Questions about my rig for you bolt gun guys

[TonyAngel]

Walkalong, thanks.

kis2, well, I say .222 but also added the size of the target diamond for reference. I think it's .222. I measured edge to edge of the group using the edges of the marks and subtracted the diameter of the bullet. Thanks for the compliment, but that's the first and only .222 group I've shot. I did shoot two .3ish groups with my buddy's custom rifle today.

I've really been going out of my way to use that squeeze bag. I did use the squeeze bag, but was shooting from a bag on the front end. My son was using the bipod on the AR. I really need to get another one. Since I was shooting from a bag, I think that you're .3" group record off of a bipod is still in tact.

 

[BrocLuno]

KG12 will help remove bad copper fast. It is the most aggressive non-corrosive solution. You can not use a bronze brush with it.

But my question is about the throat? It's getting very warm and it'll be a bitch to clean if it starts galling copper. Ammonia soak may be it if the throat starts building up. Do you have a local smith with a bore scope? I think it's time to look at it real hard. It's shooting good, but I'd sure like to see what the throat looks like up close?

 

[kis2]

haha, ok well I still hold that .2, regardless, is great. bags or no. thanks for trying to console me though.

by the way, as a responsible forum member , I went ahead and threw that group into the ontarget software and sure enough it shows a .219ish, so you're pretty accurate with calipers as well!

 

[TonyAngel]

kis2, thanks for doing that. I don't know about being accurate with the calipers, but I do try not to fudge.

Now I just have to get my dope worked out. With my mounting holes being off center, it was tough getting the cross hairs vertical with the bore. I used a set of levels to level the scope, but don't know how far off it will be. I'd like to get it dead on so that when I dial in elevation I won't have to mess with the windage, except to hold for wind.

My dope, the way it is now, I have a 20MOA drop at 600 yards. I need to work on that, but the short barrel is giving me trouble. I need to get another couple hundred feets per second out of it to flatten it out a bit and get it there faster. With the chrony readings that I'm getting, I get around 100fps for every two grains of Reloader 15. I don't mind going up to 44. I've tried it and it shoots just fine. I don't want to go up to 46. I don't know that I can. This is why my next barrel will be a 22". That with a 44gr load should get me up to around 2600fps at the muzzle with a 168gr projectile.

I've also toyed with the idea of going to a 175gr projectile. Less velocity, but better wind bucking ability so it might not matter how long the flight takes. I don't know. I'm still new to all of this. I guess I just have to experiment. It just sucks because having access to 600 yards is not easy at all for me.

I could even live with 300 yards. This 100 yard shooting is getting to be pretty boring.

BrocLuno, my local smith has a bore scope. He scopes all of his barrels before installing them. I thought about asking him to scope mine, but I think maybe I'm better off not knowing. All I need to know is that it's shooting well now and when my Kreiger gets in, all of this will be a non issue. I'm gonna look for that KG12 though.

 

[unwise11]

I have a 22" .308 Howa, sends a blast of fire with some Hott butt loads at night.
very accurate. .5-.75 MOA.
I wonder if it would be more accurate if I wore my ghillie suit and shot prone

 

[kis2]

its a good deal when 100yds is boring! just wait til 300 isn't either.

at 600 my book shows me between 13.75-15moa drop (alt and temp are the difference there). 24" on mine certianly helps. I've not done enough testing to know, but word on the street is the amax's will drop signifcantly less out that far (like a full minute)

I've also thought about moving up from 168gr to maybe 178, I know they have a 200ish grain amax as well. only thing to consider there I suppose is the bullet going transonic at longer distances (thumbs down). at six hundered though it shouldn't be too big an issue. certainly not with the 178gr.

I'm sure one of the more experienced shooters on here can comment more about it.

it's all voodoo anyway.

 

[MistWolf]

Before you spend any money on a Shilen trigger, give your original a good cleaning. Learn how to tune it and lube the sears with grease. I have found no reason to replace any of my Remington triggers once I've cleaned, lubed & tuned them.

I will note that I am not familiar with the new Remington trigger design

 

[TonyAngel]

kis2, voodoo is right!! I went back and looked at the numbers on the heavier than 168 projectiles. There are just too many variables. I think I've decided that I'm just going to stick to the 168 Match Kings for right now. In all of the guns that I've built, shot, owned, they have shot at least well, if not the best. I'm just doing to keep working on the load for that particular bullet.

Mistwolf, I have the new Remington trigger. I have the trigger adjusted as low as it will go, and I'm still waiting for the trigger to break. What's really bugging me with the Remington trigger is that darned set screw. I can feel it poking into the top of my trigger finger. I also ordered a Timney trigger. I'm going to see which one I like the best

 

[Skylerbone]

Tony, you may want to have the smith cast the chamber for you. You'll have a permanent record for reference and subsequent castings, say every 1000-1500 rounds will give you an idea of overall "health" and establish a time table for major surgery.

On the subject of triggers, I'm loving my new Rifle Basix. I specified 2 1/2 lbs. (mine is for hunting) and it took verification by scale to believe it wasn't lighter. Much better than my original 3 1/2 lb. Ordering direct meant free shipping and the ability to specify pull weight.

