I have switched to a Begarra BA13 in 308 with thumbhole stock. Wildcat evolution 10
moderator with a small 3 slot Piccatinny rail on the front sling stud to take a swagger bipod. Works fine in the woods. Rifle is cheap at £600. 3 shots in an inch at 100 yards. Dead easy to clean. Be aware that the attaced Piccatinny rail for the scope mount may need some modification to fit Piccatinny scope mounts. Mine did. Rifle is short overall because you are missing 4 inches or so because there is no magazine well or bolt. Hammer action so no safety required as the gun can’t fire until you cock the hammer. Swings up fast and easy with fast handling characteristics. Can be supplied in 16” barrel if that’s your thing but mine is 20” Taken an assortment of deer from 30 to 100 yards in the woods walking and stalking
This is very interesting, to someone who has been thinking (dreaming) about just such a thing. To replace my Marlin 336C, which obviously can't be moderated without some extensive work, which I would not even contemplate.
Thoughts being that, particularly with the future lead ban coming, finding suitable bullets, or even ammunition for the 30-30, ,in the UK, would be a challenge. Besides I want something with much more authority (I dream of shooting boar and massive reds and sikas) and longer range potential than the 30-30, which is realistically marginal anyway, with its 20" barrel, shooting blunt bullets.
So I've been contemplating the Bergara BA13 in 308. Either the 20", or even the 16.5" Both lengths have their pros and cons, but ATM the 16.5" with the 8" twist looks better, for me. Opens up much more potential for say downloading, or even subsonic with 300 Blackout style bullets. With the 20" barrel they chose to go with 12" twist, which I think I would find limiting. They also do it in 18", with the 8" twist, for those countries where 16.5" is not allowed.
It would need to be moderated, that's a given, but that's what I want anyway. Going 16.5" instead of 20 buys me another 3.5" in length and 200 grams in weight , to be put against the moderator, that I would be using anyway, whatever barrel length
Something similar to this package:
Bergara BA13 Take Down Thumbhole, Stainless .308Win 16,5 inch
The only weakness appears to be the supplied short ten slot aluminium pic. rail. Probably keeps the cost down. But Bergara, and others, have the solution for that. Such as Bergara's own, steel version, with 14 slots.
CARBON STEEL RAIL 0 MOA TAKE DOWN SET
This in hipster 6.5CM is looking lovely if I took the barrel down but length wise it's already in the neighbourhood, definitely in the length range I am looking at!
I'm not so sure that Bergara are doing it in 6.5CM, at least not over here. TBH I think, as we have privately discussed, that you might be onto a loser trying to shorten the barrel of an overbore thing like 6.5CM, just as with 243. No matter what e.g. QuickLoad might indicate might just be possible.
Overbore chamberings generally don't respond well to short barrels, whereas you can get away with it in more normal things such as 308 and 223. And also expect superior barrel life, if that is of relevance.
An important thing to note, once you start really shortening barrels, and inevitably losing some muzzle velocity, all assumptions about using standard twists go out of the window. You still need the bullets to be stable, meaning a minimum rotational speed, which is simply a product of muzzle velocity and barrel twist rate.
Hence why I reckon that say a 308 16.5" barrel with 8" twist, might be just about perfect shooting say a 130gr copper bullet. Or any other thing, all the way down to subsonic. No, it isn't too fast for even normal factory ammo, which BTW, according to my simulations, and one bit of actual experience shooting a 16" barrelled RPA at the range, all the way out to 900m it was good. And subsequently I have convinced myself that even bog standard factory type 308 loadings are still efficient in short barrels. Muzzle pressure (noisiness) does rise though, we did try a few shots through that RPA without the mod. Very unpleasant, it went back on again PDQ.
I can't see it having much different recoil to say a 6.5CM with a similar weight bullet and powder charge, but I am just theorising.
I do have another cunning plan in mind though, involving a bolt action in an MDT LSS chassis with collapsible AR15 buttstock, also with the folding adapter. Now I am really dreaming, but no harm in that.
