Rigby Highland Stalker

As a younger man, I read the exploits of the great hunters like Jim Corbett and W.D.M. ‘Karamojo’ Bell avidly. So, this test is a bit of a nostalgia trip for me. Corbett used a 275 Rigby for some of his work and I’m currently reading his book; Man-eaters of Kumaon about his time in India, in which he describes having to shoot a man-eating tiger at near point-blank range one handed; amongst other adventures! John Rigby & Co. are Britain’s oldest gunmakers and now part of the L&O Gruppe that includes Blaser, Sauer and Mauser. Ironic really, as their association with the original Mauser company goes back to 1897.

Rigby today

In their 300-years, Rigby have been owned by various people, but now under L&O’s wing are re-established back in London and building rather classic and elegant rifles. Their Big Game is a Mauser 98 Magnum in the usual big bore calibres, but rather specialised. They have also re-created one of their most famous hunters from the early 20th Century the Highland Stalker, originally called the Highland Model. Available in more stalking-oriented calibres, it’s like stepping into a time machine and I feel a bit privileged to be able to finally evaluate a rifle I always admired.

Classic

The Stalker owes very little to modern design, with the exception of the Winchester-style, shroud-mounted, 3-position safety catch, which is a vast improvement over the original, 180°, flag-type as it’s easier and more instinctive to use. It’s a classic Mauser 98 long action with their trade mark long, external extractor claw, blade-type ejector and controlled round feed and straight, drop down bolt handle. Feed is from a top-loading hinged, floor plate, 4-round magazine and it comes with iron sights!

In this day and age, the Stalker is a bit of an anachronism, as and though the rifle is still a viable shooter, there are far more efficient, modern and cost-effective designs around. But that is not what it’s about, build quality is 100% and there’s an indefinable something about guns like this. However, I was pleasantly surprised to see Rigby had synthetically and pillar-bedded the action and even given the barrel a free-float at the font of the hollow forend!

Built!

The weight at a not inconsiderable at 7.8 lbs (un-scoped). The shortish 22” barrel shows a medium profile, which gives a muzzle-heavy feel, which translates into good stability and the gun swings and stops easily. The bolt shows twin, forward, locking lugs, with a third safety type at the rear. The straight-down bolt handle is scalloped at the top of the lever, which is finished with a nice ball end. The shroud-mounted safety pushes forward to FIRE, middle for SAFE with bolt operation and rear SAFE bolt locked. There’s a cocked action indicator pin at the rear, with the bolt removal catch left/rear of the action, which also mounts the ejector.

The receiver is stepped and for the test Rigby fitted QD HexaLock bases, standard Mauser-types can be substituted. Typically, there’s the signature massive ejection port, that you can easily drop a round into and close the bolt quickly. Everything is steel, with barrel and receiver finished in nonreflective black Nitride, apart from the extractor claw and magazine floor plate, which are peacock blue. The trigger is a single stage unit and breaks at a pleasingly crisp 2.5 lbs from the wide/curved blade.

Furniture

The stock again is faithful to the original, with a slim but deep forend, which is shorter than on most modern hunters. Made of oil-finished, Grade 5 Turkish walnut, it shows a low/straight comb and long/angled pistol grip with rounded end. The hand-cut chequering is just right, not too aggressive but enough to get hold of and stay on. Finished off with a black spacer and thick, red rubber recoil pad, length of pull is a pleasing 14.75”, long for some, but not me! There’s also a lady’s version at 13 7/8”. But as a bespoke gun the client can specify what they want. In use this design makes for fast shouldering and easy pointability, with your eye falling instinctively to the iron sights.

On that point; the rear sight is a three-leaf (one fixed, two folding), windageadjustable, Express-type cut for 100, 150 and 250 yards using a wide/shallow V leaves, the fixed (100) has a vertical white line-up insert. Up front, a brass-tipped blade on a high ramp with removable protector, which is elevation-only.

Writing is kept to a minimum with the legend; J Rigby & Co. London. England, on the barrel, the action shows Mauser M98 Standard – Made in Germany – (just like the good old days)! Again, in keeping with the original, there’s a sling loop under the barrel and another screwed into the butt and here I take issue. The wide leather sling is of good quality, but is attached by leather thongs, now I know I would not trust such a beauty to what amounts to rawhide boot laces! Traditional snap hooks or fixed swivels would be preferable!

Calibres

The Stalker comes in a range of calibres and is very much capable for most game species, with; .275 Rigby, 7x57mm Mauser (these two are the same thing), 308 Win, 30-06, 8x57mm Mauser JS and 9.3x62mm. I was pleased to see my tester was in 275 Rigby, as I do like 7x57! The only other bit of writing on the rifle is on the short/stepped, barrel re-enforce; ‘Sighted for Rigby’s special high velocity .275 bore cartridge, soft nose 140gr bullet!

It was here that I ran into some small problems, 7x57/.275 is not that common in the UK, Hornady make both, but I could not get hold of sufficient quantities for the test. RUAG Ammotec UK came to my aid with 60-rounds of RWS, 7x57, 162-grain ID Classic, which uses the old Brenneke Torpedo-style, steel-jacketed, twin core bullet. I mentioned this to Rigby and they said the gun was regulated for the 140-grain .275 load; no problem as I had Hornady dies and substituted a Sierra 140-grain Spitzer (SP) over 43.5-grains of Vit N140. I also found some old 7x57 CBC 140-grain full metal jacket ammo I’d had for about 20-years, just as sight-in fodder and cases for reloading.

Performance

Rigby supplied their red dot package, that consists of a HexaLock bridge mount with an AimPoint Micro H2 on top. It looked a bit odd on the Stalker, but as a shorter-range, point-n-shoot system worked well! They also included 30mm rings and I fitted a Swarovski 1.7-10x42 Z6i, so I could determine accuracy potential. Plus, I had the irons; always a pleasure!

I set up some midi clays at 100m and the Stalker (on irons) was breaking them easily with the 140 FMJs, it shot a tad right, but I just aimed off. Switching to the AimPoint with its 2MOA dot I found them even easier to hit, so both iron and electric systems keeping it easily inside 4” and more than enough for hunting at sensible iron-type ranges!

Switching to the Swarovski and the RWS proved interesting with groups running to an inch, which was much better than had been lead to believe! These 162-grain pills were averaging 2611 fps/2469 ft/lbs and only 14 fps off the factory quote, I was impressed. Switching to my reload showed the same inch ability! My recipe produced an average of 2799 fps/2448 ft/lbs the latter near the same as the RWS. The main difference is in retained energy, the RWS hits 1700 ft/lbs at 170 yards, whereas reload takes this out to 217 yards. So, good practical accuracy and like any rifle/calibre combo a deal of experimentation is required to get the best out of it.

Senior moments

The Stalker proved very well behaved in the shoulder, not surprising at 9lb scoped. Technique-wise, you must remember to be forceful with bolt movement, as the speed the case hits the rear-mounted ejector governs if it will exit the action or not! The safety proved easy to use, with little disturbance to the firing hand position and the trigger was a dream.

This rifle leaves me in two minds, as to its role in the modern hunting world. I’m fully aware that I and probably 90% of hunters are not Rigby’s target customers, the price alone confirms this. Though I admire Mauser’s 98 action and rifles, there are more efficient and practical designs around. The Stalker is unashamedly retro, which is not a bad thing and I really like it for what it is and there’s the rub!