The Steyr Männlicher

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Photon Guy

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Anybody know how to get a Steyr Mannlicher rifle? I don't see them in any gun shops and they're a foreign rifle, Austrian made, so Im not sure about their availability in the USA. They are really high quality and you can expect to spend well over two grand to buy even a used one. Anywhere in the USA where they sell them new? And any American rifles that rival or bypass the Steyr Mannlicher?
 
if your after a "Mannlicher" style rifle...since you asked about american rifles....consider the CZ line of "Mannlichers"...."CZ-USA.com"....I have the CZ 527FS..and CZ452FS....which are in the mannlicher style...and CZ makes a long action in various calibers with the mannlicher stock..the CZ550FS series....all the centerfires come with single set triggers...
 
Steyr can be Mixed Bag

I do not know about the current offerings, but be cautious about any of the Steyr models that use plastic parts. I have a Steyr Mannlicher L from the 70s that is one of the most gorgeous rifles I own. The quality of construction, fit and finish is fantastic, with the exception of the total crap plastic they used in the trigger guard and the rotary magazines.

The gun is in .308, which is a caliber that I detest, so It rarely gets used. But even so, I have had to replace the trigger guard due to split plastic. The gun has not been shot in over 20 years, but I recently was reorganizing some stuff and found that BOTH of the plastic magazines have broken - apparently the simple weight of gravity from sitting alone and unloaded on a carpeted shelf in my guns safe has been just too much stress for them!

I have tried writing to the company and have never received a single response. Not impressed and will not buy again.
 
Interesting and unfortunate.
I think the advertised their plastic parts as Makrolon. Which is a brand of polycarbonate competing with Lexan. I would have expected better.
 
A proper Steyr Männlicher is straight pull, uses en-bloc clips, and has sights calibrated in steps (schritt). :D
 
I do not know about the current offerings, but be cautious about any of the Steyr models that use plastic parts. I have a Steyr Mannlicher L from the 70s that is one of the most gorgeous rifles I own. The quality of construction, fit and finish is fantastic, with the exception of the total crap plastic they used in the trigger guard and the rotary magazines.

The gun is in .308, which is a caliber that I detest, so It rarely gets used. But even so, I have had to replace the trigger guard due to split plastic. The gun has not been shot in over 20 years, but I recently was reorganizing some stuff and found that BOTH of the plastic magazines have broken - apparently the simple weight of gravity from sitting alone and unloaded on a carpeted shelf in my guns safe has been just too much stress for them!

I have tried writing to the company and have never received a single response. Not impressed and will not buy again.
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So why would you get a gun in a caliber you don't like? And why don't you like .308?

You could replace the trigger guard with a metal one. A gunsmith should be able to make one for you if you can't find one. Same thing with the magazines, you could get magazines made out of a better material that you could use in your rifle.
 
The plastic is 40 years old. I doubt they use the same plastic today. Even so, everyone should know plastic, especially if exposed to sunlight, doesn't last forever. It becomes brittle over time.
 
Steyr Mannlicher What? What model? What configuration? What wood? It all matters.

And FWIW, they are not great rifles. Good rifles, yes. Well made, maybe. Lots of plastic parts, lots of corners cut. The magazines cost an arm and a leg and break and jam. Their barrels, hammer forged and straightened, shoot just OK. I was not overly impressed with the overall results of their modernization efforts.
 
That is Why I posted the information - a warning to buyers

The plastic is 40 years old. I doubt they use the same plastic today. Even so, everyone should know plastic, especially if exposed to sunlight, doesn't last forever. It becomes brittle over time.
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I do not care if the plastic is 1 year or 40 years old - it is crap, and any potential buyer should know about it if looking at an older Steyr (I specifically stated I do not know about their current products, but their customer service sucks). And for the record, that original trigger guard had to be replace in less than 5 years. I can understand a weapon that wears out or is damaged from hard use - I cannot accept one that falls apart from sitting in a temperature and climate controlled safe. If the manufacturer had a tag on the gun that plainly stated the plastic parts would need replacement every 5 years, I would not have bought it!

So why would you get a gun in a caliber you don't like? And why don't you like .308?
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I had no opinion about that worthless and nasty little round when I bought the Steyr. My hatred of the .308 is irrational, but I glory in it none-the-less. It does absolutely nothing as well as the .30-06, and in similar weight rifles, it seems to kick much worse. I am sure that is probably not true in all cases, but my M70 Featherweight in .30-06 is a joy to shoot, and this Steyr is horrible by comparison. And I'll take my Sako Finnbear in .270 over either of them any day!

