Colonel Jeff Cooper was a bit of a Renaissance man in the shooting and gun world. He is remembered most often as a military guy and for handgun shooting and training. What is often forgotten, though, is that he was also a hard-core big-game hunter with worldwide experience.
Cooper introduced the scout rifle concept in the early 1980s. The idea is a short, lightweight and fast-handling rifle that is easily carried in the field for military scouting and/or hunting. The Cooper scout rifle uses a forward mounted scope to allow top loading of the rifle using stripper clips. That loading style is obsolete with modern removable box magazines, but the forward mounted scope remains popular with the scout-rifle crowd.
The scout rifle concept has found some traction in today’s hunting world, and the latest entry into the category is the CVA Cascade SR-80 Scout Rifle. SR for Scout Rifle and 80 in honor of Cooper starting work on the concept in 1980.
The SR-80 rifle weighs 7.3 pounds, so it’s just a bit heavier than Cooper’s specification of three kilos. With the Leupold scope it’s 8.5 pounds. It’s just about a meter long without the muzzle brake, which is Cooper’s spec. The gun comes with a fully adjustable Williams peep sight, which has a threaded insert that can be removed to use the sight as a ghost ring. The front sight is a post with wings to protect it and is adjustable for elevation with an AR sight tool. The gun comes with a rail for mounting a scope in the forward position. In this case I used an older Leupold VX-R Scout 1.5-5x that I borrowed off another scout rifle.
The SR-80 is offered in 350 Legend and .308 Win. I went for the .308 Win. without even a hint of remorse. The barrel is 18 inches and has a threaded muzzle for ⅝x24 attachments. It comes with a thread protector and a muzzle brake.
I did all the accuracy testing with the gun as it came configured from the factory with the muzzle brake installed. Later on, I installed my Silencer Central Banish 30 Gold suppressor for some of the drills. The short barrel is a good mate to a suppressor and my anti-gun neighbor didn’t even yell one obscenity at me.
The bolt is a three-lug design that allows a shorter rotation, and it runs like it’s on bearings. There is a slot milled into the left side of the bolt where the bolt stop fits and acts like an anti-bind guide.
The bolt has a sliding extractor fitted into the right lug. The ejector is a spring-loaded plunger in the face of the bolt. The bolt handle has an oversize, knurled knob. The side-mounted safety is two position and does not lock the bolt shut. The trigger pull on this rifle is 2 pounds, 6 ounces. It’s sharp, clean and breaks like a good trigger should. All metal is Cerakoted in Graphite Black.
The injection-molded stock is light tan with a black splatter pattern. It has a 14-inch length of pull, which is a bit long for many of us. But fear not as a 1-inch spacer can be easily removed. The stock is fitted with a Crushzone CVA rubber recoil pad. The pistol grip has a small palm swell on the right side. The grip panels have a molded checkering pattern for a better grip. The stock itself has a “grippy” surface. There are three sling attachment studs for attaching a bipod while still using a carry sling.
The single issue I had was with the magazine. The 10-round magazine is proprietary to CVA rifles, so this rifle will not accept other style magazines. It worked fine, except it was dropped twice with ammo loaded and it burst apart. I easily fixed the issue with a little super glue on the baseplate. Can’t do anything about being clumsy.
For hunting, you can order a flush-mount, four-round magazine from CVA.
When you consider the limitations of a forward-mounted 5X scope for precision testing, this gun shot remarkably well. I suspect if I were to fit one of the high-magnification scopes I normally use for range testing rifles I would see even better results.
I shot a few groups at 50 yards with the peep sight, which ran about an inch. That is 2 MOA, and the rifle is better than that. It pains me terribly to admit it, but as I creep up on my seventh decade on this earth, some days I just can’t see iron sights very well anymore.
Scout rifle standards like a Pic rail, a rear peep and a drop box mag come standard on the SR-80. Adjustable length of pull makes the rifle a universal fit.
For the drills, which emulate hunting situations, I turned the magnification all the way down and turned up the illuminated dot in the center. This setup is very fast on target acquisition. I ran a steel target array several times at varying distances. I shoot this drill often on my home range with a lot of rifles. While I didn’t use a timer, the action is so smooth and the trigger so good that I am pretty sure it’s the fastest I have shot the drill with an off-the-shelf centerfire, bolt-action rifle. It’s fast enough that I am surprised every time the 10 rounds are gone. It will be just as fast when still-hunting whitetails.
I make a lot of my living doing gun tests like this one, and as a result I shoot a lot of rifles. I have a protocol that I follow for the accuracy testing, and that doesn’t vary much. It also doesn’t tell you much about shooting the rifle in the field, so I follow up with some field shooting like I did here on the steel to get a good feel for the rifle.
Usually, I shoot for a while and then pack up the rifle and head home to the computer to write up the report. In this case, I stuck around, shooting again and again, until I ran out of ammo.
I can’t think of a better recommendation than that for any rifle.
Technical Specifications
• Type: bolt-action centerfire rife
• Caliber: .308 Win. (tested), 350 Legend
• Magazine: detachable box; 10-rnd.
• Barrel: 18"; med. contour; 1:10" RH twist; threaded muzzle w/ muzzle brake
• Trigger: single-stage; 2 lbs., 6 ozs. pull weight
• Sights: Williams peep rear, adjustable front post; forward Picatinny rail
• Safety: two-position toggle
• Stock: straight comb; synthetic; Flat Dark Earth w/ black web finish; 13"-14" adjustable LOP
• Metal Finish: Graphite Black Cerakote
• Overall Length: 39.75"
• Weight: 7.3 lbs.
• Accessories: thread cap
• MSRP: $925; cva.com
