'Leftovers' project

[AlNyhus]

This was a fun little project gun I just finished up. I had bought this '78 vintage 700 ADL 243 from the original owner quite a few years ago, basically just for the action for future use. It had fired less than 3 boxes of factory ammo since he had purchased it new. Year after year, it retreated further to the back of the gun safe. And as the wave of 700 'clones' surfaced over the past few years, it just didn't seem practical to do. I finally got tired of looking at it and decided to get it up and shooting again.

A used factory Remington LVSF stock (Bell and Carlson) was found. It had been horribly hacked by someone in a ham handed attempt to bed it. With that straightened out, new pillars and a stress free two point bedding job done, it got a couple coats of Battleship Grey, some dabs of tannish camo, some black spray webbing and was topped off with some fuel resistant RC airplane matte clear.

A used Shilen trigger that was in the parts box got rehabbed and resprung to 1 lb, a pair of left over Weaver bases were bedded and a set of vintage Bushnell light weight rings were lapped and bedded. Most reading this have probably never seen these Bushnell rings but they were 'the' rings on BR guns in the '70's and early '80's due to their light weight.

A good JB'ing of the barrel was done and it looks like new via the borescope. The throat is in there nice and straight and the free bore is short enough (pre-lawyer days) that a Nosler 70 gr. BTip will touch the lands with .125 of the bullet shank in the neck. A rummage through the brass boxes yielded 100 new Lapua 243 cases (score!) and the a search of all the yellow Wilson seater boxes turned up a 243 seater die from years ago. A Redding standard f.l. die on hand got fitted with a carbide expander ball so that will be used for sizing duties.

As pictured, it's 7lbs/3.5oz 'all up' with the 2-8X36 scope....the scope is a story all it's own. Will drop one of my higher power test scopes on it and as soon as the weather settles down, we'll see what this safe queen has to offer. Should make a nice, light combo deer/coyote rig, hopefully.

Good shootin' -Al

 

[jobhopper66]

You are a very talented man. I always look forward to what you have created.

 

[pipe]

YES!

 

[Judd]

It‘s alive

Looks good!

 

[harro]

I really enjoy threads like this one .
I’ve found myself utilising quite a lot of accumulated “ Bits “ lately and it’s actually very satisfying to put together a basic fun rifle without having to spend or wait for stuff to be delivered.

 

[brainfry]

What is the origin of the forward stock pillar?

 

[AlNyhus]

What is the origin of the forward stock pillar?

I make them. -Al

 

[spitfire_er]

Nice rig. I've done this a few times with left over parts sitting around. Put the right stuff together and nobody but you would know the entire rifle came out of the parts bin! I've got several sitting around now to do, just no time.

 

[gunsandgunsmithing]

I've got a m70 push feed that I'm nearly done with, same way as you...just a bunch of parts that I had laying around or acquired over time. I had a really nice AA walnut Accurate Innovations stock for a sa m70, a nice old Canjar trigger and bottom metal and an action. I picked up a Wilson barrel(it's a hunting rifle) and a Zeiss scope on here. I've shot it. First load thrown at it shot about 5/8" groups. All I have left is to bead blast the ss barrel and engrave it. It's a little heavier than I like at about 9-3/4lbs but looks good and I think it's gonna shoot just fine with a little load work. The barrel channel is for a number 5 contour(shilen). I put a Wilson number 4 on it so it's well floated but still looks nice. I never liked the 5 contours much...Too heavy for hunting and too light for best accuracy. All in all though, it's gonna be a fine rifle that I pieced together. I debated doing a more obscure caliber, like a 7x47 or 7 Saw but I decided to stay with a more common 7mm-08, for resale value to potentially to more buyers. But frankly, I like it enough that I may well just keep this one.

I also debated going CM barrel over ss. I do think a nice high polished blue barrel might look better than the ss but barrels are expendable and I can do that later, should I decide to.

I've got a couple of good Mausers that I'll do the same thing with at some point and a pre 64 m70 and another Canjar set trigger. It needs a safety and a little work before it's ready to build on but will make a pretty nice rifle too. PITA, but I made a new m70 stock work with the pre64 action for it. I had to piece together some floor metal to make that all work out too, but it looks fine after that. I think I have a Douglas bbl blank around here somewhere for that one. I just need more time and I'll finish it too one of these days...but I won't be converting any more new stocks for a pre64. As I said, that was a PITA and I just happened to have a combination of bottom metal that made it possible. .

 

[AlNyhus]

Got to the range this morning ahead of the next few days nastiness. Winds from the 2 o'clock and gusty from 14-18 or a bit more....the flags never stopped moving. Loaded the Lapua cases with WW760 and a Nosler 70 BTip @ .010 off the lands. While not always the ultimate powder in the 243W's, over the years 760 has proven to be a solid performer in any 243W that's got anything to show me. Could have cheated and plopped some of my BR bullets in there

but the Nosler 70 BTips have always shown me good accuracy and are pretty forgiving in any factory barrel I've tried them in. Primers were Fed. standard 210's.

Bore sighted at 100 and with the w/e adjustments centered, the first shot from a clean barrel was 2" high and 1" right....another plus for properly aligned/bedded bases and rings.

Fired four more to put a bit of temp in the barrel and then got right to the "...rat killin' ", as The Duke would say. Groups were three shots and no extra time was allowed between shots for cooling of the sporter barrel...when the flags said "Shoot!", I shot.

Over 3 grs. of powder changes, the average group size of seven 3 shot groups was .425 with the largest being the single .664 and two small ones of .395 and .360. Four of the seven groups measured .502, .515, .536 and .523. Pretty solid consistency for a sporter barrel hunting rifle. There's a hint of vertical in all the groups but you can see it come out as the powder charge increases...a sign of good bedding and a decent barrel. A slightly faster powder like Re15 or N135 and/or a bit of juggling with seating depth will bring that around.

Next trip out, I'll evaluate some 90 gr. Partitions as it's main purpose is a combination deer/antelope rig that can double as a solid coyote whacker with the same load and zero.

Good shootin' -Al