Back in the 1900's i used to hunt with a center fire rifle. Elk is what we hunted mostly, but sometimes antelope, and if a deer happened by, we killed it. I always wanted to carry a lever action with an exposed hammer. I've always preferred an exposed hammer. The lever action guns of the day with the exposed hammer weren't really chambered for Elk cartridges, so i continued carrying bolt action rifles with 'safeties'.

Our son decided to start packing a 30-30. He killed several elk with it, and ended up losing a few. He soon gave that up.

Today, i only hunt with a muzzle loader. One reason, is mine don't have 'long' actions, because there is no bolt. My hunting rifles have 24" barrels, and are inches shorter than my bolt action rifle with a 22" barrel. We always hunted elk in thick timber, and my short light muzzle loader would have been a perfect elk rifle.

Today i only hunt with a muzzle loader. One reason is because my rifles all have exposed hammers. Exposed rebounding hammers make me happy. I like the way they look. I like the way they work. When not pulled back, they don't make contact with the firing pin, and are blocked from making contact with the firing pin. The only way the exposed rebounding hammer can make contact with the firing pin, is iff the trigger is pulled back. If the hammer isn't pulled back i can see that it isn't. If the hammer is pulled back it is visibly ready to fire.

Back in the 1900's an exposed hammer wasn't so safe, because they relied on the 'half cooked' notch to keep it away from the firing pin. One could pull the trigger when the hammer was in half cook. More than once i saw guns carried with the hammer down on a loaded chamber or cylinder. Them old guns aren't near as safe as the newer guns with rebounding hammers.

Modern muzzle loader rifles with exposed rebounding hammers are short, light, safe, accurate, and my choice for packing whilst hunting.