The Sako Warbird

Guns Magazine, Jan, 2000 by Holt Bodinson

The Holy Grail of .30 caliber cartridges is finally available in a gun that doesn't carry a custom price tag.

The market for hot .30s just got hotter with the introduction of the Lazzeroni/Sako rifle chambered for the big, booming .300 Warbird cartridge. With a retail price of $895, the initial production run of this new super .30 is already sold out -- which is another indication of the enduring popularity of the .30 caliber magnum with serious big game hunters.

While I've been somewhat broad in my tastes for big game cartridges. I admit that the most consistently effective big game load I ever used was the 180 gr. Nosler Partition fired from a .300 Weatherby. Whether the game was a two-ton eland or a diminutive Coues whitetail, the .300 Weatherby/Nosler combination killed like lightning at ranges up to 400 yards.

The big .30s are blessed with great bullets, high retained velocities and energies and straight-string trajectories -- plus, most experienced hunters can handle their slightly elevated levels of recoil with a bit of practice or with the addition of a muzzle brake.

Innovation Comes Home

The 1990s stand out as a period of great ballistic experimentation and innovation in the field of high velocity .30caliber cartridges. Making their commercial appearance have been four beltless magnums -- the .300 Dakota, .300 Pegasus, .300 Remington Ultra, and the .300 Warbird -- plus Weatherby's big belted case, the .30-378.

If there were a Holy Grail in the .30 caliber magnum world, it would have to be a 180 gr. premium hunting bullet launched at 3,500 fps. Neither the .300 Remington Ultra nor the .300 Dakota was designed with the case capacity to achieve that level of performance, leaving the Warbird, Pegasus and the Weatherby, which were.

The Warbird will do an honest 3,500 fps from a 26" barrel and Weatherby lists 3,450 fps for the .30-378. Based on my own experience with the Pegasus in a 26" barrel, its comfortable pressure limits are in the low 3,400s. In short, the fastest guy on the block is Lazzeroni's rimless Warbird, and the only thing standing in its way has been the high cost of the custom Lazzeroni rifles chambered for it.

Now, Sako has introduced their TRG-S model chambered for the Warbird. This was certainly a bit of great marketing. Hunters thought so, too, and the first production run has been sold out ever since the gun was unveiled.

Great Gun, Great Cartridge

The Sako TRG-S model is the latest evolution in Sako's continuous engineering efforts to produce a highly accurate, quality rifle at an affordable price. The TRG-S retains several of the traditional design elements that have made Sakos so popular including integral, tapered scope bases, a hammer forged barrel, snappy lock time, fully adjustable trigger and side safety, and sound stock design.

Some of the obvious improvements incorporated in the TRG-S include a silky smooth, three-lugged bolt with a short 60 degree bolt lift; a detachable, synthetic magazine holding three rounds of .300 Warbird; and a reinforced synthetic stock featuring a unique buttplate that is adjustable for length-of-pull and pitch.

In the .300 Warbird chambering, the Sako is fitted with a 26" medium weight, free-floated barrel having a 1:12 twist. Without scope, the TRG-S weighs approximately 7 3/4 lbs. What you end up with is a user-friendly, tough field rifle with outstanding accuracy, and with just enough weight to tame the mighty Warbird without resorting to a muzzle brake.

The only aspect of the Sako package that needs some improvement is the Sako-supplied rings. The standard Sako rings do not provide sufficient eye relief with the high power variables and European scopes that are popular today for long-range hunting.

The combined length of the eyepieces and power rings of many of those models need lots of room behind the rear ring, and Sako's standard or extension rings don't provide it. Maybe that's why the two rifles on the cover of Sako's current catalog sport Swarovski scopes in Tasco rings! Anyway, I mounted a proven Leupold 3.5-10x Vari-X III in the Sako rings, and the combination worked perfectly.

The Warbird Flies

The .300 Warbird cartridge is a modern, beltless magnum with an overall length of 2.790", a sharp 30-degree shoulder, a 0.580' head, a 0.020-degree taper, and a long and useful 0.300" neck. Produced for Lazzeroni by Mast Technology, Warbird brass has proved to be very durable with a thick web and strongly constructed sidewalls. Warbird brass is precisely drawn, and it's increasingly seen in the winner's circle at the 1,000-yard benchrest matches.

Thriving on 90 to 115 grs. of slow burning propellants like RL-19, RL-25, IMR 7828 and AA 8700, the factory ballistics of the Warbird cartridge are impressive to say the least and are based on 27" barrels and Lazzeroni's proprietary plated, premium hunting bullets.

I was very curious to see how these velocities would hold up in the Sako with its 26" barrel, and just how accurate the Sako would prove.

The Lazzeroni/Sako rifle came supplied with factory-loaded cartridges featuring one 130 gr. loading and three 180 gr. loadings.