Need advice about what to do with a poor shooting rifle

[LRPV]

I am going to try to keep this as generic as possible because I do not want to draw blame to anyone whether or not it is warranted. I would just like some advice on what steps to take from here on as my options seem very limited at this time.

I had a "Top Gunsmith" build a pre-64 model 70 for me. I used a barrel from one the top barrel manufacturers in a med. palma contour, 1 in 8 canted lands, a tactical style composite stocks from one of the top two stock makers. The action was trued and barrel installed and was pillared and bedded into the stock. As far as I know (which isn't much) The only thing that I could have done to attempt to improve accuracy any further would have been to have the firing pin bushed.

When I got the rifle and started load development I couldn't get the rifle to group. I talked to others with the same caliber and got lots of advice but could not get anything to work. I took the rifle back to the smith and he looked things over inside and out. Using a borescope nothing stuck out as a problem. He was going to shoot it himself to see what he thought but it was a general consensus with him and another guy that I might just have a bad barrel.

The gunsmith never had a chance to shoot the rifle and has since gone out of business. Now I am stuck with a rifle that still doesn't shoot and I suspect that any other gunsmith with avoid it like the plague. I figure that I am just out of luck with it and might as well buy another barrel, pick another gunsmith and start over. I wonder if it would do any good at all to try sending it to the barrel manufacturer to see if they would warranty it at all but I don't have any experience with this. I did contact the barrel company earlier when I was first having problems and they really didn't seem interested in my problem.

Any advice would be appreciated.
Jason

 

[BoydAllen]

Where do you live? There are some very good gunsmiths around that shoot and build for benchrest. Perhaps I could suggest one that is not too far from you.

 

[Greatwhitenorth]

Get the barrel slugged by someone who knows what they are doing. Bore scopes only show obvious things possibly out of order. Who knows, maybe the last inch of the bore loosens up a bit and you can get it cut down a touch and re-crowned to fix it. A bit of lapping on the bore might help too if it needs it. Shoot the barrel in a bit before you toss it to the wind.

 

[LRPV]

I'm in the NW corner of Missouri.

I have managed to fumble through 465 rounds of various bullet, powder, primer combinations without any luck in finding a combination that groups acceptably. 1" at 100yds is about the norm.

Jason

 

[boltfluter]

You might try one of David Tubbs fire-lapping kits. I have had good luck with it in a few barrels. Just a thought. Paul 8)

http://proprecisionrifles.com/

 

[Larryh128]

Assuming for a moment that the barrel is OK, there are really only 2 obvious reasons for inaccuracy, the bolt lugs not bearing properly, & poor bedding. You have certainly shot it enough to get way past the break in stage. I personally would look 1st at the bedding & if it was suspicious at all, re-do it. Then look at the lugs. There are some top flite guys on this site that do excellent work, send it to one of them.

 

[X Ring Accuracy]

I understand your plight. I have seen bad barrels in the past but that is a fluke nowadays. Without seeing the rifle 3 things come to mind. Action / Barrel faces not square, poor chamber, improper bedding. All are fixable for less than you think. Just my .02 but it is a matter of eliminating variables.

 

[fullersson]

What type of scope, rings, and base are you using. A good rifle isn't worth anything without a very good scope. The first thing I would do is change the scope and also check the rings and base. Brian Brown.

 

[oneflyer]

I don't know of a "top gunsmith" in the country that has gone out of business. Most of them are two years behind. I'd look there first and start over.

 

[mr45man]

Change out the scope, check all base screws,
after that it almost has to be the bedding job.
John H.

 

[LRPV]

Thanks for the replies. I'm using an EGW HD picatinny rail, Seekins rings and a Bushnell 4200 elite. I swapped scopes out with a Leupold VX3 that has proven to be accurate on other rifles and got the same results. The bolt was cerra coated with the rest of the rifle and the lugs look to me like they are making good contact. I don't know what I'm looking at when it comes to bedding but there aren't any voids or anything that looks out of place or wrong to me. I guess I need to find someone with some expertise to look it over. I am thinking about just chalking this up to a bad experience and starting over. It's been one of those things that has fought me from the beginning.
Jason

 

[Dans40X]

Action & Bbl manufacturer info may assist evaluations-

Inquire to a competent 'smith(in business)to set the barrel back/rechamber/headspace & re-crown.

With Bbl removed,prior to the above mention work,inspect the action to verify if it was molested or not.

 

[DOGCAPPER]

Borrow another set of loading dies and give that a try at no cost..LT

 

[LRPV]

Action is a pre-64 model 70 as mentioned above. Barrel manufacturer is considered to be one of the best money can buy, by many on this site. I don't want to make it public because I don't want their name associated to it if it is not their problem. As for the dies, I am using dies from Redding, Forster, and Wilson and changing them doesn't seem to make any difference.
Jason

 

[mr45man]

So , you have eliminated the scope then it almost has to be the bedding
job. I cant imagine a name brand barrel maker sending out a junk barrel.
double check the length of the action screws to assure they are not bottoming out rather than securing the stock.
if that fails I,ll give you 100 bucks for the thing LOL.
John H.

 

[LRPV]

if that fails I,ll give you 100 bucks for the thing LOL.
John H.

If I don't figure something out I'll be sure to keep you mind.

 

[areaone]

Please no offense intended, but have you had someone else shoot it, I have had a similar problem and was ready to hang it up until I had a friend go over the rifle and shoot it himself, he worked up a load and it shot better for him than it did for me, he basically took it apart and put it back together(screws, mounts, scope) and it did shoot better. never great, but better.

 

[alarsene]

How poorly is it grouping?
It could be the ammo?

 

[dksac2]

Is the barrel free floated? If it's supposed to be and is touching, that could be a problem.

Possible the gunsmith messed it up. How about bedding, is it bedded ?

Do not use the Dave Tubb bullets, no custom barrel maker will take a barrel back after those have been used.
I would never use those in a custom barrel anyway. No need.

Have you checked the headspace ?

I'd send it to a good smith to have it checked.

My Best, John K

 

[ohearchai]

Jason, obviously it been mentioned in passing, but just to eliminate the obvious, your Smith went out of business because he retired, died?, I really don't know any top Smiths that actually retired per say, if they built a rifle for customer and it didn't shoot, they would be damned well interested in knowing why. I think I might want to get another Smith to look at her, as for mentioning the barrel maker, I am more interested in knowing the Top smith was who put it together.