Poor man's scout rifle - your thoughts please!

**farmer-el** · 04-11-2009, 20:00

Ever since I read about Jeff Cooper's scout concept I've wanted one. This sort of rifle was made for me! I'm a small framed person. Full size rifles have never quite felt right. I'm only intersted in walk and stalk hunts. Max. shot = 100m. Forward low mounted scope for running game and .308 calibre perfect for the bushbuck, impala & blesbuck which are the only real game in my area. I recently started combat so the gun budget has been stretched a bit. It will be years till I have the cah for a steyr. Recently saw that ruger do a range of shorties. What got my att. is that they do one in .243 calibre. Got me thinking... I have a .243. A musgrave standard bought many years ago and totally neglected 'cause it is everything I hate about rifles. It is heavy. It "feels" wrong when I bring it up to the eye. The swing over safety does not work with the scope on etc. etc. etc.
I havn't fired it in about 7 years and the only reason I've kept it is because it was my first gun!
This is what I want to do...and the logic behind it. Please comment and give your opinions.

1. Shorten the barrell to about 16.5" (The length of the ruger) Will this affect accuracy? If it does can I load to correct accuracy. I don't mind the drop in velocity. In fact I want it. This thing shreds meat. Just a bit worried that the bullet won't stabilize in the shorter barrell. Not sure of the twist in the musgrave barrell.
2. Have a quarter rib machined to mount a long eye relief scope. Sorts out the safety proble. (I know I could replace the current safety...I'm trying to justify my project here!)
3. Install a bipod
4. Get a decent supressor so I don't scare the hell out of the game on my small farm when I use the rifle.

Anyway... thats the theory. What do you guys in the know Think. A waste of a gun already being easted or possibly workable!

**Geoff Carter** · 04-11-2009, 20:06

That sounds exactly like what I want to do, luckily you've got a rifle to start off with ;)

**ikor** · 04-11-2009, 22:28

Here in the states, you would come out much cheaper to just buy what you wanted...in SA I am not sure, but it certainly would not be your first rifle. You will have to license the barrel shortening, right? And the quarter rib might be very expensive if custom made. Still, the shorter barrel just may shoot more accurately due to the vibration factor, but about the suppressor, I cannot say, naturally.

It is workable, no doubt, but the cost would be the issue for me.

**farmer-el** · 05-11-2009, 08:39

Thanks Ikor ... New rifle (Steyr) would be about R28K here before your add optics. Would get a quarter rib blank from Brownells and let smith finish fit & reblue. Thanks for thoughts on accuracy. Round here the thought is the longer the better. Longer the barrell the closer you are to the target!

**Arnold** · 05-11-2009, 08:49

In SA a lot of times things get done the way they do because of the time it takes to licence a firearm and not the cost.

I did buy a new rifle a couple of months ago as it was cheaper than to rebarrel the one I have ...

**Fred24** · 05-11-2009, 08:56

Hi K, the shorter barrel could actually make it more accurate as it becomes stiffer. There is quite an assortment of bullet weights you could try to get the best accuracy. By downloading a bit you will also lessen the meat damage.

Instead of going for the forward mounted scope you could go for "ghost ring" iron sights - I've got them on my 223 semi and they work great. Out to 100m they should be fine.

It might be a better option to get the 'smith to shorten the barrel bit by bit until you feel the balance is right - instead of just cutting it to the final length. Once it's shortened, you're a bit stuck ;D

**farmer-el** · 05-11-2009, 10:54

Thanks fro the input Fred. Just being reading up a bit about Coopers Scout. He specified an auxillary large apperture, thin ring ghost sight mounted to the reciever with a post up front. Adding this to list.

**BigT** · 05-11-2009, 12:22

My boss has a Steyr Scout and it is a fantastic concept.

**Pete M** · 08-11-2009, 10:45

If you read Cooper's original concepts you'll quickly see that his ideas are rooted in military doctrine. His idea was to have a short handy rifle (a carbine) in a medium to large (read 308 Win and up), sporting fast (ghost-ring) iron sights and mediocre accuracy. The idea of the battle sight/ghost ring setup was to allow charging the magazine with a stripper clip. How military is that??

