Whats your favorite "modern" gun?

I am wanting to buy a gun for under $700. What's the best option?

Not enough information.

What will it be used for?

Ranges?

Sorry. I am going to use it for deer hunting. Shooting 200-250 yards.

I've been extremely pleased with my 6.5 Grendel on the AR platform.

What 11 year old has 700.00 ?

You sure ain't making extra cash betting with the Chiefs.

I earn by building fence for my dad.

Pay attention, especially to those who just want to support the innocent ones. Are ya getting it yet?

I always did and more. I cut a lot of grass, raked leafs, and worked for my uncles tree business draging brush. I often had a few thousand in my pocket.

I'm betting he may be looking for x Mas gift ideas for mom and dad to go in on him with.


Absolutely any modern caliber will get the job done. What ammo is most available in your area?

I am very fond of 243 and 7mm08. Low recoil and flat puts them down. My kids have been laying them down with them for years. My daughter is 20 now and I think I bought her that Remington 700 lefthanded youth in 7mm08 when she was 8?

What action type do you want? I'm assuming you want a youth or compact model? I'm guessing you also want it scoped if so is that and rings included in your $700?

Bolt-action

Scope and rings included in your $700?

Tikka! I bought one in 6.5 Swede a few years ago. It shoots one hole but I hated the plastic stock. I bought a clean 308 in a walnut stock, did the old switch-a-roo with stocks and dumped the 308. It still shoots one hole and is a joy to carry.

Yes

Ruger No. 1.
Sako bolt action.
Marlin JM 1895.
Ruger AR-MPR.
Ruger Marlin 1895.
Blaser bolt action.

How many of these do you have for sale at $700 or less? I will take all of the No.1's you can come up with.

Think about the price of ammo. Check used gun racks too. I love my Ruger American.

Catch they don't figure it out until it's too late

160 - thought maybe you would sell yours to me.
There can be deals around, just much harder to find.
The youngster could build more fences and save his $.

I've been wanting to build one. Found a 6.5 rifle kit for around 300 today. I have the lower so I'm very tempted

In today's ammo market it's more reasonable to choose your rifle based on ammo available in your area. In my area, that would be: .223 rem, .308 win, 6.5 creedmore, or 350 legend. Where the government is heading with toxicity, you might wanting to be even more selective and only consider calibers being available with monolithic copper bullets.

Savage Arms is hard to beat today for value and reliability. While an old remington man, I have been buying Savage in varmint calibers lately; don't care for what Remington has to offer in today's models. I also like what Ruger is producing.

And remember, optics are just as important as the firearm, if not more so. You can't shoot what you can't see clearly.

Tikka, but that is going to take up your 700 and not leave anything left over for scope. The new Savages are an accurate shooting gun for less money and many come with a cheap scope. Might want to research the scope that comes in the package deals, they offer them with different brands and models at times and some of them are so junk they won't hold a zero, while others are not bad.

Willy, I'll buy every Sako you have for 700 a piece. Just PM me.

As for caliber, you will get a lot of opinions and most will work. I'm not a huge 6.5 Creedmoor fan but it is a good deer caliber and low recoil, and it seems to be the most readily available caliber around here just by my looking at the shelves whenever I get to town.

I've been impressed with my Thompson CenterCompass and Savage rifles.

I know a couple of 11 and 12 year olds who have thousands; from working, not handouts.

Tikka III, it is a tack driver right out of the box. Get whatever caliber you prefer, they are a light weight rifle, so depending on your body build and your reaction to recoil you might want one of the lighter calibers. however, I have the rifle in 300 Win Mag and the recoil is not bad at all.

Regarding scopes and your budget; buy the rifle first and worry about the scope later. If you want an affordable scope that will give you good service look at Swift scopes, they are a Japanese scope (they were when I bought mine) they are durable, and a very good buy for the money. I bought one nearly 20 years ago and put it on a 375H&H magnum, it's on my "loaner rifle" but it still works just like the day I bought it. Upgrade to a Leupold or some high end scope later.

3yrs ago I bought my son a Browning A Bolt III chambered in 243win. It’s accurate and he shoots it well. I think they are going for the neighborhood of 699 from the bass pro shops thanksgiving flyer I threw away on Wednesday.

Bearcat - never said I was selling anything for $700.

An 11 year old asking unknown adults for advice on buying a firearm is a bit absurd.
Use? Supervision? Training? Skills?
And SAFETY!
If he is going to dream, dream big!

Not many rifles out there that wont shoot 250 to 300 yards with enough accuracy to kill deer So take your pick

https://www.gunbroker.com/item/957891883

As for budget rifles, I prefer the Mossberg Patriot over the others like the Savages because they have a nice wood stock. I have one in 25-06 I've been using the last couple years without any hiccups.

Its really just personal choice when it comes to rifles, they all work.

As far as my "favorite", it is and has been a Remington 700.

I bought a Tikka a year ago. Good gun but not a tack driver. T3x stainless in 270. Tried 4 different commercial loads. It's right around that one inch group at at a 100yds with premium ammo. Which will do the job but nothing to brag about by today's standards. If I get another on I'm leaning towards trying a weatherby vanguard.

You could probably find a good quality used rifle and scope on a buy and sell forum. Especially after deer season or just after Christmas. Some of my favourite rifles were bought used

Well I got my first bear at 2 1/2 years old...With a Big Medicine.405

And changed my own diaper too !

Did I read that right? OP is 11 years old? If so, nothing is going to happen without approval of at least one parent. They would have some say in this and opinion too.

