Last night I posted this in another thread.
I carried an AR and a rifle sighted 870 to get a feel for times with a pump as well as an autoloader. Not ideal, but what I have. Here are the results:
Firing 3 shots as fast as possible, no target.
AR *
870 with 1 oz slugs .58 sec.
Marlin 44 mag 1.39 sec.
Marlin 30-30 1.41 sec
Winchester 70 308 1.88 sec.
* My wife was timing me with a stopwatch. We tried 3 times to get a time with the AR, but she was never able to start and stop the watch fast enough. Times were under .5 sec.
Shooting at a 9" paper plate at 50 yards.
AR 2.68 sec
870 Did not shoot
44 mag 3.88 sec.
30-30 3.97 sec.
308 4.08 sec.
The times on the 30-30 and 44 were .2 and .11 seconds faster than the 308, but after 2 tries with each I was never able to hit the target all 3 times. The 308 was slightly slower, but gave me 2" groups on the target each time. I wanted to try one more time. I know what I was doing wrong. Trying to shoot that fast I wasn't getting the front bead down far enough into the rear sight notch and was consistently high. But I had been shooting in the rain all morning, had put over 100 rounds down range by this time and decided it was time for lunch. I think I could have gotten all 3 rounds on target if I had slowed down a little more, but was just too tired to try again by that point.
There were few surpises here. Not the first time anyone has tried this and the results are always the same. The actual times vary, but the auto and pump always come out fastest. The lever and bolt are always in a virtual tie for 3rd and 4th with single shots being the slowest. As I predicted the levers were slightly faster when just throwing lead without aiming, but the bolt gun was faster when having to actually hit something.
You may find a few guys who are slightly faster with the bolt, others will be slightly faster with the lever, but there is never enough difference either way to matter in a hunting situation. Unless you just plain can't shoot and aren't willing to learn how to operate a bolt action they are a tie.
There are probably a lot of guys who can shoot a lever faster than I. But there are probably just as many who can shoot a bolt faster than I can too. Just goes to prove that if anyone takes the time to learn how to shoot one, a bolt gun can more than keep up with a lever in speed.
I carried an AR and a rifle sighted 870 to get a feel for times with a pump as well as an autoloader. Not ideal, but what I have. Here are the results:
Firing 3 shots as fast as possible, no target.
AR *
870 with 1 oz slugs .58 sec.
Marlin 44 mag 1.39 sec.
Marlin 30-30 1.41 sec
Winchester 70 308 1.88 sec.
* My wife was timing me with a stopwatch. We tried 3 times to get a time with the AR, but she was never able to start and stop the watch fast enough. Times were under .5 sec.
Shooting at a 9" paper plate at 50 yards.
AR 2.68 sec
870 Did not shoot
44 mag 3.88 sec.
30-30 3.97 sec.
308 4.08 sec.
The times on the 30-30 and 44 were .2 and .11 seconds faster than the 308, but after 2 tries with each I was never able to hit the target all 3 times. The 308 was slightly slower, but gave me 2" groups on the target each time. I wanted to try one more time. I know what I was doing wrong. Trying to shoot that fast I wasn't getting the front bead down far enough into the rear sight notch and was consistently high. But I had been shooting in the rain all morning, had put over 100 rounds down range by this time and decided it was time for lunch. I think I could have gotten all 3 rounds on target if I had slowed down a little more, but was just too tired to try again by that point.
There were few surpises here. Not the first time anyone has tried this and the results are always the same. The actual times vary, but the auto and pump always come out fastest. The lever and bolt are always in a virtual tie for 3rd and 4th with single shots being the slowest. As I predicted the levers were slightly faster when just throwing lead without aiming, but the bolt gun was faster when having to actually hit something.
You may find a few guys who are slightly faster with the bolt, others will be slightly faster with the lever, but there is never enough difference either way to matter in a hunting situation. Unless you just plain can't shoot and aren't willing to learn how to operate a bolt action they are a tie.
There are probably a lot of guys who can shoot a lever faster than I. But there are probably just as many who can shoot a bolt faster than I can too. Just goes to prove that if anyone takes the time to learn how to shoot one, a bolt gun can more than keep up with a lever in speed.
