If you could have just one rifle back ?

reloaderlen

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Aug 18, 2011
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209
Location
Mississippi
Most of us have done it ,sold a rifle for one reason or another and regretted ever since. So if you could have just one and only one back what would it be ?
For me it would be a Winchester 30-30 I received for Christmas when I was 14 , it really wasn't what I had wanted and I sold it a couple of years later to get the Remington 700 30-06 that I had really wanted for Christmas. A bit more gun than I really needed or could handle at 14 . My parents had spent a lot of their hard earned money to buy me that rifle money they really didn't have only to give it to a ungrateful punk . Hindsight is 20/20 but if I could get it back my heart would be happy and I surely would make it a deer slaying machine just as the man I sold it to 35 years ago has .
So what's yours ?
 
Remington Model 700 .270 I bought when I was 13. Not because its anything great of anything. Just more or less it was My first gun I ever bought! Sold it and bought Winchester 670 30-06 when I was 14. Still have that gun.
 
Tagging in. Time will tell, but I have only ever parted with 1 rifle, a handgun and a couple cheap shotguns. Thus far the only one I'm questioning is the rifle, my first custom. It shot like a laser, but i didn't enjoy packing it in the mountains. Sold it to fund my "dream rifle". Hopefully my dream rifle shoots almost as well. If it doesn't, I will assuredly regret letting go of my first custom.
 
My first high power rifle. My dad only small game hunted but my Sunday school teacher told me at the age of 12 if I would get me a high power rifle he would take me deer hunting. I worked hard that year working in the hay fields and tobacco fields, mowing yards and anything else I could do to make a dime and raised $45.00. At one of the stores they had a shopping cart full of boxed "Army rifles". That was all I knew at the time was they were "Army rifles." For my $45.00 Dad got me the rifle and two boxes of 30-06 150 gr SP ammo. Rifle cost $40.00. Rifle turned out to be a new UNISSUED 1903A3 Springfield made by Remington. I did not weigh 100 lbs soaking wet and that thing beat the snot out of me but I learned how to shoot long range with that rifle. It had the open pep sights and I learned how to estimate yardage and set the sight and could nail groundhogs at a good distance. I had a cousin that was in the national guard and he would bring me a 250 round can of ammo every month when he went to guard. I never did get to kill a deer with that rifle because deer were few and far between back then in my area. After a few years I got the hankering for something lighter and easier to handle in the woods and sold the Springfield for $45.00 and bought a Marlin 336 in 30-30 Win and killed my first deer with it that next season. Wish I had that Springfield back.
 
It would be my first rifle. My dad was badly injured when I was 5 and could no longer hunt. When I was 10 he sold his Winchester 94 and used some of the money to buy a beat up old Marlin model 80. There was no magazine and no rear sight. I saved up to get a rear sight installed, but never got a magazine for it. At one point the firing pin broke. Knowing we couldn't afford to get it fixed, I figured out that if I turned down a nail using a drill and file it would work in place of the pin. Who knows how many thousands of rounds I single fed thru that rifle. When I was 17 I traded it towards a Hi Standard .22 target pistol (wish I still had that too) I would trade almost anything in my safe to have that old rifle back, or dad's 94.
 
It would be my first rifle. My dad was badly injured when I was 5 and could no longer hunt. When I was 10 he sold his Winchester 94 and used some of the money to buy a beat up old Marlin model 80. There was no magazine and no rear sight. I saved up to get a rear sight installed, but never got a magazine for it. At one point the firing pin broke. Knowing we couldn't afford to get it fixed, I figured out that if I turned down a nail using a drill and file it would work in place of the pin. Who knows how many thousands of rounds I single fed thru that rifle. When I was 17 I traded it towards a Hi Standard .22 target pistol (wish I still had that too) I would trade almost anything in my safe to have that old rifle back, or dad's 94.
This is an awesome story. I hope some other youngster got it and got as much use out of it as you did.
 
