Best YOUTH Hunting Rifle?

[XC700116]

the rossi trifecta 243... best bang for the buck i've seen, you can get a 20g barrel and a 22lr barrel for it... its a single shot breach loading gun... worth a look and it a decent firing weapon... my 7yr old has one w/ a 3-9x40 scope and he nails the boiler room at 100+ yds...

Maybe a good price but trust me I used to sell those things by the truck load and they are a POS!!

My best reccomendation would be a Thompsen ceter Encore with Bantum stock and 7mm-08 Barrel. Good power light recoil safe single shot action and will teach him to shoot well on the first shot. As well as the fact that they are a very accurate rifle with good warranty and hold their value. It can easilly grow with him in both caliber and physical size, and you can sell the other barrels and/or stocks on E-bay for nearly what you paid for them.

Oh and they are abidextrious (sp?)

 

[milehighassassin]

are you telling me you can't load one round at a time in an AR there gunny hartmann??? you should know better than that...

Absolutely, but you know it won't be used like that, and if you are going to why not just buy a .223?

 

[XC700116]

Never thought I'd say this but I agree with Mile high on this one.

Yeah an AR has nearly zero recoil but how many guys are going to drop that kind of coin on a "youth rifle" Although it's a good excuse to get an AR. And how many times is the kid going to only load 1 round in reality?

I also think that for a youth gun a .223 isn't the best choice of caliber. Kids get excited and you don't want to try to deal with a less than perfect shot with a .223 when you could go to a very tame round like a 7mm-08 and still deliver some knock down power. This is the same reason the 25-06 and .243 aren't at the top of my list. All of those rounds are great when delivered with great accuracy but leave something to be desired in the department of bullet retention due to the speed in which the deliver it. If you did go with a lighter caliber a bonded bullet is a MUST for anything larger than say an antelope and I'd still go with one for them.

I've chased whitetails all over creation due to impropper bullet selection for the caliber, in a 25-06 that my brother used to shoot, bullet enters and decintegrates, no exit wound and not all of the energy delivered to the vitals because it blew up hitting a rib on the way in.

 

[onlyrotax]

I started with a model 700 remington 243, the hardest thing for a kid to overcome is the muzzle blast and the kick, I would not start him with anything bigger than a 243 or 6mm or he may develope a "flinch" problem. Also keep it simple, no fumbling with clips or trying to shove numerous shells down a tube feed, if he can't hit something with 4 shots he probably should wait for another chance.