Thread: 223 Howa 1500 vs Mini Action

Just to counter the above… I have both 1500 short action and mini action. The only mod I felt was necessary was to open the forend tip below the barrel (opened up to ensure any flex doesn’t touch the barrel).

Other than that the rifles go just fine as they are out of the box. I use a 1 inch leather sling to steady my aim when shooting offhand. Most of the time when I am walking the rifles are slung over my shoulder.

The Mini Action magazine doesn’t bother me in the slightest and I would not want to sacrifice the 10 shot capacity for carrying ergonomics. There’s been plenty of times when I’ve needed all of those when culling pest goats. I have a spare that I carry fully loaded and I want to be able to swap them out quickly if necessary.

I’m shooting either Belmont 62gr or an old school hand loaded 70gr softpoint and have no problems fitting them in the mag at SAAMI length. The ballistics have been tested out to 300m and I have no problems knocking over goats at that range. A traditional soft hunting softpoint is still effective… The advent of fancy bullets hasn’t changed anything there. If I want to shoot stuff further than that then I need a more powerful cartridge.

At the end of the day it’s a nice cheap rifle that does what it says on the box and I can’t really see the point in spending hundreds of dollars trying to improve it, for me it doesn’t need improving. If I wanted an “improved” rifle I would’ve bought something else. It’s hard wearing and sure gets a hard time on the front of the bike and by being used as a trekking pole in the steep wet hill country.

So for me it’s been an excellent purchase and no need to drastically modify it to use it the way I do.

we have a mini in 7.62x39 and have no complaints other than the mag release protruding and catching on clothing etc and releasing the mag unexpectedly . Sorted that using a VTP made plastic shroud that simply screws on and makes the mag lever flush - no more catching on anything but still easy as to release the magazine with a finger .
Well worth fitting to the mini for very little cost and an effective fix .