 

[Peakbagger46]

Tony,
Nice rifle and very nice shooting! I won't mess with the barrel, especially if you are concerned with practical accuracy. That is a respectible first group from a cold clean tube.
I am with many others who would advise to clean more often (200 rounds between cleaning!) and let the barrel cool down between groups. You will need a new tube if you get it hot a lot!

 

[hardluk1]

Tonyangle Nice groups for a shot out cleaned up barrel.

 

[FlyinBryan]

boy howdy those are some dandy rifles.

 

[chaser_2332]

Try cleaning your barrel less, alot of rifles need a little fowling to perform at their best, alot rifleman only clean there barrel when groups start to open up. And after cleaning it alot of the times takes several fowler shots to get the gun where it needs to be again. 800 shots in a .308 is nowhere shot out

 

[TonyAngel]

I am definitely in the "cleaning your barrel less" crowd. The most I ever do to my higher end barrels on my ARs is run a patch with Slip 2000 on it down the bore and follow up with a snake. The thing with the 700 is that by the time I noticed a degradation in accuracy, the copper build up was pretty bad and hard to get out. I don't want it to get that way again. Maybe I'll just keep it to scrubbing the barrel every 400 rounds.

Oh, a guy that I consider to be pretty "in the know" advised that I might want to try going through my bore with some Softscrub. He says it's worked wonders for his barrels. What do you guys think about this? I was just going to pick up some Flitz today and polish the bore a bit.

 

[TonyAngel]

Guys I want to thank you again for all of the consideration and input. I've learned more here than I've learned on other sites.

I do have one last question. I called my gunsmith today to see if he ordered that barrel for me. He said that he hadn't ordered it yet, so I told him to cancel it. I went back and looked at my groups and looking at them I can see where I screwed them up.

On the first sheet, the groups are pretty good, other than the fouling group. I can see where I pulled that shot on the second group, but that may well have been the last necessary fouling shot. The third group ain't bad.

On the second sheet (these were posted in the order that they were shot), the groups are good by almost any standards. On the last sheet, the range was going to be closing and I was getting a bit fatigued. All of the groups shot were shot in succession. On the first group, it looks like I forgot to hold my breath. On the second group, that was obviously (I think) bad trigger control. With the last group, knowing that it was going to be my last group, I really took my time. It probably took me a good three or four minutes to shoot the last five rounds and the results were outstanding.

At this point, I just don't know that going with an aftermarket barrel is going to get me anything that would justify the cost. Quite frankly, the barrel was smoking hot when I shot the last group and it behaved pretty well. If it gets to a point where I need to change the barrel, I may just opt for another Remy barrel, if they all shoot like this.

So....last questions, I acquired an LTR pull off barrel not too long ago. I think I gave the guy $40 for it. I know where it came from. It actually came off of the action on which that custom rifle that I mentioned was built. I've been told that it has 500 rounds on it at the most. Do any of you guys know if there is anything special about the LTR barrel that would make it any better than the stock SPS Tactical barrel? Since these are all mass produced, is it likely that this LTR barrel that I got will already be appropriately headspaced for my action?

I'm just asking, because if it is, getting an action wrench and a set of gauges would allow me to swap barrels myself when the time comes. I really love doing things myself and getting good results after having done so.

 

[USSR]

Do any of you guys know if there is anything special about the LTR barrel that would make it any better than the stock SPS Tactical barrel?

Nope, nothing "special" about them.

Since these are all mass produced, is it likely that this LTR barrel that I got will already be appropriately headspaced for my action?

Whenever you change a barrel or a bolt, headspace must be checked and adjusted if necessary. Personally, I would not go to all the trouble of replacing one $30 barrel with another $30 barrel. When the time comes to replace your barrel, have your action trued and a high quality barrel installed by a well known gunsmith. Just MHO.

Don

 

[Skylerbone]

File above under Excellent Advice. Regardless of nomenclature (tactical, special purpose or varmint) it is luck of the draw that will get you a truly excellent barrel. Your rifle was built to be purchased by LE, shot a few hours a month and to be better than most of the marksmen behind the trigger. It's a budget stick whose accuracy limits you are already making the most of (my compliments to your ability).

Remember too that another bullet and load may perform even better and sometimes 100 yards will not show you which ammo makes the tightest group. I am a current prisoner of the 200 yard range but have found a 600 yard range within reasonable driving distance.

I'd love to see you stretch that NF out to 400 and show the non-believers what a factory Remmy can do. I don't demand that level of precision from my bolt actions but then again my scope is a 3-9 and the crosshair subtends an inch at 100. Thus my groups are closer to 1" than some fraction thereof. For a $400 rifle, that's all I can ask that is reasonable.

 

[TonyAngel]

USSR, Skylerbone, you guys are getting the wheels spinning again. Uurghh. Yeah, yeah, I know. I have NEVER regretted buying quality.

