Wonder if it was an original barrel, or perhaps had been rebarreled? I ask, because to the best of my knowledge, Husqvarna never chambered anything that used .311 groove diameter barrels.
No... original barrel on it; same as when I bought it and two other Huskies new in the early 70's from a gunsmith/gun store owner in Nelson BC who had fallen into dementia; I was told his wife was selling off all the stock as part of closing up the business so I made the journey there in hopes of finding a new Husky. I would have liked to have known him and that shop before then: there were brand new drillings and quite an assortment of other interesting European rifles up in the attic/store room. I wasn't all that into guns other than the best tool for mountain hunting at the time, so I didn't appreciate what a collection of unique rifles that he had been dealing in. Probably would have dropped more cash there than I did - his wife knew very, very well what each of those rifles were worth, and she probably got the price she expected for every one of the firearms she was selling.
I figured out the issue with the barrel when I was looking for a lighter, flatter shooting bullet specifically for a self guided muley hunt my brothers and I were planning for the US. At the same time I had decided that the Barnes X bullets were the cat's ass when I tried them as a substitute for the Bitteroot bullets in my Husqvarna 358 Norma Magnum. Up until then I had been exclusively loading the 165 grain Partition in the 30/06 as an all around choice for everything from moose and elk to bighorns and whitetails. They grouped well enough for hunting, never anything spectacular, a little under 1.5 MOA after lots of handload tuning and lots of Partitions into the backstop at the range. When I started trying to find a 150 boat tail for a flat shooting load for the mule deer hunt, I couldn't find anything that would even do two MOA. I started wondering if maybe I had a barrel that needed a bullet that would obdurate to the bore as best possible, and that led to slugging the bore.
When I mic'd my slug and found a groove diameter of .311", I figured that's why the Partitions did as well as they did, and why anything with a solid base performed so lousy. Whether I was right or wrong in my speculation about the groove size, that led to me driving out to see Bill Leeper and whine about my oversize barrel limiting my options with that particular Husky. And that ultimately led to the 30 Newton chambering as Bill was at the beginning of being on a Newton kick and having purchased a 30 and 35 Newton reamer. And there was new Newton brass available... and I had lapsed into a condition where old/historical big game rifles and chamberings appealed to me. The 30 Newton barrel went on, Bill said he'd bob the barrel length he'd originally put on it if I didn't like it, and I've never touched it since seeing how it grouped and how it felt in the hands while out hunting.
I have since then come up with a rule of thumb that most shooters and reloaders should NEVER look at their rifles' bores with a borescope, nor slug the barrels to check the actual dimensions... almost as bad as when chronographs became affordable for everybody! It's emotionally crushing many times...
Regardless, I'll bet you are quite pleased with your Husqvarna Newton. Great cartridge!
Yep; right on both counts. You have to be honest and say that the 30 Newton won't do a single thing that a 300 Win Mag (or a 308 Norma Mag) won't do in the same action length. Same bullets at the same velocities - but you can be absolutely certain that there's little to no chance anybody else you bump into also has one. Watching other guys eyeballing the rifle and the cartridges laying on the bench to be used to shoot a group can be both amusing and distracting when they finally ask their questions.
But I am pleased with my little featherweight Nordic mountain rifle. The magic in the caliber is it's age, it's history in cartridge development, and being one of the original magnums - minus a superfluous belt that lends nothing to the cause. All wrapped up in a classy little working man's rifle, which is what the Husky imports into Canada were intended to be for.
It didn't hurt that at some point before that, I'd followed my brother in law on one of his Saturday obsessions with garage sales and found a really old Speer reloading manual that came with five boxes of new Speer brass for a caliber that most people had never heard of. But I had: $20, all in. Another case of buying the ammunition/components before you have the rifle to use them in. Since then I've bought another couple of hundred of the Jamison 30 Newton cases. Far more than I'll ever need in whatever time I have left on this planet, but whoever buys the rifle from my estate should be set up with enough cases to keep them chasing game in the mountains for their lifetime as well.
Your rifle sounds to be very similar to the one that was handed down to me when Dad passed away. A Husqvarna model 4000 light weight that has VERY nice wood. Quite likely I'll stay with the Barnes 180gr TTSX BT and IMR 4064 loads I'm presently using in it. Point of curiosity though, are those 250gr Barnes Original RN bullets still available?? If so, where and any load data to share??
