Sub-5 pound hunting rifles in big game calibers are a rare sight. So when I happened to stop by Wild West Guns in Las Vegas before SHOT Show and saw this svelte little rifle, I just had to share it with the armed intelligentsia. WWG starts with a Remington 700 or Winchester Model 70 action, mates it with a custom contoured, hand chambered, polished, match grade cryogenically-processed barrel, a Timney Trigger and a custom bedded Kevlar stock. The action is squared, trued, and lapped, and the action and bolt are lightened in non-critical areas . . .
WWG has been perfecting the Summit Lite series since 1998. They are designed for hunting sheep and goats in the mountains of Alaska. According to WWG, they can get these rifles down to 4 1/4 lbs, depending on the options ordered by the customer. This particular sample was a left-handed model that began its life as a Remington 700 LH.
The only rifles I have ever held that were this light had carbon fiber barrels, so it was impressive to hold an all-steel barreled hunting rifle that weighted less than an M-1 Carbine. Anyway, enjoy these images, and give Wild West Guns a call if you have $3-4 K that you are ready to drop on a fine custom hunting rifle.
For the price of 4-5 more M700s, I can save 4-5 pounds on my current one…
Then it’s clearly not a rifle for you. nor would be any custom gun. Stock items are boring.
Of course it’s not for me, I value my money.
Wow. One of my dream hunts is for a Marco Polo sheep. They tend to live well above 10,000 feet.
The savage lightweight hunter is 5.5 pounds and about $800.
My Tikka T3 lite is about 5.5 lbs. Its nice to carry, and I don’t mind the .270 WSM in a light gun. It’s not for everyone though. Having more weight helps deal with recoil. I wouldn’t mind having this rifle, I also wouldn’t mind hunting up in Alaska.
Pretty sure you can drop another 4 ounces if you remove the recoil pad right there. After all, it’s not like it’s gonna help all that much, right? Right? Sorry, can’t answer? Arm still quivering?
Tom
Doesn’t the Stevens 200 (actually a Savage 110) weigh about the same and cost around $300? Same kick for one tenth the price seems like a bargain to me, especially when it takes a tumble down that 10,000 foot mountainside.
I think it’s funny that Joe is at SHOT show and posting about stuff he finds at Vegas LGSes.
That kind of cheddar would be better spent on a gym membership so one could hunt with a real rifle that weights maybe 7 lbs….
Take a two pound dump, flush the toilet, pick up your 6-7 Lb rifle head up the mountain.
Break even on the carry weight and be way ahead on cash.
Same thing mountain bikes with a lot of titanium parts to lose 3 or 4 pounds when I’ve seen riders that could stand to lose 15
You’ve cracked the code on my personalized, gluten-free, hypoallergenic, vegan, daily weight-loss program. It also accounts for most of my TTAG browsing time.
@KCK, game, match, set.
@KCK, game, set, match.
A 5 lb. rifle with a muzzle brake will be a truly offensive instrument to use when hunting. It will have a sharp recoil impulse and will be hell on the ears.
Having hunted (successfully) mountain goat in Nevada, which involved stumpfing around at altitudes above 9,000′ ASL, I can attest that lighter weights would be nice. But a rifle which you cannot shoot comfortably for more than 10 rounds a day is a rifle with which you will never become a good enough shot to take goats or sheep at altitude. Most of your presented shots will be either uphill or downhill, in steep rocky terrain, and with improvised shooting positions. Here in the states, drawing a sheep tag takes you years and years. Drawing a goat tag takes just as long, but there is no state in the lower 48 where of which I’m aware where you can draw a goat tag more than once in a lifetime. eg, I’ve drawn mine in Nevada, I can never even apply for goat again in Nevada.
Then there’s the issue of nailing your animal in place. If you don’t choose the time and place of your shot well, your animal will roll downhill in very steep, rocky terrain, basically turning it into shredded fur and hamburger. If I had not nailed my goat on the 30’x50′ “pad” on the side of the slope, that goat would have rolled downhill about 1500′ before finding a stop.
You simply must become very good with your rifle. That means practice. For me, that was hundreds of rounds of .338 WM. By the end of the summer, I hated that rifle. It is a killing machine, but after about the 50th round on any given day, I’m done.
So think carefully about your choice of hunting rifle for these types of hunts. If you’re really going to pay up the big bucks and put in the effort on these types of hunts, you really want to be an excellent marksman. And there’s no way around it: it takes practice to become a really good shot with any rifle in rough conditions. Telling yourself that you’ll shoot a super-light, super-obnoxious rifle “only a few times a year” is telling yourself that you will never become a very good rough terrain shot with that rifle.
So in essence, buying a 4k rifle for a once in a life time expereince in which you may or may not have the constitution to put in the practice for is not a great use of dinheiro. Unless you are independantly wealthy and want a novelty safe queen that is unconfortable (or even painful) to shoot. While I don’t doubt there’s folks out there than can and will buy this, the truth about the gun (get it?) is that there are much cheaper options if your want to embark on a high-altitude hunting endeavor. If hiking with a 1/2 to one pound makes it or breaks if for you and means all the difference in your life, you need to exercise more.
Dys, thanks again for making it real.
That still is a beautiful rifle…my precious.
If this is the same company that owns the “Wild West guns” here in Anchorage, then most of what accounts for that price tag is ego padding.
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