Past that, in most parts of MO, I suspect there are upwards of 100 suitable idle guns resting in gun safes and behind bedroom and closet doors within 10 miles of just about anywhere. A good kid would have no trouble obtaining the loan of one of those from family, friends or neighbors until such time as he had enough experience to make an informed decision.

Kid would also need to know that each time he pulls the trigger, each shot is going to cost him somewhere between $1 and $2 per BANG. Takes a lot of practice to ethically anchor deer at 200 yards, so not a trivial thing.

Sort of a related story, up at the farm, a neighbor's grandson took an interest in trapping, and was getting pretty good and nabbing coons with DP's. Have moved up to those from cages. His reputation was spreading. Neighbor dropped by in Aug and I asked about the kid, as I was set to give him a small selection of 1.5's, 110's, etc to expand his repertoire. He said he had quit trapping. Not because of money......there was none. He couldn't stomach trapping and killing animals for no good reason. Self taught ethics. Pretty impressive for a kid that age. These kids are out there and worthy of our help.

I would look on the used racks. FEW rifles get very many round shot through them and you may find something nice with a decent scope. Especially after season goes out and it's time to buy Xmas presents for the kids. And when the after Christmas bills start rolling in and the economy getting bad things like guns get sold when people need money.

Take your time there is no hurry there is a year tell next deer season.

My favorite rifles are Rem 700s. My most accurate is a plain 270 ADL.

You can easily build your own AR-15 or AR-10 platform rifle for that these days

When I was 11 I was teaching my self how to trap and hunt,, no one in my family was an outdoors person. Just because you weren't capable of doing something at a young age doesn't mean that others aren't capable.
Perhaps this guys folks aren't outdoors folks, makes perfect sense that he would be asking for advice on this forum. It's not like the kid is going to go out and buy a rifle without his parents involvement.

.243 is a sweet caliber and easy on a young man. I like the Rem 700 and Ruger 77

Young man look at a 308 gread caliber plenty of ammo available everywhere light recoil and it kills deer. And guy use it to shoot steel out to 1000 yards

Stop throwing crazy calibers out there that the kid can't find ammo for !! Get you a savage axis with a vortex scope in 270 caliber. Kill anything you want to hunt. Buy them all day long on sale for 379 bucks. Take therest and buy more traps or another rifle.

I am kinda. My brothers are all "warm-weather hunters". lol

Dont need need to learn to shoot with a 2 buck a cartridge rifle. You learn to shoot with a 22. Shooting is shooting. Then when you shoot the big stuff only need to shoot enough to be familiar with the rifle. Hunting rabbts and squirrels will teach you bout everything you need to know about hunting and shooting

And yes my parents are involved.

I like old Remington 700's, model 7s, ruger m 77s, and old winchester model 70s. They're are so many more great rifles out there. These are just some I have had great luck with. But buying a used old gun it will be hard to find with a short stock. So you will want to have it cut down or order a shorter one frome somewhere like stockie stocks or Boyd's.

I have heard positive things about the rugar American and savage has always made an accurate budget rifle. My inlaws have a savage axis and I can't recommend that. Their's doesn't have the accutrigger and the trigger In it is horrible. It was not as accurate as I normally expected out of a savage. I think the newer model has the accutrigger.

This one... https://www.bing.com/videos/search?...90C47A0A94B9214CC55&&FORM=VDRVRV

Garry-

Since I take it you don't reload here's what I fell you should do bud.
Go to everywhere you'd regularly to buy ammo if you don't buy online. If you have your folks buy online for you it's about different.
Take not of everything on the shelves and get back with us. As far as caliber.
If you can't reload or ammo for this or that is too expensive or hard to get locally or otherwise that should be a key factor.

As far as the rifle it's self, honestly for under $700 I don't feel like you can go wrong with an AR-15. You 11 so your probably not a great fit or most off the self rifles. An AR is amazing because you can easily adjust and mod every thing from the stock to the grip to the barrel ect to fit you perfectly without a lot of fuss. And a good fitting rifle means A LOT if you wanna be good. Trust me I'm 5'1" and 80% of rifles just plain don't fit me even though I'm 24yr. Was 2x as bad when I was your age. Developed a lot of bad tendencies due to this. It's 2022 no need for anyone to have to go through all the bull crap of having to use some crappy ill fitting gun and developing a bunt of poor marksmanship tendencies.

Another great thing about an AR platform is you only need to go to the gun store and buy 1 lower ( we'll have your parents buy 1 lower. And you can a TON of different uppers in various calibers and configuration buy just sapping the upper . And you can just order an upper right though the mail no paper work needed. So say you get a 18" 350 legend upper and decided 4moths down the road that due to this or that you don't like it. Cool pop it off ( just two pins) give it to your brother or parents and have them sell it at the local gun store and buy something else. Instead of being out $700 something bunch for a while rifle and getting half of that if your lucky I'm most places your only out like $350 in alot of cases and you still have your lower. So while you selling that upper and you see their selling a 258 wizbang or something you can just buy that upper and BCG and try that for a while. If your making $700 at 11 within a year you could have one lower and uppers covering everything from .22lr to a .50 Beowulf and have all your bases covered for the most part.

I mean I have a few uppers and two lowers and I'm swapping them out constantly all the time. Honestly best bang for your buck modern gun I think you can get .

Word of advice though. Take a second to study the anatomy of every critter you wanna shoot and you be able to do ALOT more with less gun

https://www.basspro.com/shop/en/savage-110-apex-storm-xp-bolt-action-rifle-with-scope As mention above the new Savages are accurate and price is good. 243 is a very good deer round.

https://www.snipercountry.com/6-5-creedmoor-vs-243/

Savage axis vortex combo. Cheap ugly fairly tough and will shoot.

X2