Thread: Ultimate compact rifle & catrige - 6mmGT/22GT in howa mini action

Not a chance. Howa engineered it and choose not to use high pressure cartridges in it. Aluminium sleeved actions have been with us for decades and are proven. Its not just the material. Its the complete design.

I suggest you represent yourself when you sue Howa.

If you want to run a 22 wildcat chambering ,then surely, the most obvious choice would be the .22 Grendel .


Just putting it out there .

Wow! thanks guys. For worrying about firearm safety. I appreciate that.
But, before you go on think I am going to blow up my gun with this carriage, have you actually had a look of the Mini bolt? Say put it side to side to a Tikka bolt. You might notice the bolt face wall thickness is about the same (if not thicker), the lug thickness is also about the same. They didn't make those important things "mini".
There are discussions about if bolt thrust is the only main safety factor for a bolt gun. As I understand it, for a bolt action rifle the majority force of the bolt thrust goes into its lugs, where it happen to be the strongest part of the action (for a reason). To cause failure of the lug you need very high forces. here is the force required to cause 4140 steel to fail.
ROCKWELL ‘C’ HARDNESS 4140 YIELD STRENGTH PSI
20 83,500
22 87,000
30 135,000
34 148,750
37 159,000
42 178,000
46 195,000
49 211,000
Now to reach this kind force, I will be worried more about other things first. like the case will be ruptured or at minimum the primer will be blown off, so the hot gas will flow through the bolt and heading towards shooter. Here is where howa bolt shines. It has 4 vents to direct hot gas away from shooter, while Tikka has none. If gas still reaches the shroud, the howa has metal shroud, while Tikka has piece of plastic (ok the later model has metal one now). On top of that the Mini has M16 style extractor which is consider safer than Tikka/Sako. So I will trust more in howa in such scenario.
I do own one gun that has lug setback due to the bolt thrust (only 1 thou so not an issue), and it is Remington titanium 700, never happened to my steel actioned rifle. Hence my suspicion about other material. I have never owned a Aluminum actioned rifle so happy to hear other opinions.
Happy discussion

Hmmmm, you just reinforce my pet prejudice, I'll happily trust engineering, but I never trust an engineers! Do some reading on hoop strength versus shear strength and you mjght start to gain some understanding.

You have a good idea with the cartridge but no idea with the vehicle to take it forward - tell me that shouldnt feed my prejudice towards engineers!

https://www.nzhuntingandshooting.co....rminator-5607/

Or get a fast twist 22-250

I think the issue is not only the small size of the bolt tenons but the diameter of the thread on the barrel and the thickness of the receiver where the barrel screw in.( I have a spare Howa mini barrel at work I can measure on Monday. Or we can ask wingman).
My understanding is that it is a bit the same problem when you starts to get stiff loads in 28 nosler into a tikka t3.
Not enough steel around the chamber (1” or 25.4mm thread tenon diameter) where a Remington 700 will handle it better with a 27mm tenon thread diameter ( same pitch in both cases at 16tpi, so same depth of thread).

@hey I have a 6GT and its my main match gun. won a few and placed in a few.

It kills wallabies and smaller critters well, wouldn't hesitate to use it on a fallow etc but I use match bullets and they are no bueno for the deer, just like the 69gr experience you have had in the 223.

Pros: Easy to load and find accurate nodes (designed around 2208 & 105gr), lots of data, short - but designed around the AICS SA length 2.8"

Cons: dies are expensive, brass is $3 a piece (might be more now) and no factory ammo available in NZ.

I recently built a fast .22 centerfire and settled on a 22-250AI as it is the same performance as the 22 CM but toyed with a 22GT as I have bushing dies. I ended up going with the 22-250AI because brass is cheap, I can use loaded factory 22-250 ammunition if I want and dies were easy to get & available in NZ.

Yes the .223 will do everything you want, Yes the .308 will do it better, Yes .270 is what god shoots...

But if YOU want a 22GT on a Howa Mini, fill ya F*ckn boots mate... You'll likely find the mag length of 58mm is a bit short for running long heavy for calibre bullets (the whole point of fast .22 centrefires) but give it a go!

Just make sure to start a thread with lots of pictures so we can all learn from your experience too please

Good luck

@Friwi, the barrel tennon on the Howa mini is 22mm dia.
I too would have exersized on the side of caution with using a howa mini due to unknown strength but Howa have just released their super light action in 6.5 creed and .308 win which is the same mini action only 6mm longer and a bit more material removed to fit a wider mag. Any apprehensions I did have about strength of these actions have gone.
The best donor would be the .450 bushmaster which already has the .470" bolt face and extractor to suit, the .450bm mag would also feed the GT case with no mods.
Or.. one of the new howa super lights in creed oe .308. They have a 3 round removable mag with a 2.8" internal length

@Wingman, it took you a while to reply to that one ;-)

Originally Posted by Friwi

@Wingman, it took you a while to reply to that one ;-)

Ha.. I've been busy... and your didn't put the @ in front of my name so didn't get the mention notification..

I reckon a 6mmGT would be an a sweet candidate for a lightweight compact rifle. Its a very efficient and easy to tune cartridge with minimal recoil.

I would however build it on a standard length action to suit 108gr ELD's

have 1500 rounds with the GT on my comp rig, will keep the hagged brass at the end of its life for a hunting rifle one day