I'm primarily a trapshooter and secondarily a pistol guy, but I've been thinking it might be nice to have a rifle in the house as well--for plinking, for building familiarity with rifles, for recreation, for defensive use if need be (though I still look primarily at pistols for defensive use). It's unlikely to be used for hunting, so I'm not set on any one particular cartridge. What model should I be looking for?
These are things that are important to me:
* Low maintenance--I don't want something I have to do a lot of work to keep running smoothly.
* Reasonable affordability--I'd like to keep the price under $1,000. $500ish would be awesome if that was possible.
* Lefty-friendly. I'd love something that was as ambidextrous as possible (though I know that few/no rifles are as truly ambidextrous as my bottom-ejecting BPS shotgun).
These are things that are not:
* Tacticool accessories--I'm not categorically opposed to polymer, but both my current firearms are both traditional metal-and-wood (BPS Hunter and 1911 R1), and that works fine for me. I'm not looking for something with a bunch of doodads and accessory rails on every surface.
* Extreme accuracy. I don't want something that's frustratingly inaccurate, but I'm not going to be using this for competition, so "good enough" is good enough.
* Largest ammunition capacity or highest effective rate of fire. Hell, I'd be fine with a lever-action or bolt-action if such a model turned out to be the best fit.
These are things that are important to me:
* Low maintenance--I don't want something I have to do a lot of work to keep running smoothly.
* Reasonable affordability--I'd like to keep the price under $1,000. $500ish would be awesome if that was possible.
* Lefty-friendly. I'd love something that was as ambidextrous as possible (though I know that few/no rifles are as truly ambidextrous as my bottom-ejecting BPS shotgun).
These are things that are not:
* Tacticool accessories--I'm not categorically opposed to polymer, but both my current firearms are both traditional metal-and-wood (BPS Hunter and 1911 R1), and that works fine for me. I'm not looking for something with a bunch of doodads and accessory rails on every surface.
* Extreme accuracy. I don't want something that's frustratingly inaccurate, but I'm not going to be using this for competition, so "good enough" is good enough.
* Largest ammunition capacity or highest effective rate of fire. Hell, I'd be fine with a lever-action or bolt-action if such a model turned out to be the best fit.