howa mini 7.62x39

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if i had a old mauser bottom metal id try cutting it in half and weld it back together to the right length. id thin it up to to match the smaller size. maybe use a remington or a savage steel mag body for the feed lips and attach it to the floor plate like a browning abolt.
 
Newtosavage said:
So I finally got tired of that magazine extending down so far and the mag latch being bumped accidentally, so I did something about it today. Fortunately, there is a small ridge all the way around the magazine at just the right point to make it a 3-round mag by cutting off the portion below it. If you try this, just don't cut right up against that line. Leave about 1/8" below it and then work that down with a wood rasp or file to get a good tight fit on the lip of the magazine bottom plate. There are a few little spots to file down on the floorplate carrier, and I took off about 1/4 of the protruding piece on the plastic follower, but it all went back together just fine and I now have a tight fitting 3-round mag that doesn't get in the way of my hand.

I also trimmed that release lever down to the point where I had to intentionally try to release the mag. No accidental bumps and dropped mags for me now. This carries in the hand so much better, and I'll never miss those 2 rounds in the mag. If I think there is a chance I'll be getting into a big pack of pigs, I'll just buy an extra 5-round mag for it. But this is my range rifle and a hunting rifle, and I wanted a little sleeker lines and better carrying. I really like it now.

I'll probably lop about 1.5" off that forend next time I get bored, but the way this baby has been shooting, I'm reluctant to pull it out of the stock again!

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Great job!
 
Thanks. The funny thing is I found a guy on another forum who did the exact same thing with his .223 Howa Mini, the same day I did mine. Guess it was in the air. LOL His write-up had some great pictures too.
 
I grabbed one with the heavy barrel. Sitting on the work bench waiting for me to decide on a stock. Rings, mounts and scope ready to go. My .223 mini will shoot right around .7 inch 5 shot 100yd groups with the factory synthetic stock and hand loads.
 
ford8nr said:
But Boyd's has so many choices
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Fair point lol.

Honestly what stoped me from buying one a couple weeks ago (I already put money down on a 9, but I could have changed my mind), was that what I wanted was an ultralight build with the lw profile barrel and a carbon stock. Just the stock would have cost me upwards of 600 bucks.
We're I interested in a heavier gun I'd probably have gone the Boyd's route.
 
Made an early morning trip to the range and that Howa mini is just boring accurate. 1" 5-shot group at 100 yards, and 1.75" 3-shot group at 200. Magazine mod performed flawlessly and I'm starting to appreciate the shape of that Boyd's classic stock. Cranking 123-grain Hornady SST's out at 2600 fps. (not a typo), this will be my primary deer rifle for 200 yards and in.
 
Newtosavage said:
Made an early morning trip to the range and that Howa mini is just boring accurate. 1" 5-shot group at 100 yards, and 1.75" 3-shot group at 200. Magazine mod performed flawlessly and I'm starting to appreciate the shape of that Boyd's classic stock. Cranking 123-grain Hornady SST's out at 2600 fps. (not a typo), this will be my primary deer rifle for 200 yards and in.
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Is yours a light barrel or heavy? I took my Lt Barrel 7.62x 39 in Boyds' stock to the range for the first time this morning, it shoots OK, but not as well as my 7.62x39 AR. My 7.62x39 AR likes my hand load with Nosler 125 gr .310 projectiles and 26 gr H322, can do 1 ragged hole at 50 yrs, but my Howa Mini is about 3/4-1" group at 50 yds. Geco brass case 7.62x39 is a disaster that "grouped" about 2.5" at 50 yds, it is not the most accurate but shoots fine in my AR. Hornady SST is .311 dia or .308? Maybe I should try some .308 projectiles such as Speer 125 gr TNT. My heavy barrel Howa 1500 308, bought together with the Mini from Bronells, likes Speer TNT, 1 hole at 50 yds!
 
Light barrel. And I did a quick and dirty JB Weld bedding job on the Boyd's stock not long after I got it, although it was shooting pretty well without it.

