I want to buy a HOWA weapon and i was wondering if anyone could give me some facts on how good or bad they are?? Accuracy ,relibality,etc!

I hear good things. Reportedly its a great bang for the buck.

IIRC, manufactured by the same folks who do the Japanese Brownings and Weatherbys.

My Japanese A-Bolt 2 is top notch. The one Howa I've seen was a good rifle as well.

-Hobbit

Weatherby Vanguards use the Howa action.

The Howa is a mauser copy and I've heard good things about them for quite a while.

This may be a situation where it depends on who markets the gun. I'm sure someone like Weatherby would be more willing to spend a little extra for a decent barrel and assembley because of their name.

But if you buy a gun built on a stripped Howa action or barreled action, then who knows how or what was use to assemble it.

I bought a Vanguard a couple of weeks ago and so far I really like it. I think I'm goint to be very please with it over the long haul.

well im glad to be hearing good things ,,i guess this means i might have to get one and give a try~~

i wonder what kind of MOA can be achevied using a handloaded 270..at 2oo yards

I had a 223 and a 308. They are excellent rifles. The 223 was a tack driver. A guy offered me great markup on both of them at the range one day. I took it and regreted it the next day.

Oh well.

I have a number of them.

Since I don't buy crappy guns, that should tell you what I think about them.

The Weatherby Vanguard barreled action is manufactured by Howa, just as the Howa 1500 barreled actions are...  The importers (Legacy Sports International (1500) and Weatherby add the US manufactured synthetic or wood stocks.

These rifles are the best value out there (and Wal-Mart just unloaded a bunch of the Vanguards at throwaway prices because of overstocking)...

The early Howas had a recall for replacing part of the striker/bolt mechanism because a moron could reassemble them in such a way that the striker could exit the back of the bolt.  If assembled correctly, even these early rifles were perfectly safe.  Check LSI for a list of affected rifles (they were manufactured around ten or more years ago.  The newer ones have an improved (moron-safe) bolt mechanism).

Buy them with confidence.  You will love them.  They even offer a 6.5x55mm one (and I'm trying to convince them to offer one in 8x57mm Mauser to take advantage of all that cheap ammo currently available).

By the way, their (Legacy Sports International) website is www.legacysports.com

Check them out.