finally picked up my new remington 700 vls in 308, and got a little time to shoot it. thought i would post a few thoughts about it...
the rifle:
it is what it is- a mass produced factory rifle. the fit and finish is on par w/ what i expected. no visible tool/machine marks, no cosmetic flaws on the rifle or stock.
the rifle did not come from the factory w/ a floated tube... however, i am an incurable gun-tinkerer and actually prefer to do this myself, so it isn't that big of a deal.
the trigger sucks. it isn't the worst trigger i've ever shot (that honor belongs to savage), but it is far from 'good'. i don't have a trigger scale, but would guesstimate the weight to be around 6-7 pounds!! in its favor though, was no overtravel at all, and although there was some creep, if you aren't used to good triggers, i doubt you'd notice it.
remington lists this rifle as having a 1-12 twist. i felt reasonably sure this was a misprint...the reason i wanted a 26" heavy barrelled 308 is for shooting long-to-very long range, which means heavy (175 +/- grains) bullets. feeling that remington would feel the same way, i expected this rifle to be a 10 twist. during my initial cleaning, i checked the twist rate, and was disappointed to learn that it truly is a 12 twist ...
for initial sight-in and break-in procedures, i wanted to see if this rifle would handle heavier bullets, so i picked up the cheapest 180 grain ammo that was readily available (pmp). i was pleasantly surprised to see that there was no evidence of tumbling.
as for accuracy... i am, in addition to a gun-tinkerer, a handloader. so, i really couldn't care less how it shoots factory ammo, but, since i had all my gear out, i measured the groups the pmp ammo was punching and came up w/ a .976" 5-shot average at 125 yards in a 15-25 mph wind, making no attempt at correcting for the wind. to date, i haven't made an effort to find what factory ammo the rifle likes best, and have only shot the pmp stuff...
on pmp ammo...i thought this stuff burned very dirty, and when what i have left is gone, i won't replace it. i seriously doubt this stuff is all that accurate. i think the groups i was getting is a testament to the rifle, and not the ammo. i think if i used a proven accuracy brand (fed gold medal, or something along those lines) and was shooting in more favorable conditions, 5-shot groups would be remarkably smaller...but, i'm not going to find out as i have 150 pieces of new brass match prepped, and am looking forward to load development.
the scope: all my other rifles wear one flavor or another of leupold. a friend talked me into trying a swift, saying i would be impressed. anyway, the scope is a 6-24x50 w/ turrets and an adjustable objective. the glass quality is certainly a step behind the old vari-x 2's, but not bad for the money. the eye relief isn't all that good, but tolerable. overall, not a bad scope for the money, but make no mistake, it is not a leupold.
last comment is on my cleaning chemicals...typically, i use 'barnes cr-10' for my copper removal chores. decided to try 'shooter's choice copper remover' and 'wipeout', after hearing good things about these two, especially the wipeout. the shooter's choice did a good job of getting the copper out, but did require more effort than the barnes stuff. i thought the wipeout was not worth the money regarding copper removal. it did work very quickly on the carbon fouling, but copper is harder for me to get out than the other stuff. when i run this can out, i won't replace it.
i will be bedding this rifle this weekend, and floating the barrel as soon as the bedding cures. will also be re-working the trigger in short order.
if you made it this far, i'm interested in your comment.
the rifle:
it is what it is- a mass produced factory rifle. the fit and finish is on par w/ what i expected. no visible tool/machine marks, no cosmetic flaws on the rifle or stock.
the rifle did not come from the factory w/ a floated tube... however, i am an incurable gun-tinkerer and actually prefer to do this myself, so it isn't that big of a deal.
the trigger sucks. it isn't the worst trigger i've ever shot (that honor belongs to savage), but it is far from 'good'. i don't have a trigger scale, but would guesstimate the weight to be around 6-7 pounds!! in its favor though, was no overtravel at all, and although there was some creep, if you aren't used to good triggers, i doubt you'd notice it.
remington lists this rifle as having a 1-12 twist. i felt reasonably sure this was a misprint...the reason i wanted a 26" heavy barrelled 308 is for shooting long-to-very long range, which means heavy (175 +/- grains) bullets. feeling that remington would feel the same way, i expected this rifle to be a 10 twist. during my initial cleaning, i checked the twist rate, and was disappointed to learn that it truly is a 12 twist ...
for initial sight-in and break-in procedures, i wanted to see if this rifle would handle heavier bullets, so i picked up the cheapest 180 grain ammo that was readily available (pmp). i was pleasantly surprised to see that there was no evidence of tumbling.
as for accuracy... i am, in addition to a gun-tinkerer, a handloader. so, i really couldn't care less how it shoots factory ammo, but, since i had all my gear out, i measured the groups the pmp ammo was punching and came up w/ a .976" 5-shot average at 125 yards in a 15-25 mph wind, making no attempt at correcting for the wind. to date, i haven't made an effort to find what factory ammo the rifle likes best, and have only shot the pmp stuff...
on pmp ammo...i thought this stuff burned very dirty, and when what i have left is gone, i won't replace it. i seriously doubt this stuff is all that accurate. i think the groups i was getting is a testament to the rifle, and not the ammo. i think if i used a proven accuracy brand (fed gold medal, or something along those lines) and was shooting in more favorable conditions, 5-shot groups would be remarkably smaller...but, i'm not going to find out as i have 150 pieces of new brass match prepped, and am looking forward to load development.
the scope: all my other rifles wear one flavor or another of leupold. a friend talked me into trying a swift, saying i would be impressed. anyway, the scope is a 6-24x50 w/ turrets and an adjustable objective. the glass quality is certainly a step behind the old vari-x 2's, but not bad for the money. the eye relief isn't all that good, but tolerable. overall, not a bad scope for the money, but make no mistake, it is not a leupold.
last comment is on my cleaning chemicals...typically, i use 'barnes cr-10' for my copper removal chores. decided to try 'shooter's choice copper remover' and 'wipeout', after hearing good things about these two, especially the wipeout. the shooter's choice did a good job of getting the copper out, but did require more effort than the barnes stuff. i thought the wipeout was not worth the money regarding copper removal. it did work very quickly on the carbon fouling, but copper is harder for me to get out than the other stuff. when i run this can out, i won't replace it.
i will be bedding this rifle this weekend, and floating the barrel as soon as the bedding cures. will also be re-working the trigger in short order.
if you made it this far, i'm interested in your comment.