I'm using the Hornady .311 SST's (123 grain) and CFE BLK. I used RL-7 for years but now that I've tried CFE BLK, I'll never go back to RL-7. BLK has the accuracy of 7 with 150 fps more velocity. ;) I'm also using Lapua brass FWIW
 
ford8nr said:
You guys are killing me!
Right now I'm working 70 hour weeks, have my .22 target rifle on the bench for final adjustments and a new shooting jacket on the way. Indoor smallbore starts in 2 weeks.

Now all I want to do is fondle the Howa Mini still sitting in it's box.
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Do yourself a favor and get that Mini on the range. You'll forget all about that .22 ;)

My 7.62x39 Howa is at 300 yards what my .22 bolt action is at 100. Accurate and cheap and fun.
 
Newtosavage said:
Made an early morning trip to the range and that Howa mini is just boring accurate. 1" 5-shot group at 100 yards, and 1.75" 3-shot group at 200. Magazine mod performed flawlessly and I'm starting to appreciate the shape of that Boyd's classic stock. Cranking 123-grain Hornady SST's out at 2600 fps. (not a typo), this will be my primary deer rifle for 200 yards and in.
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WOW! 2600 is screaming. I can't recall ever reading anything online about an x39 going over the high 24s.

What is the barrel length on that rifle? A quick search through the thread didn't turn anything up.
 
Glad to see this thread is still alive. I got a boyds classic stock for my LW barrel 7.62x39 barreled action last week. It was pretty, but heavy, at about 2-3/4 pounds. I cut about 1-1/2" off of the forend leaving about 1/2" before the channel that is cut out under the barrel and shaved a bit of thickness off the outside of the forend to get a more svelte feel in that area. There is a lot of extra meat on these. I also shaved down the "cheek rest" on the side of the butt to make the left side symmetrical to the right side because it was not functional with the cheek weld on a scope. This is a classic stock, and I have a longish neck so I generally end up most comfortable with a pretty heads-up posture on a rifle. I drilled two 1" holes as deep as I dared to into the butt under the pad, then a 5/8" hole where the upper pad screw was, and a 1/2" hole angled up a little where the bottom pad screw was. The material removed from the butt was the most worth while, it really improved the balance of the rifle more than anything. With the scope, and an empty magazine, it balances right at the front edge of the magazine about 4-1/4" forward from the trigger, which isn't terrible. I reshapped the pistol grip a bit, more for feel than anything, putting a couple of light finger grooves where my finger tips land.

With those modifications, it shoulders and points very well. It was a lot of work, and I am happy with the way it turned out. Is it perfect? No, I am far from being a woodworking expert. Would I do it again? Not voluntarily, it was a lot more work than I originally conceived, especially shaving down the forend, if I had it to do over I would forego that part. I also trimmed the trigger spring to get a very crisp 3 pound pull (for those interested, that ended up being 1.5 coils off of the adjuster screw end of the spring. I went 1/2 coil at a time until I got it where I wanted it. Disassembly of the trigger to get at the spring is easy, but I recommend doing it in a 1 gallon freezer bag because those c clips are squirrely). As a last step, I will do a very basic bedding of the recoil lug and tang areas into the stock.

With a flip-flop butt pad (the original pad from boyds weighs almost 4 ounces, at the end of the rifle that you don't want it), the final stock weight looks like it will end up at 30-32 oz, very respectable. That will put the weight of the rifle around between 5-1/2 and 5-3/4 pounds. With the DNZ mount and vortex 2-7 that I am putting on it will add a pound. Not an ultralight, but for a rifle I have under $550 in including the optic, with the nice handling in an attractive durable laminate stock, I am happy for sure. If I can develop a load that get it shooting near as well as Newtosavage's, I am going to be very happy with it. I will post pictures at some point.

The way this rifle balances, it actually carries really nicely at the front of the magazine, tipped forward just a little, so the mag hanging down doesn't bother me too much. But that puts the magazine release in a bad spot. I am leaving it as-is for now to see if that is a problem for me, but might be looking at shaving it down or somehow re-configuring it at some point.
 
high country, I'll probably make many of those same stock mods myself. I didn't think about the weight of the recoil pad/plate, but that is another place to shave weight in a place - as you said - that matters most. I'm not familiar with "flip-flop" butt pad. Can you elaborate?
 
