I had already built myself several nice bolt action repeaters on Stiller 2500 & converted Rem 40X actions before buying my 1st CZ457 American. After doing lot testing with those custom repeaters (all of which had Benchmark or Krieger barrels in Rem sendero contour), and finding out that it's almost typical for a really good 22RF rifle to produce 'ragged one-hole' groups at 50yds once you find a good lot of ammo. So when I loaded the 5rd mag of the CZ with some decent SK Std+ ammo and shot the 1st rounds through the American's light sporter bbl at 50yds, I was not pleased. The 'group' was splattered over 1-1/2". And even more concerning, it didn't get any better as time went on. After I'd taken a good look at the fugly, ragged factory muzzle crown with my Hawkeye borescope, I pulled it, dialed it in on the 4-jaw chuck of my lathe and cut a nice precision 11* crown. That actually did result in a slight improvement of accuracy, but it was still quite a long ways from being acceptable.
The features of the new 457 actions were too many & too nice to overlook, and this particular American had a nice looking stock. So instead of considering sending it back to CZ to have them check accuracy, I ordered in a Shilen select match ratchet #5 blank, parted off the large shank, then turned the radius transition down to a snug-fitting tenon, chambered it with an EPS reamer, cut the extractor slots in the breech, set headspace at .042", CeraKoted it with a mix of tungsten & graphite black, and then glued it into the 457's bbl socket. After all that, I wound up with a very attractive sporter that shoots really well. I love how smooth the 457 action feeds, extracts, and ejects, and I love how easy it is to adjust the factory trigger for a very nice break. I like the 60* bolt lift, which makes it easy to mount scopes without a whole lot of concern about bolt handle clearance of the scope's ocular bell. I also like the custom-like bolt stop lever on the left side of the action. And I also like the shape & proportions of the American stock. Otherwise, I would never have put the time, money, and effort into re-barreling mine. As you can see in the pic, the Shilen bbl is a little larger than the factory sporter - it weighs 1/2lb more, finished. So I had to sand out the bbl channel a bit to get it to float.
The features of the new 457 actions were too many & too nice to overlook, and this particular American had a nice looking stock. So instead of considering sending it back to CZ to have them check accuracy, I ordered in a Shilen select match ratchet #5 blank, parted off the large shank, then turned the radius transition down to a snug-fitting tenon, chambered it with an EPS reamer, cut the extractor slots in the breech, set headspace at .042", CeraKoted it with a mix of tungsten & graphite black, and then glued it into the 457's bbl socket. After all that, I wound up with a very attractive sporter that shoots really well. I love how smooth the 457 action feeds, extracts, and ejects, and I love how easy it is to adjust the factory trigger for a very nice break. I like the 60* bolt lift, which makes it easy to mount scopes without a whole lot of concern about bolt handle clearance of the scope's ocular bell. I also like the custom-like bolt stop lever on the left side of the action. And I also like the shape & proportions of the American stock. Otherwise, I would never have put the time, money, and effort into re-barreling mine. As you can see in the pic, the Shilen bbl is a little larger than the factory sporter - it weighs 1/2lb more, finished. So I had to sand out the bbl channel a bit to get it to float.
Attachments
Last edited:
