Sako L579 owners..243

Southern

Well-Known Member
I have never been a .243 user, but owned one L579 with open sights for a short time before selling it to a friend - lovely rifle.

I found a mint one, old, Deluxe .243 and think I must have it to go with the L61R.

How many of you are still using older Sakos with the original longer barrels? And for what game? Andy downsides or quirks?
 
Southern, I have a L57, the predecessor to the 579. It, and a l61r in 3006 are my primary hunting rifles. My 57 is a 243, it doesnt care for light bullets. Its nuts about the hornady 90 gr sst, and will group nicely with 100 gr gamekings, 85 gr gamekings on the other hand, the best group so far with them is 4 inches. I havent noticed any faults, nor to me, any shortcomings. I love the ball bearing feel of working the bolt on either. Ive been considering a 46 length in 222, it would round out my battery quite nicely.
 
They can be very, very fussy about ammo.

The .243s handle heavy for calibre and boat-tail bullets poorly: you may really struggle to stabilise anything over 80gr, and will probably do best with flat based bullets.

My Finnbear is much, much less fussy!

Having said that, mine shoots sako 90gr extremely well, and (exactly contrary to what I said above), it will shoot Hornday 95gr SSTs well. I have used both of these to good effect on roe and fallow up to about 75kg.
 
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Thanks for the info on what bullets your Sakos like. I suspect that 90 and 95-gr is going to be the sweet spot for deer, maybe a flat base 100-gr Speer or Hornady tops.

Yes, I know about the heavier bullets in 6mm. A lot of the .243s have a 1:10 twist.

I had a Browning B78 in 6mm Remington (6x57mm) with a 24-inch heavy barrel that would shoot 100 and 105 gr into bug hole groups. It had a 9.25:1 twist, more powder and longer barrel to spin them up. I bought it to rebarrel, but could not with such accuracy, so I sold it to a friend.

My Finnbear .375 H&H likes every load, but most .375s are not fussy, and are accurate, in my experience.

This Forester is from the original owner, in mint condition, just as my previous Forester was, but this is the Deluxe. I would probably remove the original scope and mounts and use the factory peep sight. It is just lovely, but I don't want to be fiddling with trying to find a good load, and I already have an even nicer Sako .308 with which I only use with iron sights, so I don't need the .243, but it would be nice to have an L579 and another L61R. I found a nice 7mm Rem Mag L61R from the original owner, with Deluxe wood in oil finish, very reasonable price.. tempting.
 
We have a 308 Sako Forester in our family since the early seventies. It might have been the thing in it's day but I think there were better actions, rifles before and after. The one we had would not shoot worth beans until she was shot really hot. Early 70's we already had a weaver wide angle scope on which showed the problems. The Bofors steel barrel was probably just a dud. Several others with 243's had very good accuracy. The best things about the action is that it is quite light, small and has a fantastic trigger. Later Sako's seemed of much better quality, I think at least. The ergonomics of the stock was so awkward that I started improving the stock and in the end we started a company making stocks.... This was my first deer rifle handed down, in the meantime with a good barrel, a better stock and different mag system I could annoy many at 300yd shoots with the old girl. She has taken many deer in the last years and is still my reliable back up rifle.
edi

ps. My son with his staggie shot with the L579.

DSCN7190.jpg
 
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That's very good to have some firearms which you want to keep in the family and pass down, even if they are not show pieces or if they have had to be remodeled along the way to make them even more functional or pleasing to the eye.

When the family hunts together, and the children see their father or mother, and grandfather using a rifle, it means a lot more to them than just inheriting something out of the blue; those are the ones which get sold off, the ones I look for.

This L579 I am ogling has a vintage steel tube B&L 8X scope in windage adjustable mounts, so I presume it shoots well. But I am going to pay what the stock and action are worth, on the assumption that it might have to be rebarreled into a 7x57 Mauser, .257 Roberts, or even a .25-08 or .27-08.
 
Southern, of course I'll try pass on the Sako to my sons. This rifle got my father and then me as a kid into hunting in South Africa in the late sixties. She was owned by a professional hunter who was a friend of my fathers and they went on a hunt to get a few Kudu. The PH managed to wound two Kudus and followed one while my father followed the other with his Mauser pocket pistol and a local tracker. The little 32 Mauser did the job and took the limping Kudu down. We were accepted and invited to hunts. We ended up with the Sako and the wounding saga kept going on. When I got the rifle I tried bedding and de-coppering but it didn't help. After the barrel change she shot under 1/2" even with factory fusion ammo. At least she has a new life. I shot six Sika stags with her alone in the last season. What I liked about the forester stock is the square shaped forend. To me it makes sense as it tells the hand on the forend how to bring up the rifle straight for a quicker shot. We kept that feature on our hunter stocks. My father now in his eighties will fire a couple shots out of her this summer when he visits us.
edi
 
I like all kinds of fore ends on rifles: round, square, slim and fat. Perhaps from shooting target .22s, I like the sort of flat bottom on the older Sakos and Remington 700s. It does seem to help my feeble muscle memory in putting my hand in the same spot, just as a palm swell does. I like the look, too.
 
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