• Hey All! Lately there has been more and more scammers on the forum board. They register and replies to members requests for guns and/or parts or other things. The reply contains a gmail or hotmail address or similar ”anonymous” email addresses which they want you to reply to. DO NOT ANSWER ANY STRANGE MESSAGES! They often state something like this: ”Hello! Saw your post about purchasing a stock for a Safari. KnuckleheadBob has one. Email him at: [email protected]” If you receive any strange messages: Check the status of whoever message you. If they have no posts and signed up the same day or very recently, stay away. Same goes for other members they might refer to. Check them too and if they are long standing members, PM them and ask if the message is legit. Most likely it’s not. Then use the report function in each message or post so I can kick them out! Beware of anything that might seem fishy! And again, for all of you who registered your personal name as username, please contact me so I can change it to a more anonymous username. You’d be surprised of how much one can find out about a person from just a username on a forum such ad our! All the best! And be safe! Jim

218 bee

Sako Collectors Club Discussion Forum

Register Log in
Fantastic. Love the wood; it looks a lot like the finish on some wartime Sako military rifles. Did you find that locally?
 
Don't get too disappointed if the ammo doesn't perform great. Reload with 40 v max hornady ahead of some lil gun and you'll be happy with the results.
 
Vincent, congratulations! I'm not sure you realize just what a prize you've captured. First, the .218 Bee is the rarest of the L46's imported commercially to the U.S. (a couple of other rarer calibers were never commercially imported). Second, your rifle has the early left-hand wing safety, which is very scarce. And next, you have a fully checkered BIRCH stock instead of walnut. Almost everything imported to the U.S. had a walnut stock, and it is very rare to see a fully checkered birch stock as most had no checkering or checkering only on the pistol grip.

Does the rifle show to have had the rear sight removed? I've never seen one from that era which didn't come equipped with a rear sight.

I'm guessing that your rifle was brought to the U.S. by and individual rather than being imported by Firearms International. It would be interesting to know.
 
stonecreek said:
Vincent, congratulations! I'm not sure you realize just what a prize you've captured. First, the .218 Bee is the rarest of the L46's imported commercially to the U.S. (a couple of other rarer calibers were never commercially imported). Second, your rifle has the early left-hand wing safety, which is very scarce. And next, you have a fully checkered BIRCH stock instead of walnut. Almost everything imported to the U.S. had a walnut stock, and it is very rare to see a fully checkered birch stock as most had no checkering or checkering only on the pistol grip.

Does the rifle show to have had the rear sight removed? I've never seen one from that era which didn't come equipped with a rear sight.

I'm guessing that your rifle was brought to the U.S. by and individual rather than being imported by Firearms International. It would be interesting to know.
Click to expand...
Thank You for the information- I knew it was unusual to have a full stock on a 218 bee however I did not know the other details; perhaps I didn't overpay. When I saw it I just had to have it.
Anyway, I know very little about it except that the previous owner thought that it was an employee built rifle. Looking at the wood to metal fit it is almost flawless. Sadly it has no rear sight or rings.
 
Further to the previous comment, the early version of the Sako dovetail-mounted peep sight (period correct for your rifle) is shown below, mounted on an L46 in .222. Another photo below shows the early sight on the left, compared with the hooded, streamlined-looking later variation on the right. I believe there are actually two variations of the early style sight; perhaps someone else has photos of those.

Is there any sign of a barrel-mounted rear sight being removed from your rifle? From the photos it appears that the gun was built without a rear sight, for use with a scope or the clamp-on Sako sight.
L46FS-1.jpg L46-1.JPG
L46-2.JPG

Sako Rear Sights 1.JPG Sako Rear Sights 2.JPG
 
VINCENT ENGEL said:
No no sign of having a sight. What would the best scope mounts be? Sako?
Click to expand...
I doubt many, in any, would disagree - a set of original Sako ringmounts to keep the period originality would be recommended. Height would depend on the actual optic. Low ringmounts won’t allow for much if any objective bell. Medium height allows for some additional flexibility. I’d also suggest a period optic, but it’s obviously your decision. I’d also invest in a period peep, simply to finish it off.
 
VINCENT ENGEL said:
No no sign of having a sight. What would the best scope mounts be? Sako?
Click to expand...
Absolutely. Original Sako mounts are the only thing I would even consider putting on a gun that early and collectible. Here are high, medium, and low rings so you know what you are looking at. A lot of sellers don't know what they have and will advertise rings without stating the height, or will get it wrong. Also be sure you are getting the correct ring diameter. Most of the rings you find will be 1" - no surprise - but they were also made in 26mm. Old Sako rings have the diameter in millimeters stamped on the bottom - 25.4 (1") or 26. 26mm rings can easily be shimmed for 1" tubes, but trying to cram a 26mm scope into 1" rings can cause permanent damage. Also watch out for missing parts and buggered screw slots. SakoSource, a forum sponsor, usually has some original Sako rings in stock.

I agree with Sean about putting a period scope on the rifle. A 6x fixed would be typical. The Kollmorgen Bear Cub was a popular scope back in the day, and very high quality for its time. The Kollmorgen scopes had 26mm tubes, so you would need 26mm rings to mount one on your rifle. Most other US-made scopes of the period have 1" tubes. Kollmorgen eventually sold its riflescope division to Redfield. I have an early L46 in .222 with a 6x Kollmorgen in a Stith mount, which was almost certainly installed when the gun was first sold. (pic below the ring photos). Unertl, Weaver, Leupold, Lyman, etc. also made good scopes. A European scope would also be appropriate, such as a Kahles, Pecar-Berlin, or B.Nickel-Marburg. All of these would have 26mm tubes. You would need to be sure that any Euro scope you put on it had internal adjustments for both elevation and windage, as a lot of them lacked a windage adjustment, which was on the base instead of in the scope.

Original Sako High Rings 1.JPG Original Sako Medium Rings 1.JPG Original Sako Low Rings 1.JPG 1951 L46 Action R.JPG
 
Those look nice! I was thinking of putting a 1 X 5 Leupold with a 1" objective tube; I then could use the low mounts.

After rereading your post carefully I will get the time period quality scopes you list. I agree a brand new scope looks out of place on a vintage rifle.
 
VINCENT ENGEL said:
Those look nice! I was thinking of putting a 1 X 5 Leupold with a 1" objective tube; I then could use the low mounts.
Click to expand...
Mounting as low as possible is a good idea since the comb of the old Sako L46's is pretty low and intended primarily for iron sights. Mounting higher keeps your head from resting snugly on the stock. I've used a 2.5 or 3X Weaver with the straight tube on older L46's in low original rings. This makes a nice contemporaneous blend of scope and rifle.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top