Not a good idea with a bigbore. The sling swivel tends to be very near where the average person puts their hand and it hurts like a fucker when recoil rams it into your palm/fingers. With big game rifles a sling is little more than a carrying aid.


Nice rifle OP, thanks for updating us. Good choice on the scope too. I never saw the need to spend the money on a Leupold-until I bought a rifle from my uncle that had one on it(Vari-XIII 6.5-20X). Amazing difference between that and a cheap POS.

People have done it and been satisfied with it.  Obviously Jeff Cooper comes to mind first, and he did in fact use his sling as a shooting aid in the field.  The forearm on his rifle was possibly longer than that typical today on sporters, though.  He also used flush-mount swivel cups, but that only matters when the sling is not in use.  

In any case, the point stands that you can't really use a sling as a shooting aid in that configuration.  A shooting sling is therefore kind of pointless with this configuration.  Might as well just go with a simple carrying strap type sling.

I also don't think that a scope has much of a place on a dangerous game rifle.

Congratulations!

Not my first choice but a good choice neonetheless!

It's not a choice I'd personally make either, but as long as the sights are zeroed instead of just cosmetic, especially in this case, I don't see anything wrong with it-OP did mention it's a "never going on a" safari rifle. For an expensive to shoot, or overkill deer rifle why not?

Its more of a "do all plains game" rifle with big 5 capabilities. Using cast bullets it shouldn't be more than a few pennies more expensive than FMJ 5.56 per round for blasting. Good solids and expanding projectiles (TSX notwithstanding) are well over a buck a pop though. I know the barrel band is less useful than a fore end mounted stud, but Safari rifle.

Exactly!