Mosin Bubba said:
WOW! 2600 is screaming. I can't recall ever reading anything online about an x39 going over the high 24s.

What is the barrel length on that rifle? A quick search through the thread didn't turn anything up.
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20" barrel. I actually got 2630 with 30 grains of CFE BLK, but backed off to 29 for an accuracy node.

That little 123 grain SST when starting out at 2600, still has over 1000 ft. lbs. of energy at 250 yards, making these Howa Mini's a very capable deer rifle for just about any practical situation.
 
When I popped the butt pad off, I was immediately like how the heck does this piece weigh so much?!? It comes off with 2 screws that are hidden down in the rubber, and it a little sticky even after the screws are out from the finish. A light tap on the edge with a small hammer popped it right off. The flip-flop butt pad is definitely nothing fancy, it is just making a replacement pad out of a cheap set of flip-flops. You rough out the shape, epoxy it in place, use painters tape to protect the wood, and shape it to fit with a rasp and sandpaper. I know it sounds questionable, but if you think about it, those flip-flops are made to withstand the impact of thousands of steps by people with a lot more mass than is created in a recoil. With the 7.62x39, there isn't a ton of recoil to absorb in the first place, so it should provide plenty of padding. I might get fancy and epoxy the pad to a piece of PVC (could even use a white piece to add a white spacer look) then use screws to fasten it rather then gluing directly to the stock. In the interest of full disclosure, I have not used this type of pad on any of my own rifles, but the ones I have seen look pretty good, and the weight of the pad should be under an ounce, as opposed to the almost 4 ounces of high density rubber in the boyds pad. This seems like the perfect rifle to give it a try on.

That is some impressive performance you are getting, I am definitely going to have to pick up some CFE BLK. I am excited to play with this cartridge, it seems to fit a very versatile role, with some impressive performance from well designed jacketed bullets, but not such a high velocity round that it can't be effective loading heavier cast bullets. Shooting SKS, etc. I never really thought much about the round other than how cheap it is, but reading some of the reloading discussions, it has some real potential as a general purpose round. Cheap off-the-shelf plinking ammo, loadable as a 200 yard deer round, and a good cartridge for cast bullets is a win-win-win in my book. Brass is a little harder to come by, but there seem to be several places that have once-fired online fore reasonable enough prices, and there is generally some at gun shows, or you can just by cheap brass cased stuff at about $0.50 per round and save the brass.
 
I probably should increase my load. 26gr H322 is the Nosler starting load (26 -28 gr) for the 123 gr Nosler 7.62x39 which is what I have but appears to be under starting load in Hodgedon 125 gr Spr SP data for H322(28-29 gr). 26 gr is already to the shoulder and shoot well in my AR, I guess bump it up to 27gr or even more worth a trial. 26 gr H322 does shoot POI lower than the factory GECO 7.62x39. I load mixed brass which is also why I load light.
 
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I was going to just edit my previous post to update instead of bumping the thread, but it is too long for an edit of a posting a week ago!
Loaded 26.5 gr and 27 gr, do shoot better. See the 1 ragged hole at 50 yds with 27 gr again!:) One reason I like stick powders is stick powder is less load sensitive, I guess still have a significant effect here. Maybe the light weight barrel!
27 gr is already above the bottom of the neck, and Winchester brass is noticeable smaller capacity. Nosler load data shows 26 gr is 101% and 27 gr is 105%. I will just stick with 27 gr and not higher! Amazing that Nosler load data shows 28 gr max which is 109%, I'm not brave enough to load to it. Some may wonder why H322, I have plenty old H322 that I want to use up!
Dropped the mag once by accidently tripped the mag release latch, poor design, will need to do something about it.
 
HankC said:
I will just stick with 27 gr and not higher! Amazing that Nosler load data shows 28 gr max which is 109%, I'm not brave enough to load to it. Some may wonder why H322, I have plenty old H322 that I want to use up!
Dropped the mag once by accidently tripped the mag release latch, poor design, will need to do something about it.
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Ive found noslers load data in some cartridges and powders to go up to about 115% compression, and unless you get bullet....uh...push out? it hasnt been an issue for me. My personal limit is 110, as that seems to be where i start feeling powder grains crunching as they try to rearrange themselves.
 
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