Ex Wikipedia:

"Drawing inspiration from several sources, specifically the Austrian Mannlicher-Schönauer of 1903 and the Winchester Model 1894, Cooper defined several distinguishing characteristics of a scout rifle:

An unloaded weight, with accessories, of 3 kg (6.6 lbs); with 3.5 kilograms (7.7 lbs) the maximum acceptable.
An overall length of 1 meter (39.4 in.) or less.
A forward-mounted telescopic sight of low magnification, typically 2-3 diameters. This preserves the shooter's peripheral vision, keeps the ejection port open to allow the use of stripper clips to reload the rifle, and eliminates any chance of the scope striking one's brow during recoil. Cooper has stated that a telescopic sight is not mandatory.
Ghost ring auxiliary iron sights: a rear sight consisting of a receiver-mounted large-aperture thin ring, and typically a square post front sight.
A "Ching" or "CW" sling. Against common practice, Cooper advocated the use of a sling as a shooting aid. The Ching sling offers the convenience of a carrying strap and the steadiness of a target shooter's sling with the speed of a biathlete's sling. (The CW sling is a simpler version of a Ching sling, consisting of a single strap.)
A standard chambering of .308 Winchester/7.62x51mm NATO or 7mm-08 Remington for locales that forbid civilian ownership of cartridges in chamberings adopted by military forces or for its "slightly better ballistics."[2] As Cooper wrote, "A true Scout comes in .308 or 7mm-08."[3] The .243 Winchester is an alternative for young, small-framed, or recoil-shy people, but needs a 22" barrel. Cooper also commissioned "Lion Scout," chambered for the .350 Remington Magnum cartridge.
Accuracy: Should be capable of shooting into 2 minutes of angle or less (4") at 200 yards/meters (3 shot groups).
These features dictated short, thin barrels, synthetic stocks, and bolt actions. Other optional features included a retractable bipod, detachable magazines, a butt magazine, and an accessory rail for lights and other attachments. The addition of some of these features often render the rifle technically not a scout as originally defined, but this has come to be accepted by many as still conforming to the spirit if not the letter of the concept."

I think there's a website dedicated to the concept, somewhere.

You can almost imagine horse-mounted cavalrymen "scouting" through the bush harrying the enemy then disappearing again like ghosts.

Totally flies in the face of what I believe a rifle should be but then that's just my opinion. Long eye relief scopes are hard to find, the quarter rib is expensive to fit. The recoil can be horrendous if it is a big calibre.

If you go hunting with a scout rifle you can imagine the following conversation round the fire:

"Saw a 56" kudu this afternoon, he was standing about 20 meters away, didn't know we were there!"
"Why didn't you shoot him then?"
"Aw no, we were just scouting, we'll go shoot him tomorrow!"

LOL!!!
But good luck. If you don't like the rifle as is you might just change it into something you do.

**ikor** · 08-11-2009, 11:43

Not quite, Pete. If you read Cooper a lot, you will see that one drill he was big on was the 'snapshot', and this is useful for either hunting or military work. The Scout excells at this sort of thing, and Cooper and many others used to shoot trap with their rifles! Recoil from the .308 is relatively mild, even in a 6 1/2 or 7lb bolt gun, but the .30-06 can rattle your teeth a bit I grant you.

A well made Scout will shoot as well or better than any other non-dedicated target rifle, but with the light barrel and rearward weight distribution it is difficult to see that, even off of a bench, and the barrels heat up fast. Heating up, however, is...once again...not a big issue for the Scout since it is not designed for bench sessions or plinking.

My son in law did, in fact, take a R&W Kudu with his .30-06 Scout and had no problem doing so at around 75 meters in thick scrub. The shot was fired in what I am pretty sure was under a second from the time the butt hit his shoulder, but no one was timing him, naturally.

I respect the fact that a Scout is not what you believe a rifle should be, but not everyone feels the same way you do. I think the Scout concept is brilliant, but its execution is not always up to snuff in factory built rifles. The original Steyer Scout is superb.