I guess its that I'm getting old and words have different meaning to me than to a lot of posters here. To me, .243 isn't really medium caliber its small bore like .223 but just a tad bigger.

Its not medium caliber by a long stretch. Medium to me starts at maybe .270 or 7mm and runs up into the .30s. Large bore starts at maybe .40 and goes up. I know the .264 probably qualifies, but I don't know of any but bolts.

Time was, medium caliber rifles were mostly lever guns, and they worked well for the medium sized critters like woods deer.

A while back I wanted a "loaner" rifle in the pile. I looked for a while and found a nice BAR for about $500. It was a tad older, but came with scope mounts. So I started looking for a nice scope. And destroyed any thought of loaning it out with a nice, nearly new Zeiss variable. But its a .30-06 which basically owns the mid bore category. Just a little small for big critters with claws and teeth (like bears that aren't black) but big enough for all the horny things here in the US. If you go hunting moose or black bear with a .243, you're undergunned. If you hunt griz with it, take out more insurance.

There have been a bunch of bambi like things shot with a .30-30. Smallish bears,too. I'd guess that lever guns all fit the mid size caliber you seek. But of course you only want semi-autos. You can find lever guns up into the large bore calibers like .45-70. And they do a respectable job, maybe as well as the even slower bolt guns.

It seems to me you've kind of limited your choices by designating the action type.

6.5 Grendel !
Love mine.

rburg, finding a used bar for $500 would be sweet!

Medium caliber is subjective. Lets not turn the thread in to a subject argument over what is medium vs large.

Old Rugged Cross,

I totally spaced HK 630 in 223, and HK 770 in 308.

Neither look like AR's

ORC:

The Remington 8 and 81 guns are very reliable but somewhat heavy. Think of them as a Long Recoil AK-47. Cuz that's what they are. LOL.

Or think of them as a farm implement that a bullet squirts out the end of. Cuz that's what they are! LOL.





I read once that John Moses Browning said the Remington 8 was his favorite gun of all he invented!

Scoping one can be done in a variety of ways, none exactly perfect. The barrel assembly takes down which is neat but many have loose barrel assemblies as the shroud rivet gets loose, but you can make one from a nail and cinch things up well. I did to mine. It was a gun in excellent + shape when I got it except for the wobbly barrel. Accuracy ran about 3-4 inches for 5 shots at 100 tho some I bet do better. Shooting one is an experience worth experiencing! Mine was a .300 Savage cal.

RE: accuracy of the Mini, I did a test of two old ones compared to three AR's. With irons they were actually similar in field accuracy {shooting from sitting, elbows on knees, 100 meters}. It's posted up on a Mini thread here IIRC. But that is the .223. New ones are supposed to be pretty good.

Do NOT get a Remington 740/7400 series. As one old time Remington distributor described them to my gunsmith "The gun that starts self destructing with the firing of the first shot". Maybe that is an exaggeration...maybe not!

I had one and learned the gun, accurizing it and whatnot. All the war stories you have heard about them losing zero when the barrel gets hot are...true!

I needed something that would take handloaded ammo and I could never get it to fire rounds that had been fired 3-4 x's. Something to think about.

Many uncountable numbers of deer have fallen to those rifles as in truth, a guy that fires a few shots every year to check zero and then has at it in the woods of Michigan doesn't need more and the gun will probably last long enough to serve the fellow thru his life. Probably. LOL.

As much as I regret getting rid of my Remington 81, I celebrate getting rid of my 740!

I know you don't want a Mini-30, but if I was in the market for a woods gun for deer to 150 yards or so, I'd buy a current production Mini-30, scope it and not look back. I have killed a lot of stuff with the 7.62x39 and it is a very good deer round. Ours was a CZ527 and we took ground squirrels, coyotes and deer. Here's one of them. Not exactly a fawn!

Frank Hamer shot the shit out of Bonnie and Clyde with model 8’s with custom extended magazines.

M1A were also factory made in 7mm- 08. I always thought one in 358win would be nifty. I’d go bankrupt dumping 20 round mags of 358win ammo though

I think you are going about this backwards. Pick a caliber, then look for a semi auto you like in that caliber. I did and settled on .308 and/or 30-06.My reasoning was that one is a current military caliber, and the other albeit an old military caliber is still widely available. Both are good for stocking up or reloading and stocking components for reloading.
The rifles are Browning, Remington, Winchester, Springfield and a couple of foreign built guns. And also the good old M1 Garand in both calibers
I wound up with a Remington 742 in 30-06 and a Winchester 100 in .308. Both oldies, but built when they built them for real. Mags are still available for both, and the Remington is a real tack driver, the Winchester a little behind but absolutely excellent enough for hunting or SD, and a very handy carbine size/weight to boot. There are 10 round mags for the Remington, which is 2 more rounds than the M1, which I am reliably informed did OK in WWII.
In case you have or acquire a good bolt gun in either caliber, you will have the makings of a real long range precision rifle.
Just my .02, YMMV.....

For a medium caliber semi-auto rifle I would look at this especially in 30-06.




If that is too big I would go with this rifle in .270 Win

https://www.gunsinternational....cfm?gun_id=101232661

Don't personally own one, but I would

What "medium caliber" means to you would also be helpful. Bullet diameter or case size/power?

I know it’s been shot down but my new mini30 put two holes in the bullseye at 50 yards w Hornady Black ammo. Haven’t had a chance to shoot it at 100 yet.

quote:

What "medium caliber" means to you would also be helpful. Bullet diameter or case size/power?

Minimum .243win up to 7mm or maybe 30.06

I really wish Ruger would revisit the XGI platform. They were made in .308, and even prototyped in .243, but never made into production. If they made a .243 in a Mini-14 style platform, Ruger would sell a ton of them.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CdjgiFQ0Gkc

Barring that from happening, a Mini-30 would easily fit the OP’s needs. Modern hunting ammo is very effective and approximates a 30-30 in performance.

M1A in 6.5 Creedmore
Circumstances have prevented me from shooting it yet.

As mentioned, look at the Browning BAR. I've had one for decades. It has been completely reliable and is quite accurate. Benelli also makes a semi too. My cousin has had one for years and it has been equally reliable.