Yes, I know that, but that's a LOT of trouble and there are few places where you can shoot such weapons.

I would rather direct my gun money elsewhere. To each his own, however.

I have two Springfields deriving from the 1903(A3) rifle. One is a .30-06 which has been restocked by my father, probably with some other modifications such as bluing the barrel and, importantly, changing the bold handle to allow use with a telescopic sight. The other is a .25-06 with a medium weight 24" barrel restocked by my father. Both rifles have a 15.5" length of pull, which suits my 6' 2" frame very well. Both rifles shoot quite accurately, probably more accurately than I can shoot them -- 1" groups for the .30-06 and 1.25" for the .25-06 (these groups also seem to be sensitive to the specific commercial loads that I shoot -- maybe other commercial loads or handloads tuned to each rifle would improve accuracy). The .30-06 has part of the forward iron sight still in place: the blade with the bead has been removed, but the heavier component that attaches to the barrel and formerly held the blade remains. This is a little unsightly (pun intended!) and the sight picture through the scope shows this as a blur, but is not a practical problem. I talked to a gun smith about removing, and basically the appropriate fix would be to chop off about an inch of barrel and recrown. Because the gun does shoot well, and I'm not keen about losing barrel length, I've never moved forwards with this modification. Maybe I still will do this some day. The barrel now is about 24". I suppose most would say that the performance decrease of the .30-06 in a 23" barrel versus a 24" barrel is negligible, but I'm just not sufficiently motivated to get this modification done.

Having said all that, I love both rifles. They are handsome solid pieces to carry in the woods and hunt with. I plan to use the .30-06 on my second elk hunt in about 3 weeks in SW Colorado.

Just saw this thread. Military rifles for REC. Yep! it works for me.
I started with a 1903 Springfield. Over the years I picked up a SMLE - gave it to my son. There's a Swiss K31, a Moisin-Nagant rifle, an M1 Carbine, a Martini-Henry Longlever, an original Trapdoor Carbine, a Martini-Cadet .310. The big hole for me is that there is no M1 Garand....yet.
Pete

i have a moisn i put a sin stock on it and love it

i really like mine and have been werking on it and getting ready to bed it.

Working on sporterizing and modernizing an SMLE for my girlfriend then maybe a Mosin for myself.

I took my first deer with an as-issued '03A1 Springfield. Most of my cousins use WWII mausers.I am really fond of the k31 Swiss. It's a great south-paw friendly bolt. I recently took this crop damage tag doe at 220 yd.'s with a 150 gr. Sierra game king hand load. DRT

i have a old m1 carbine that I love... belonged to my grandfather, and was used extensively by my father to feed their family on arkansas deer... I'm hoping to get one this year with it...

I have hunted with most of the rifles listed. I would say the best one to use either as original or modified is a 6.5 Arisaka carbine. Once you get used to the safety, it is really fast. All the other rifles have uncomfortable safeties to use when hunting. It is easy to put a scope on the 6.5 as you can bend the bolt enough to clear the scope and still use the original safety. It is one of the lightest rifles, even the 7.7 model is fairly light in original condition.

Just an opinion, it's tough to beat a 7.5x55 Swiss.

Though never really considered the safety aspect as the above poster mentions. I guess I don't much hunt with a safety so it's a non-issue for me.

Has anyone ever heard of building a custom out of a Swiss action?

Tom