Being a normal 'Merican I had read of the Blaser and it's straight pull bolt but always thought it was just typical German over-engineering of a bolt action and that it was just a "gimmick" of some kind... never really thought of it as anything I would like or entertained the idea of buying one since they are pretty expensive compared to a M70/77/700. However, since I have been stationed here in Germany and started my hunting course I have been able to shoot a couple different Blaser R93's. One in .308 and one in .375 H&H. WOW! What an eye opening experience! The first night I shot the .375 I just single fed rounds into the chamber and shot a couple three shot 1-1.5 inch groups from the bench. Nothing extraordinary there, a lot of rifles will do that. But I don't do it really often, especially with a strange rifle and a 6x scope (zeiss). I did play with the action some, just racking the bolt straight back and forth from an off-hand position. Pure speed there... click-snick-snick, click-snick-snick, click-snick-snick. Just about as fast as you can read it. I've never practiced that with regular bolt actions, not believing that I could work them really quickly straight from the shoulder. Thought about it off and on for the last week, then at our Wednesday night shoot last night (we have a mandated shooting program before our licensing test), I got to shoot a well-proven R93 .308. Shooting three different loads I managed two sub-inch groups from a bench with a Swarovski at 6x on top of it. I was talking to the owner after that and he said "It's not a gimmick... let me show you something..." Now this guy is a SHOOTER! Two Special Forces Armorers that we work with defer to this guy on shooting ability, readily admitting that "Kurt will embarass you at the range" so I knew he was about to show off. He loaded up 4 rounds of .308 Triple Shocks and set down and went to work. "boom-snick-snick (the "snicks" were just one sound really), boom-snick, boom-snick, boom-snick" and just that fast he hit the button to bring the target back to the line. Three touching and one about 3/4 inch out and all in probably less than 4 seconds. I've never seen a bolt move that fast unless it was a semi or a pump! So then he told me to try it for myself. I loaded three and snuggled up to a that rifle like it was my wife on a cold German evening...
Boom-sniiiiick, boom-sniiiiick, boom-sniiick... and I was done... hit the button and wait for the results. When the target came back it wasn't nearly as bad as I had feared it would be, nor was it a good as I had dared to hope. I had about a 2.5 inch group and my time for three was just probably about what his four shot string was... but the ease and speed of the action REALLY made an impression on me. The fact that you can change barrels and bolts makes it even better. As long as you have the same case head size, just pop a new barrel on and your good to go. I didn't come close to equaling this guy and probably never will, but I think with some practice I could cut the difference in half. I may just have to put one on lay-away next time I'm back in the States...
Anybody else have the Blaser??? Comments? Just wondering...
no guns here