You could replace the trigger guard with a metal one. A gunsmith should be able to make one for you if you can't find one. Same thing with the magazines, you could get magazines made out of a better material that you could use in your rifle.
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Yeah, I probably could - but why? I bought what I considered to be a very high quality rifle, and I have a right to expect it to work the way it was sold so long as it has not been abused.
 
I had something called a SM Luxus back in the 80s. It was probably from the 70s. I was told that it was a very good rifle, and what I gave for it and what I got for it seemed to confirm that. I was impressed by the Kahles scope. The stock was very nice wood, lots of dark brown, and I doubt if there was any plastic on it, although it's been so long that I can only really recall one thing. It too was in 308 and it definitely kicked the snot out of me. Of course it was a very light rifle, and I decided that the honeycomb recoil pad was bottoming out too soon.
I have seen what they make today, and I don't think I would give a kid a toy gun that looked like that. It may be very ergonomic and purpose-built and all that, but I have my standards.
 
Steyr Mannlicher What? What model? What configuration? What wood? It all matters.

And FWIW, they are not great rifles. Good rifles, yes. Well made, maybe. Lots of plastic parts, lots of corners cut. The magazines cost an arm and a leg and break and jam. Their barrels, hammer forged and straightened, shoot just OK. I was not overly impressed with the overall results of their modernization efforts.
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I posted the link before but I will post it again. This is the kind of Stery Mannlicher I want, in this model and caliber and so forth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTrCEa4fsG8

And as for the rest of your post, you give the impression that you consider the Steyr Mannlicher a decent gun but nothing spectacular. That you're not a huge Steyr Mannlicher fan. I would expect more from a rifle that costs over 2 grand. So let me ask you this, how would the Steyr Mannlicher from your point of view compare to a Remington? Would you choose a Remington over a Steyr Mannlicher? From what I've heard Remington used to make good guns but as of recently they've been pumping out junk and that a Remington is not and never was in the same league as the Steyr Mannlicher's are.
 
I had no opinion about that worthless and nasty little round when I bought the Steyr. My hatred of the .308 is irrational, but I glory in it none-the-less. It does absolutely nothing as well as the .30-06, and in similar weight rifles, it seems to kick much worse. I am sure that is probably not true in all cases, but my M70 Featherweight in .30-06 is a joy to shoot, and this Steyr is horrible by comparison. And I'll take my Sako Finnbear in .270 over either of them any day!
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Well for some reason the Army seems to really like the .308 as the famous M60 is in that caliber.

But I agree, the .30-06 is I believe a better round. Maybe the M60 should've been made in .30-06 and maybe the Army should've stuck with that round as the standard rifle round for their riflemen like it was in WWII.
 
Maybe the M60 should've been made in .30-06 and maybe the Army should've stuck with that round as the standard rifle round for their riflemen like it was in WWII.
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In ~150gr NATO spec loading, the .30-06 offers no performance advantage over the .308, and is longer, requiring a larger, heavier rifle. The ammo also weighs more. The .30-06 offers some advantage with bullets over ~180gr, but in my opinion, not enough to bother with one way or the other.

The .308 is also more accurate, search back for "Bart B"'s posts on the reduction of the LR target size after the introduction of the .308, because there were too many cleans.

None of which helps the OP find his rifle.

I can offer no assistance with the rifle in question, my only Steyr was made prior to WW1. Based on the plastic comments above, if I was going to drop ~$2K on a rifle, I would look elsewhere, probably at Sako for an off the shelf piece, or to the various custom places in the US.

I think most people complaining about Remington are talking about the bottom of the line SDS and ADL models, I think you will find the higher end rifles are better. See if you can find a store that stocks the 700 BDL or CDL, go see for yourself.
 
Just because a gun has some of its main parts made out of plastic doesn't mean its a bad gun. Look at the Glock, its a top gun in terms of reliability and popularity, and many of its main parts are made out of polymer plastic. And its from the same country as the Steyr Mannlicher, Austria.
 
I like the sleek lines of th rifle in that video. The polymer stock would make it a great utility hunting gun.

Problem is it costs a little more than 5 times what a competing similarly utilitarian rifle would cost me.
For a $2000 bolt gun I want something pretty.
 
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