Thread: What would your ultimate Bush Pig rifle build be and what NZ gunsmith would you use?

It seems like everyone is missing the point... the bush pig thing is only an issue if you want a can, and don't want the extra length and weight on the end of your barrel that a good can creates.

If you don't want a can, good luck to you and your increasing deafness.... or your fumbling for something to stuff in your ears...

If you do want to use a suppressor; personally I don't like putting cans on anything over 20 inches in length, and preferably about 16" so that the extra 4-5" forwards make it a total about back to where we started. People who started doing this soon worked out that a small amount of velocity loss made little difference to the thing you point it at, and in fact if you reloaded, using faster powders still got you back to almost the same velocities as what you are buying in factory boxes with the original length barrel.

Now there are 2 reasons, why you might not want to chop.... you have a nice original rifle or you don't want a suppressor. Don't chop if you don't want a supressor. Its almost all minuses. If you can live with an original length rifle and a suppressor, good luck to you also... some do just because they don't want to chop a nice rifle.

Outside of that, for me at least it's purely pragmatic.... I've already lost as much hearing as I want to and I don't want to cart a telephone pole around in the bush.

Originally Posted by Sidney

It seems like everyone is missing the point... the bush pig thing is only an issue if you want a can, and don't want the extra length and weight on the end of your barrel that a good can creates.

If you don't want a can, good luck to you and your increasing deafness.... or your fumbling for something to stuff in your ears...

If you do want to use a suppressor; personally I don't like putting cans on anything over 20 inches in length, and preferably about 16" so that the extra 4-5" forwards make it a total about back to where we started. People who started doing this soon worked out that a small amount of velocity loss made little difference to the thing you point it at, and in fact if you reloaded, using faster powders still got you back to almost the same velocities as what you are buying in factory boxes with the original length barrel.

Now there are 2 reasons, why you might not want to chop.... you have a nice original rifle or you don't want a suppressor. Don't chop if you don't want a supressor. Its almost all minuses. If you can live with an original length rifle and a suppressor, good luck to you also... some do just because they don't want to chop a nice rifle.

Outside of that, for me at least it's purely pragmatic.... I've already lost as much hearing as I want to and I don't want to cart a telephone pole around in the bush.

Yeah.i get your point but heres the thing. Shooting at the range or sighting in etc you use ear protection. If you shooting long range or have plenty of time to set up and shoot you use ear protection. If you goat shooting etc you use ear protection, not a problem. if you bush stalking and see a animal one shot should do the business and one shot here and their doesnt totally stuff your hearing. My hearings fine, and ive use no suppressor for years . I know many old time shooters and alot of their hearing is fine,but those ones that arent told me they used to fire untold shots without hearing protection and often sighted in whereever without hearing protection and still arnt stone deaf. Using a suppressor is clearly a good choice for your hearing no doubt and should be encouraged .
But not using one isnt the end of your hearing if you use protection when you can and a shot here and there doesnt seem to do alot from what ive seen and heard from long time shooters

Originally Posted by deer243

Yeah.i get your point but heres the thing. Shooting at the range or sighting in etc you use ear protection. If you shooting long range or have plenty of time to set up and shoot you use ear protection. If you goat shooting etc you use ear protection, not a problem. if you bush stalking and see a animal one shot should do the business and one shot here and their doesnt totally stuff your hearing. My hearings fine, and ive use no suppressor for years . I know many old time shooters and alot of their hearing is fine,but those ones that arent told me they used to fire untold shots without hearing protection and often sighted in whereever without hearing protection and still arnt stone deaf. Using a suppressor is clearly a good choice for your hearing no doubt and should be encouraged .
But not using one isnt the end of your hearing if you use protection when you can and a shot here and there doesnt seem to do alot from what ive seen and heard from long time shooters

Maybe you should ask an audiologist their opinion rather than rely on the opinions of these 'long time shooters'. I suspect you will find every shot fired without some form of protection does compounding damage.

But hey, they are your ears to wreck I suppose.

Originally Posted by deer243

... I know many old time shooters and alot of their hearing is fine,but those ones that arent told me they used to fire untold shots without hearing protection and often sighted in whereever without hearing protection and still arnt stone deaf. ..

The trouble with those observations is that casually talking to a person face-to-face doesn't give an accurate indication of what their hearing is like less-than-ideal situations , especially in background noise. I would say well over half of my patients who wear their hearing aids -all- the time can still hear me fact-to-face without their aids . But they are hopeless at distance, with any quieter/female voices and most particularly if there is -any- background noise about. They often avoid social events because they know they will be reduced to guessing what's being said and making embarrassing mistakes from guessing.

If someone is obviously "deaf", their loss would be making their life and all those around them miserable. I can tell you shooting does your hearing no favours and adding age to that is inevitable.