Sporter Weight

B

Bill B

New member
I know that most of us hate change, but I'd like to bring something to your attention before you bring out the rope and foot stool.

Quietly, the number of 6X scopes with AO and Target Knobs have gone from 4 to 1. Gone are the Weaver T6, the Sightron SII 6X HBR and the Burris HBR II. All that is left is the Leupold FX-III 6X42 Target Dot model. That's not much of a choice.

The Leupold FX-III weighs 15 oz. When/If this scope is discontinued all that will be left with an AO will be some heavier variables and a scramble for some used scopes.

I just had a sporter built and the only scope that I could use that would allow my rifle to make weight was the Burris at 13.6 oz. Luckily I got the last dot model that Natchez had in stock. I had to go through many vendors to find one that had one left in stock. I then went and got a used one to have as a back-up.

As you can see, I'm set for awhile but I'm thinking about the next guy. With so few scope options, if the Leupold is too heavy then they have to start lopping something off a possibly good shooting sporter. We could just say "To heck with them, I got mine", but I hope we would give some thought to them and the gunsmiths struggling to build a good shooting sporter that'll make weight with fewer options to allow that to happen. Who would want one of our gunsmiths to build a good shooting sporter that will not make weight and tell us "That's your problem."

If we were to allow an increase in the sporter weight limit from the current 7.5 lb to say 7.75 or 8.0 lbs it would compensate for the lack of scope options currently availble to us. Also, an increased weight limit would allow for some of the better factory sporters to be used by those with a desire to get into our sport. I'm not afraid that a heavier weight limit would render my sporter obsolete or put it at a competitve disadvantage. It would just give us more options.

I fully expect to be in the minority with my viewpoint but take a moment to give it some thought and put away that rope! ;)
 
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Bill, this past sunday at anderson creek there were 4 empty benches in the custom sporter with only 2 shooters with real custom sporters. the last shoot was a squirrel shoot with scope power to 10x and the benches were full. 5 shooters came just to shoot in the squirrel shoot. and the rifles could weigh 8.5lbs.
 
Would it really be all that hard to come up ith an ounce or so to mount a Leupold, which does'nt seem to be going anywhere for the time being .
 
Tim,

Trust me, when you've got a perfectly tuned sporter in your hands that has a custom sporter action, a sporter weight barrel and a sporter weight stock and it won't make weight with a 15 or 16 oz scope, what would you have your smith start lopping off? Thankfully I still had the option of putting on the Burris. I guess others can just have their smith take off some more from the barrel and hope for the best, and if it goes out of tune - oh well. Like I said, I've got mine, and you've got yours, so we no longer have to face that decision. But if the Burris was not available to me, that's exactly where I would have been. I had purchased the Sightron for this project and it now sits in a box.
 
Most of my sporters have variable scopes. Plenty of them on the market
Don
 
i wish someone would tell me the original purpose for the SPORTER class, i think it has been lost!

I'm thinking it was intended and should be there to draw new blood from the hunters and plinkers, to give them a chance to see if bench rest shooting
is something they might like.
if so, as guns and equipment have evolved over time, rules need to be re-examined and changed..jmho
 
Scope Options

There a couple of scopes for a sporter that quickley come to mind....The VX II 4-12 AO which is 14.0 oz. and the 3-9 Rimfire EFR at 11.0 oz....They can be purchased direct from Leupold with target knobs which adds 1 .oz..Also..don't forget the queen of sporter scopes..6-18 AO Target..at 15.8 oz....less without caps....
 
Gambler
When Cooper came out with the factory 36 sporter in 1996 or so, any sense of original intent was lost. They had a Jewell trigger and your choice of a Lilja or Shilen barrel. If it wasn't for a few design flaws that made the bolt hard to close, and a high initial cost they would have ruled the rimfire sporter class in all rimfire competitions. Instead they opened the door to custom sporters and modifications of factory guns.
Can't put the genie back in the bottle.
Don
 
when building a sporter (as I found ou the hard way) you must start with the weight of the stock and build around that weight. Don made my stock and my Sako weighs less than 6.5 lbs with a leupold.
 
I sold Hoke Kerns a Unertyl Condor. It is a very light 6X and the optics are better than what you guys are using. Try EBay.
Butch
 
gambler said:
i wish someone would tell me the original purpose for the SPORTER class, i think it has been lost!

I'm thinking it was intended and should be there to draw new blood from the hunters and plinkers, to give them a chance to see if bench rest shooting
is something they might like.
if so, as guns and equipment have evolved over time, rules need to be re-examined and changed..jmho
Click to expand...

I know I am new here but what you say is oh so true. Unfortunately there is nothing that can be done.
 
