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I like mine a lot. It's a 1949 M99 in 300 I got just a few years ago.
I grew up with a Savage 1899, which was either a 30-30 or a 303 when made, but was converted to 300 Savage by an Arizona Gunsmith sometime during WW2 or maybe a bit before. My dad got the rifle from that gunsmith in 1946.
It had a short barrel (20" as I recall) and a "dog-knot" where the rear sight was and the barrel was VERY light almost looking like a shotgun at the muzzle. It had a crescent steel butt plate and no pistol grip. It was a very light carbine and I thought it kicked a lot when I was a young boy. I got my own 1st rifles when I was 12, a Winchester M70 in 270 and after that I stopped using the old 300.

But after many years I got to wanting one again even though when I was a 110 pound kid I though the 300 Sav was an evil kicking device made to torture deer hunters. And a few years ago I got one.

It's a Standard M99 in 300 and I have a peep sight on it. It's got the 24" barrel and no dog-knot. Standard butt plate too. It had a badly bent rear sight so I cut it off and retained the male dovetail to make a slot blank. It now is used only with the peep sight. I have killed a number of deer and antelope with it including one antelope buck just about 5 weeks ago. It shoots 150 grains bullets into just about 1-1/4" at 100 yards and I leave it hitting about 3" high at 100. 40.0 grains of 4064 in re-formed 308 machine gun brass with 150 grain Core-Lokts or Nosler Ballistic-Tip (hunting) bullets. MY chronograph says they go 2628 FPS. So far it's dropped all the game I have shot at with it.

The 300 Savage is the first cartridge I ever killed an elk with when I was a young boy. My dad and a bunch of his friend went on a week long hunt and he took me along. He used his brothers 30-06 Mauser and gave me the 300 Savage to carry. I bet no one really thought "the kid" would shoot one, but I got a shot at a 4X4 bull running across in front of me and made a hit behind it's shoulder with the bullet exiting from the base of the neck on the other side.

We had stopped in Eureka Nevada at a gas station and dad bough a box of "elk ammo" (180 grain instead of the 150 grain he usually bought) I made a good hit and about 3 seconds later my Uncle shot the same bull, but his bullet hit the neck low and never touched the bones. He said the elk went about 15 feet more after his hit. My bullet took out both lungs and his cut major blood vessels in the front of the neck. So I think of it as "my first elk" but in all honesty it was a collaboration of my shot and my uncles shot. Either way, we had a dead elk.

Some time in the future I hope to do it again. I don't know how many elk I have killed in the last 50+ years, but the only one I ever shot with a 300 Savage was the 1st one. I hope I can do it again---- before I get too old to hunt at all.

Edited by szihn (21/11/21 01:22 AM)