting' project. I'm not sure if I'll be able to BAG this year; been saving up but too many other things just keep popping up.

Anonymous said...

I would go for the .250 Savage.
(Of course, since it's my favorite deer caliber I could be biased).

The .250 is a fine, accurate round.
Brass is available (sometimes) through Midway USA and other catalog houses. Remington 100 grain factory ammo is available and shoots very accurately, in my Ruger 77RL.

I have taken deer with the .30-06, the .250 and a 16 gauge shotgun. Of the three the .250 produced more one shot kills with the deer dropping on the spot.

Anonymous said...

What is "BAG DAY." New one on me.

J said...

We now have a nominee for the "World's Ugliest Rifle."

Old NFO said...

Geez... they truly F'ed that rifle up... Good luck with the salvage project!

J said...

Put a 20" 1-24 to 1-32 twist 358 Winchester barrel on it and have the ultimate thicket rifle using a 190 - 250 gr cast FP bullet @ 2000 fps. The stock is plastic, so just slide that front action hole back a tad and epoxy it in place. Give it an over-all coat of Krylon OD paint.