It is not a problem to make a good functioning stock that is under 20 oz. The gunsmith has to take the weight limit in consideration when selecting and fitting a barrel. The scope rings can be under an ounce. I have a 6.5x 20 Leupold, 30 mm tube long range scope on my Hall sporter. And it is the full 1.350 diameter round Hall. Allen's newer sporter action is 8 oz lighter. You are promoting a problem that does not exist or does not need to exist.
Don
 
Bill B said:
Tim,

Trust me, when you've got a perfectly tuned sporter in your hands that has a custom sporter action, a sporter weight barrel and a sporter weight stock and it won't make weight with a 15 or 16 oz scope, what would you have your smith start lopping off? Thankfully I still had the option of putting on the Burris. I guess others can just have their smith take off some more from the barrel and hope for the best, and if it goes out of tune - oh well. Like I said, I've got mine, and you've got yours, so we no longer have to face that decision. But if the Burris was not available to me, that's exactly where I would have been. I had purchased the Sightron for this project and it now sits in a box.
Click to expand...

Bill, call Pippin. Also yes I have a sporter and yes I put a scope on it as heavy as anything you've mentioned, and yes with a little tinkering and no lopping off it's not an insurmountable issue. There ain't a gun make you cannot come up with an ounce or so...honest. Next time I see you I'll show you my paper thin buttplate[hint].
 
I called Bill Pippin and, yes, I could send it back to him and he'd take some weight off, but with the Burris that I have on it, there is no need and it shoots so well that I don't want to change a thing. (Both Bill Pippen and Gordon Eck have been great people to work with on my sporter project.) There is no doubt that some additional weight can be taken off this rifle and that sporters can be made to make weight. Sure, they can be made with balsa laminates, paper thin buttplates, those frustrating Hall rings etc. but why do we want to put ourselves, our gunsmiths and our stockmakers through all this? This 7.5 lb weight limit seems very arbitrary. What's the significance of it? Why is it so sacred? When a custom sporter action, in a nice, lightened, hardwood sporter stock, with a sporter weight barrel, aluminum buttplate and trigger guard has to struggle to make "sporter" weight, maybe we should re-think what sporter-weight should be. That's all I'm saying. As shooters, do we not want our expensive sporters to have decent wood, nice trigger guards, regular buttplates and to make weight with available scopes? If you were to order a nice custom sporter for squirrel hunting would you ask your gunsmith to stock it with balsa and sycamore or would you ask for some nice walnut or - - curly maple?

Maybe everyone involved in making and shooting these sporters enjoys the challenge of getting them down to this arbitrary weight limit as much as they enjoy the challenge of shooting them. Maybe that's the point that I'm missing. Anyway, like I said at the beginning of this thread, I've got my sporter, it does makes weight, and I couldn't be happier with it.
 
HMMM! laminated balsa. Never thought of that.
My 37 Rem sporter is solid curly maple. The Hall is laminated obeche. The 54.18 MSR Anschutz is stocked in exotic fiddle back Anegre. My Turbo sporter is stocked in solid sassafras,a very durable and attractive wood.
Sycamore is a hard wood and can be quite beatufully figured. Have that on some of my unlimited rifles.
Don
 
My Hall sporter is one of the older,Big actions,Serial # 20,It is in a solid high grade Maple stock,Benchmark Reverse taper barrel & A Nightforce 30 mm,2.5 By 10 scope,Harrells rings & the complete rifle is 4 ounces under the limit. BILL
 
gambler said:
i wish someone would tell me the original purpose for the SPORTER class, i think it has been lost!

I'm thinking it was intended and should be there to draw new blood from the hunters and plinkers, to give them a chance to see if bench rest shooting
is something they might like.
if so, as guns and equipment have evolved over time, rules need to be re-examined and changed..jmho
Click to expand...

While I know this also will be looked on as unfavorable this is just my humble opinion. :eek: This is the same problem in our off hand Sporterifle league which also has a 7.5lb maximum weight limit. New shooters, mainly the kids, come in with a rifle weighting over the 7.5 lbs and are not allowed to compete for score in the league. All our shooting sports have evolved and the new rifles with the newer scope all seem to be over the old 7.5 lb rules which served us so well before. Like in Sporterifle, I view this as an entry level (feeder) into our sport and if it means turning away one new shooter we are doing all of us a disservice and only helping to diminish our ranks. I agree with the 8.5lb limit as that weight seems too coincided with some other competitions and may bring more new folks in.

While I realize it is two different discplines, lets not be as closed minded as the other league and at least consider it.
 
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If nobody else is having/had trouble with making weight with their sporter customs, then I guess it's a non issue. Never mind. :)
 
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