I have finally had some time to play with my S&W i-Bolt in 25-06. I really didn't need one of these and really prefer Savages, but there was a sale on these things so I bought one, with the S&W rebate it was $250.00. First thing is they did not have a 25-06 in stock, so they special ordered it for me, the factory did not have any with the plain black stock so they sent me one with the realtree camo stock for the same price. On the plus side, they come with a very nice steel Weaver one piece scope base installed, it even has a little recoil lug built into it. The entire metal finish is Parkerizing, I like this finish, but some don't, it is not a gloss finish like Blueing, but it is durable. Even the bolt is parkerized. The stock is very basic, it has built in sling swivel mounts in the plastic stock, basically plastic attach points for the quick disconnect type of sling swivels. Problem I had was with the paint of the camo design on the stock there was not clearance for the swivels, so the paint around the mounts had to come off for the swivels to fit. No big deal, but they should have thought of that, I don't know if the black stock would have this problem. The stock is extremely light weight, and is very stiff for such a light plastic thing, it is lighter than a Savage plastic stock and stiffer also. The fit of the barrel to the stock was perfect, I was amazed, very close fit with the barrel exactly centered in the channel, don't know if this is normal, but his one is very good. It is not pillar bedded, just the plastic snugging up against the action, one screw in front of the trigger guard and one into the tang. Three position safety works well, and it has a nice feature in that the bottom of the blind magazine releases to drop out any loaded rounds if you want. One issue I can see is that the release is on the inside of the trigger guard, push forward and the bottom drops out, could be a problem if you shoot with gloves on I would think. Trigger is adjustable with a little tool provided, it has nice click adjustments, down to about 3 pounds I would say, it has some creep but not bad, the Savage accutrigger is better but not by much. Back to the Bolt, it has a very large diameter, the bolt diameter is the same as the locking lug diameter, and it is one piece, no bolt head, just a one piece bolt with a Sako type extractor in it, looks good, but heavy, the 60 degree bolt throw is nice and it is cock on opening. The look of the rifle makes a Savage look sleek I would say. I will shoot it tomorrow and tell you how it does. Larry
