I took delivery of my new Henry Single Shot .223 Remington /5.56 x 45 from Cabelas on Thursday 15 Feb. It had been on back order for almost 1 month at that time.
In terms of the condition and physical appearance, it is everything I have come to expect from Henry. (This is my third, one small game rifle, one Big Boy Steel .44M) Wood is beautiful, metal finish is excellent. .
I thoroughly cleaned it and took it to an indoor range to break it in and function check it. Almost all good.
In general, I find the review by Chuckhawks to be pretty accurate:
http://www.chuckhawks.com/henry_H015-223.html
In my case, I agree that the break is absolutely clean, but my Wheeler mechanical gauge (old style) measures it at closer to 6.5 lbs than 5.5 as they report. There is no "creep" and there is no gritty feel, BUT there is a very light two-stage effect. It is like two breaks, almost like set. The first break is a very low pressure, might not even be a quarter pound, but you can feel the trigger move just a bit after a clean break at low pressure. (It is also audible) Then 6.5 for a clean break. It is NOT like a trigger safety or Acu-trigger, it is light break - heavy break.
For NOW, my plan is to shoot some more and see if the trigger breaks in a bit. I could live with the break-break effect because it is predictable and consistent (over approx 25 rounds)
The sights are almost useless for me. I would do much better with a peep rear. 60+ year old eyes, what can I tell you. My lever Henry's do have peeps and I have replaced the brass bead with fiber optic, but for this rifle a scope is warranted. I won't mention groups as it is not fair, I had trouble with the sights, as I said, and the only way I could shoot at this particular indoor range is standing offhand. No brace, no steadying, and I didn't think to mount a sling.
Which brings up the strong negative. I purchased the mount and ring combination referenced in the Chuckhawks review. The mount is a problem. There are only two notches for rings and they are 4 1/8 inches apart. I ATTEMPTED to mount a Vortex Crossfire II 3-9x40 (very similar to scope in review) but the ocular bell would not clear the hammer spur. I was able to use a different ring I had in my spares that is higher and clear the spur, but I still cant get the bell rearward enough for comfort. (Insufficient eye relief.) Having a couple more notches in the scope mount would be helpful, but I will have to either file those myself or have a smith cut them.
In any event, I am not happy with the adopted H&R scope mount, it is clearly a kluge not meant for this rifle, and looks it. The cantilever is excessive. In a light recoiling .223, it may be acceptable, but in .308 it may subject the scope to harmful vibration from the unsupported half of the "rail." Henry announced this rifle a long time before they finally started manufacturing it, they had plenty of time to come up with a better mount solution than this. Mr Imperato, this is a really half-assed effort and not a good result for your otherwise excellent rifle.
