I built this rifle about 3 years ago. It has a Shilen match SS barrel. I shot over 1000 rounds thru it so far and it shows no signs of barrel erosion or wear. I know that the Swift had a reputation for eating up barrels when it first came out, but that was over 60 years ago. I believe that with todays better powders, it will shoot a long time before I need to look at replacing a barrel.
My son and I shoot them together a lot and I often tell him "I painted that one!" which means nothing but a pink haze/mist around the hole!!!
Any centerfire is legal in California. I was born & raised there and the first deer I shot when I was 12 was a doe with a .22 Hornet. I used to have a .22-250 and killed a couple of deer with it, but back then there was not much choice in bullets, also realized pretty quick that they had to be fairly close, because of bullet energy loss and wind drift.
I think I would have to change bullets. The one I am using for prairie dogs is a hollow point, probably just explode and blow the hell out if the meat. It does shoot well and is really fun to work with.
