Griffin and Howe 1903 target rifle

[Mustang51]

A few years back I glommed an old 30.06 Griffin and Howe "bull gun" built on a Springfield 1903 action. It was in pretty good shape and had a 28" heavy bull barrel. Is 30.06 pretty well dead as a target round?

The rifle is set up for one of the old long tube, external adjustment scopes and I would like to give it a whirl at long range.

 

[ApacheCoTodd]

Dead?

Nope.



Out of favor?
Out of fashion?
Victim of trends?

Yup.

Look at the resurgence in black-powder target shooting. Makes any -06 look like a whipper-snapper.

Besides - who cares if you're toting that sweet thing to the range?
Todd.

 

[Offfhand]

If the barrel is good it will be a wonderful rifle to shoot at long range. That's what it was made for and I'd personally love to shoot it against some (any) of today's erector-set hotshots.

 

[Mustang51]

Thanks, guys

The barrel is good...very tight at the muzzle per the CMP muzzle gauge.

 

[hps1]

Is 30.06 pretty well dead as a target round?

The 30-06 is far from the grave yard!

Out of favor?
Out of fashion?
Victim of trends?

In some circles, but still a very capable caliber and that is one beautiful rifle.
As far as the venerable 30-06, this 20 shot string was fired from prone position, no artificial support with iron sights on an SR-21 target in practice. Target is a 100 yard reduction of the NRA 600 yd. target. Group measured .932"

Same rifle, same position @ 600 yards.


No fancy metric nomenclature, not followed by a sexy name, such as Creedmore, but the 30-06'll do in a pinch.

Regards,
hps

 

[Plastikosmd]

Beautiful

I also enjoy the older scopes

 

[Mustang51]

Damn, hps1, that is some nice shooting.

Yesterday I mounted an old Fecker scope on the G&H and shot it a bit.



The scope was of unknown magnification and was somewhat cloudy. I also had no luck adjusting the parallax, so the image was a little blurry. Despite that, the rifle shot a hair over 1MOA using Federal GMM.

I used some cheap PRVI to get on paper, and then shot a 5 round group with 168 gr Federal GMM at 100 yards. I was shooting off a rest.

 

[Mustang51]

Beautiful

I also enjoy the older scopes
View attachment 985734

I would say you do. Very nice.

 

[ApacheCoTodd]

The 30-06 is far from the grave yard!

No fancy metric nomenclature, not followed by a sexy name, such as Creedmore, but the 30-06'll do in a pinch.

Doesn't that about cover it?

Ackmore short improved 7.6235 enhanced tac-tickle international super-comp... whatever.

"So, your rifle's not a .30-06? Oh, I guess you must have the other caliber.... .243, no?"

Todd.

 

[Walkalong]

today's erector-set hotshots.

Heh.

 

[dieselchief]

varget sends 173 match bullets down range in my 30 06 bolt gun. around 2600fps. (works great in the garand too.)

 

[Speedo66]

How old is the build by them? G & H used to be the in-house gunsmith for Abercrombie & Fitch.

 

[GooseGestapo]

Load some Berger 185gr Juggernauts to 3.330” in the Federal GMM brass with Fed 210M primers over 54.0gr of IMR4350. Will get 2,800fps from the 28”. It’ll stay super sonic to 1,300+yds

My two commercial’06’s shoot under MOA with quality bullets over 4350’s.
A poster here by pseudonym USSR several years ago successfully campaigned a .30/06 in F-match competition.
He used 190gr bullets over hefty charges of RL22 for near 3,000fps from 29” barrels.
Yeah, they do recoil a tad more than the mini-metrics.....

 

[Offfhand]

The 1935 Wimbledon rifle match was won with a rifle made by Griffin & Howe. It was a .300 H&H Magnum and began a trend toward magnum caliber long range target rifles that has continued for generations.

 

[horsemen61]

A few years back I glommed an old 30.06 Griffin and Howe "bull gun" built on a Springfield 1903 action. It was in pretty good shape and had a 28" heavy bull barrel. Is 30.06 pretty well dead as a target round?

The rifle is set up for one of the old long tube, external adjustment scopes and I would like to give it a whirl at long range.
View attachment 985696
View attachment 985697
View attachment 985698
View attachment 985699

Gorgeous rifle I hope she shoots as good as she looks!

 

[Howland937]

No fancy metric nomenclature, not followed by a sexy name, such as Creedmore, but the 30-06'll do in a pinch

I always thought the .30-06 had a sexy enough name in "Springfield" buuuuut, the fact that everyone knows what it is even without the name says a lot. Try that with a 6.5 Whatever.

I have no practical use for the '06, or 6.5 Whatever's but I'd take one of these

an old 30.06 Griffin and Howe "bull gun" built on a Springfield 1903 action. I

over anything currently on the market.

 

[Dave DeLaurant]

Beautiful!

 

[Mustang51]

How old is the build by them? G & H used to be the in-house gunsmith for Abercrombie & Fitch.

