What does your sheep gun weigh?

[CBH Australia]

My first lightweight, sheep, mountain rifle is just a Tikka with a n Australian made Bolly (Precision Defence Industries) stock at 680g, an IBI Carbon wrapped barrel on a Tikka action, budget build.

Playing with it today, it's about 3.5kg 7pound ish, maybe 8lb all up best I can do with my scale.

I'm gonna go load some ammo so I can test it in the next few days.

 

[Quintus]

9 pounds ready for battle is not bad. What you curse as you climb you will cherish as you try and settle in and center up on you ram with your heart beating through a thin shirt. I have seen some pretty well set up really light rifles get the better of some pretty competent shooters. Unless I'm in the woods I like 8 to 10 pounds and I am a 500 yards and in guy. If I was going to let myself shoot game past 600 I would haul 10, but I get excited.

 

[dogz]

And they say light rifles won't shoot well at distance. Well it probably has a lot to do with the shooter also. Nice rifle and pretty impressive shooting.

This is just my experience and only my experience but I've found lightweight rifles that shoot well aren't that tough to find anymore.

What's tough to find is shooters that under pressure and when they're tired and out of breath that can deliver the goods on demand with lightweight rifles. I"m in this category and I suspect I'm not alone. I do much better under these conditions with a 8.5-9 lb rifle (all up, rounds, sling, scope) than I do with my 6 lb all up .308.

Merry Christmas all, have a fantastic day!

 

[shphtr]

"hunt ready": rifle, scope, rings/bases, sling, full mag ... they all weigh 6.5 - 7.5 lb and shoot at least .5 MOA or they don't hunt .... just my paramaters for the last several decades, yours will prob vary no doubt. Good Luck

 

[gbett308]

Built on my Terminus Apollo Lite action.
View attachment 205675View attachment 205676

Does the bolt handle ever give you problems with catching on anything while hunting? or upon recoil?

 

[Joel Russo]

Does the bolt handle ever give you problems with catching on anything while hunting? or upon recoil?

No sir, never had a problem with the bolt handle catching anything or opening upon recoil.

 

[gbett308]

No sir, never had a problem with the bolt handle catching anything or opening upon recoil.

All the way!

 

[vvhoisjohngalt]

I have one now with all of the parts at the gunsmith.
I didn't do my research very well appropriately and I think I'm going to overshoot my target weight by 1.5 -2lbs..
If I calculated right ..then I'm going to be at 9lbs ..
I was shooting for 7.5

Looking to see where this falls in average with everyone else's

Depends on your effective range and/or physical condition. A 9lb rifle in a good caliber will be very easy to shoot in sub optimal positions under stress. I like the 8-9lb range for sheep rifles. If you drop 2lbs off your frame then you are hauling the same weight anyway.
People stress out about ounces and hunt with pounds they could have trimmed off their bodies. Never really made sense to me.

 

[de.rek74]

New to the forum, figured I'd share my sheep hunting setup. 28 nosler weighs in at 8.2lbs with scope. 26" proof barrel, manners eh5 stock, rem 700 action. Running an atlas bipod these days.

 

[Quintus]

I just started with my latest sheep gun. I found a Weatherby Mark V SBGM in .270Win. Added an Accubrake, topped it with a Vortex Razor 3-15x42 (gen 1 with 1" tube) in dual dovetails and it ended up 2oz. shy of 7 pounds. I am pretty excited. 20 year old rifle that was broken in, went on one mule deer hunt in Montana and then retired to a collection. I ran a ladder yesterday afternoon with 140 B-Tips and RL19 and RL22 and had positive predictable results. I also shot some 140 Accubonds that had been loaded for a previous 270 and was pretty happy with those groups. Nice to have a mid-winter project. The rifle and scope both came off the clearance rack for a very affordable ultra-light. I may take the Accubond load to 400 this weekend if the weather is OK. It put 5 holes in a .8 at 100 with an average velocity of 3008 and ES of 14.

 

[GT123]

Tikka T3 lite in 30-06 w/ burris short mag scope and a web sling...6lbs 6 oz. Every ounce makes a difference. Super accurate right out of the box!

 

[Shooter264]

It's been good for a 1/2 slam so far. Canada needs to open up so I can make it 3/4

 

[GT123]

What about Fannin?

 

[DropTyne]

Am I allowed to call my rifle a sheep rifle if I haven't been able to take it on a sheep hunt??

Sure wish I could draw a tag.