Skyler, if you think being a 200 yard prisoner is bad, try 100, which is where I am most of the time. When I get a chance to shoot further, I'm so busy doing serious work that I can't even enjoy it. Like the last time I got to let my rifle stretch its legs. I wound up spending all of my time getting the dope on my load only to find out after that I had to up the powder charge a tad bit, so the next time, it's just about back to the drawing board.

I'll tell ya, it's really a shame when you have to use stuff like smarties and pez candies as targets just to get a rise. Or trying to put a bullet through the hole of one of those miniature powdered doughnuts. It's actually pretty hard to do without vaporizing the doughnut.

Anyway, thanks guys. The Shilen trigger I ordered was on back order so I just cancelled it, when I got notification that my Timney had shipped this morning. Better or worse than the Shilen, it should be better than the X-Mark that I'm running now. For the time being, I think I'll concentrate my efforts on getting better at shooting this beast. I have two barrels to burn through before I HAVE to start thinking about it. This little $550 rifle is turning into a real money pit. I could have just started with an action, which Brownell's happens to have in stock right now.

 

[hardluk1]

I have a 12 year old Timney Sportsmans trigger on my rifle and it brakes at 2lb. No take up, no over travel, just a crisp break. Yours should work just as well. If you do deisde to change barrel in the future remember that some like Krieger do install your barrel for you to but may take some time just scedule the job. No local smithy would be better and probably not cheaper.

 

[TonyAngel]

hardluk1, all I really need is a barrel blank. I don't know if you've heard of him, but Don Geraci is my local gunsmith. I didn't know it when I met him, but apparently he is some hot stuff in benchrest circles. When I googled his name, my jaw dropped a bit. I shot one of his rifles this past weekend (Krieger barrel). My friend and I sat and shot four consecutive three shot one hole groups with the rifle. I have no doubts about this abilities at all. Don took the blank, profiled it, threaded it, chambered it and headspaced it, essentially starting out with a hollow tube turning it into a barrel, so I believe that he'll be able to handle whatever I need. I actually feel kind of lucky knowing that I have a goto guy.

 

[TonyAngel]

Just an update. I got the Timney trigger in and it made a BIG difference. It breaks cleaner than the X-Mark. Well, maybe not cleaner, it just has a more refined feel to it. I think that the wider trigger is helping a lot. I'm still getting the copper fouling, more than other guys are, but it is a stock barrel. Looking down it, I can see machine marks. I've just resigned myself to having to give it a good cleaning about every 100 rounds to keep accuracy at its peak. This rifle is a shooter.

I don't have ready access to enough space to do a proper ladder test, so I just loaded up 18 each of loads using the 168SMK with Reloader 15 starting at 42gr working my way up to 45gr. With everything from 42gr to 43.5gr the groups were one holers. When I got to 44gr and 44.5gr things went hay wire. MOA on the average, then when I got to the 45gr load, it tightened back up again to around .5MOA. I did this on Friday. With the results that I got, I ran home and loaded up 50 rounds at 43.5gr and 50 at 45gr. With the 43.5gr, the groups were one holers, except for called fliers. This is one heck of a load for this rifle. The only problem is that I think I'm only getting around 2500FPS out of it. I'm extrapolating this based on the fact that I'm getting 2400fps out of the 42gr load according to the chrony that I used. That puts my at dialing in around 20 minutes of correction at 600 yards. If I run the 25gr load, that should put me at around 2600fps and only 17 minutes of correction at 600. From what I hear it's always windy where this 600 yards shoot is going on and I'm thinking that less flight time is defintely going to be better.

kis2, if you see this, I tried shooting with a bipod and just my hand as a rest for the stock. I forgot my squeeze bag at home. All I can say is that you're a better man than I am. The best I could do shooting like that was MOA. Of course, shooting a bipod off of concrete sucks.

When I hit that shoot on Dec. 4, I'm going to try to get out there early. If I can get some range time, I'm going to do a proper ladder test. That way, if I bomb out, it won't be a total loss.

 

[kis2]

"kis2, if you see this, I tried shooting with a bipod and just my hand as a rest for the stock. I forgot my squeeze bag at home. All I can say is that you're a better man than I am. The best I could do shooting like that was MOA. Of course, shooting a bipod off of concrete sucks."

I laughed pretty good when I saw this! Certainly I'm not a better man, just one that spent a lot of time on a different technique. If I went out with a squeeze bag today, I probably wouldn't do so good just because I haven't practiced with it. consistency = accuracy

Glad to hear you're getting some nice groups again. I stopped my load at 43.2gr of varget, but have a 24" barrel helping out. I think it was USSR who gave me the advice "I have no need for a slow but accurate load". and he's right of course, the less time of flight that thing has the better. just be safe as you work up there.

I'm sure you'll get to learn a lot at the competition. I went to one of Zak Smith's competitions and learned a ton about my gun/load just by getting the distance to shoot at (let alone all the friendly advice from some experienced shooters). If by chance you get to shoot out to 600 yards a little more often, I would encourage you to give the amax bullets a try. again, I haven't done the legwork myself to know, but a lot of people are saying out that far you can see a difference between it and the SMK's in drop. might be worth a shot.

pun!

make sure to let us know how the competition goes and good luck