I'm not sure. After I got the rifle, I checked it over carefully for stamps or engraving. I took one of the scope blocks off and found one of the numerals in the build number, "No. 1X27" had been drilled through...



I contacted Brian Beach, the Griffin and Howe (G&H is still in business) now-retired historian, who responded...

"I regret that I have retired from doing the research and letters of provenance effective the end of 2018. There is a current G&H employee who intends to continue the service but it will take some time to rearrange his present responsibilities and familiarize him with the available documents.
A new Research email account has not yet been set up for him so I will continue to read and respond to inquiries. As you may know there are no original G&H& records prior to 1970 except for those rifles sold through Abercrombie & Fitch which owned G&H from 1930 until 1976 and sold many G&H rifles as both new and used guns. I checked all of the possible G&H serials numbers in the A&F records that were in the form 1x27 and there were four possibilities, but each does not seem to describe your rifle.

No. 1127 is built on a Winc. M54 action

No. 1627 has a 26 inch barrel

No. 1827 is a Winc. model 70 in .270 caliber

No. 1927 is in caliber 257 Roberts.

This suggests that your rifle could be:

No. 1027 built in 1930 – 31

No. 1227 built in 1933

No. 1327 built about 1933 - 34

No. 1427 built in 1935

No. 1527 built about 1936

or No. 1727 built in the early 1940’s

These dates are derived from the dates of near number G&H rifles sold at A&F and Michael Petroff’s research. I will check the files at G&H when I next get there which may not happen until November. G&H does have some paperwork for guns that were sent back for shop work post 1970 but these haven’t yet been put into the database that I can check. If I find anything more for you I’ll be sure to get back to you.

Thank you for the inquiry and enjoy owning this piece of undocumented history.

 

[ApacheCoTodd]

Nice of him to go out of his way to at least give you elimination examples.

Todd.

 

[Mustang51]

varget sends 173 match bullets down range in my 30 06 bolt gun. around 2600fps. (works great in the garand too.)

Load some Berger 185gr Juggernauts to 3.330” in the Federal GMM brass with Fed 210M primers over 54.0gr of IMR4350. Will get 2,800fps from the 28”. It’ll stay super sonic to 1,300+yds

My two commercial’06’s shoot under MOA with quality bullets over 4350’s.
A poster here by pseudonym USSR several years ago successfully campaigned a .30/06 in F-match competition.
He used 190gr bullets over hefty charges of RL22 for near 3,000fps from 29” barrels.
Yeah, they do recoil a tad more than the mini-metrics.....

Thanks for the load data, guys!

 

[Mustang51]

Gorgeous rifle I hope she shoots as good as she looks!

Beautiful!

I always thought the .30-06 had a sexy enough name in "Springfield" buuuuut, the fact that everyone knows what it is even without the name says a lot. Try that with a 6.5 Whatever.
I have no practical use for the '06, or 6.5 Whatever's but I'd take one of these over anything currently on the market.

Thanks, guys!

 

[Mustang51]

The 1935 Wimbledon rifle match was won with a rifle made by Griffin & Howe. It was a .300 H&H Magnum and began a trend toward magnum caliber long range target rifles that has continued for generations.

That is true. Griffin and Howe target rifles with heavy barrels are somewhat rare. G&H are primarily known for their superb sporter rifles.

In researching my rifle, I came across the story of Ben Comfort and his Wimbledon Cup winning G&H heavy barrel magnum rifle. Comparing my rifle to pictures of his is what led me to the conclusion that mine was also a "bull gun".

http://sportsmanslegacy.com/firearm...-wimbledon-cup-engraved-inspired-elmer-keith/

 

[BLRguy]

Very nice. It resembles a fancier version of the Springfield Armory Model "T". A bull barrel target model build for long range matches, released though the CMP. I wonder if G&H used those as a basis, or built from scratch. The T models were made from 24 through 1929, I think.

 

[Mustang51]

Very nice. It resembles a fancier version of the Springfield Armory Model "T". A bull barrel target model build for long range matches, released though the CMP. I wonder if G&H used those as a basis, or built from scratch. The T models were made from 24 through 1929, I think.

Thanks, BLR!

The similarity to the Springfield "T" model is what originally drew my attention to this rifle. Also the Griffin and Howe connection.

 

[Mustang51]

Ben Comfort's 1935 Wimbledon Cup rifle was also built by Griffin and Howe and, at Elmer Keith's suggestion, was chambered in 300 H&H magnum. As I said, I couldn't find out much about G&H heavy barrel target rifles, but when I found the article about Comfort's "bull gun" and started comparing the pictures, it seemed pretty clear that mine was most likely also conceived as a bull gun.

There are differences, of course. Comforts was built on a Remington model 30 action and was chambered in 300 H&H. According to Elmer Keith, Comfort's gun was the first Wimbledon Cup rifle in that caliber. From what I've learned, many Wimbledon Cup rifles prior to Comfort's were in 30.06 and based on the 1903 Springfield action...just like mine.

http://sportsmanslegacy.com/firearm...-wimbledon-cup-engraved-inspired-elmer-keith/