Mine would be my dad's old 32 Winchester Special. It is a model 55 takedown with a 24" nickel steel barrel. It was given to my dad in the late 40's by a guy that he guided on a deer hunt in Michigans Upper Peninsula, when he returned home from Germany at the end of the war. He killed countless deer with it and I and my 2 older brothers added to the number. Dad finally got a model 721 '06 and gave the 32 to my oldest brother. In 1973, my dad drowned on a fishing trip in Ontario
We had planned an elk hunting trip to Idaho, but it wasn't to be. Two years later I moved to Northern Idaho and my brother would travel out to hunt with me. In 2002, my brother and I were sitting on a ridge, looking accross a canyon and he said, brother, when I'm gone I want you to have my rifle! I thanked him and when he was leaving to head home to Michigan he said, "see you here next year"!
He passed away that year
before he could return. His dear wife gave the rifle to me after his passing. I killed my first Buck with that rifle when I
was 13. It is the one rifle that I would not, or could not, ever sell. My son will get it when I'm gone!....rich
 
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I bought a used R700 SA BDL, nice cherry stock, re-chambered in .250AI. That gun was a shooter. My older daughter shot her first deer with it. Light, and handy.

I built a .25-06AI, and my older daughter quit hunting when she went to high school, so it sat in the safe. It came out a few times over the years for some pigs, and deer hunts, but the .25-06AI usually got the nod for deer hunts.

Well, I tore it apart and built my 6.5SS with the action. My younger daughter used it to shoot her first deer with it.

Last year, my older daughter got back into hunting, and asked to use it again. The look on her face when I told her I tore it apart was tough to handle.

So now, I am collecting parts to build another .250AI for her. I bought her a 6.5CM to get her by until I can build the .250AI again.
 
Most of us have done it ,sold a rifle for one reason or another and regretted ever since. So if you could have just one and only one back what would it be ?
For me it would be a Winchester 30-30 I received for Christmas when I was 14 , it really wasn't what I had wanted and I sold it a couple of years later to get the Remington 700 30-06 that I had really wanted for Christmas. A bit more gun than I really needed or could handle at 14 . My parents had spent a lot of their hard earned money to buy me that rifle money they really didn't have only to give it to a ungrateful punk . Hindsight is 20/20 but if I could get it back my heart would be happy and I surely would make it a deer slaying machine just as the man I sold it to 35 years ago has .
So what's yours ?
I recently regretfully sold my CZ 550 Safari Magnum Classic Custom in 505
Gibbs, it had every option from the custom shop except a jewelled extractor. Exhibition grade English walnut that was absolutely gorgeous.
I did make over $1000 on what I paid for it, but I still regret parting with it.

Cheers.
:(
 
morning, I had a german built 240 weatherby. wood
stock, very nice looking. would not shoot under 1.5"
this was in the 70's. new nothing about doing a
rebarrel. still kick myself in the butt.
GBOT TUM
 
My first hunting rifle was bought by my wife back when we didn't have the money to spend on things like that. She got it for me Christmas of 2000. It was a Ruger MkII 30-06. Not a very good shooting rifle so I got rid of it. No sense having a tool that doesn't work right? Knowing what I know now, much could have been done to attempt to make it a shooter.

Now I look back and realize I'm a selfish bastard!!!
 
Most of us have done it ,sold a rifle for one reason or another and regretted ever since. So if you could have just one and only one back what would it be ?
For me it would be a Winchester 30-30 I received for Christmas when I was 14 , it really wasn't what I had wanted and I sold it a couple of years later to get the Remington 700 30-06 that I had really wanted for Christmas. A bit more gun than I really needed or could handle at 14 . My parents had spent a lot of their hard earned money to buy me that rifle money they really didn't have only to give it to a ungrateful punk . Hindsight is 20/20 but if I could get it back my heart would be happy and I surely would make it a deer slaying machine just as the man I sold it to 35 years ago has .
So what's yours ?
I know this ones a little different but the gun you got to replace your 30-30 is the gun that I got for Christmas when I was 15. I used a 222 my first 3 deer season and after crippling several deer with this light caliber gun my father and brothers bought me a Remington model 700 , 30-06. But the 222 we did not get rid of, nor did I ever part with my cherished Christmas gift. Oh!, buy the way, I only ever lost 1 deer using the famous 30-06 and that was shooting through heavy brush at a moving deer, I am now 66 years young. One lost deer due to a bad judgment shot in 51 years is not bad. So I ended up KEEPING THE GUN I WISHED I NEVER GOT RID OF. Good thread!! Good luck hunting and be safe.
 
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