Rifle Build

[Two Barrels]

I picked up a new and unused Rem 700 Stainless LA Magnum action a couple of years ago with the intention of building an all weather hunting rifle. The primary purpose would be for hunts out West. I have read a ton of articles and different forums over the past several months with different opinions and viewpoints. I know several of you have experience with custom builds and I have a few questions.

What part of your rifle build was absolutley necessary to squeeze out all the accuracy you were willing to pay for?
1. Which barrel maker? Kreiger, Bartlein, K&P, etc.
2. Particular style of barrel crown?
3. Complete blueprinting of the action?
4. Any other action work? Time and tig bolt handle? Enlarged scope base screw holes?
5. Stock? McMillan, Brown Precision, H-S,etc. (I like the style of the McMillan Remington Sporter)
6. Trigger? Timney is planned.
7. Bottom metal? Standard Remington or custom mfg?
8. Gunsmith to actually do the work?

The caliber of this rifle will very likely be 300 H&H with a 26” barrel. I have no desire for a new hot rod whiz bang “calibre du jour”. I am already set up to load for it and it is different but very capable. I know I could buy an off the shelf 300 Win Mag and save money and it may shoot just as well, but that is just dull.

Suggestions are welcome and appreciated.

[Biggie1976]

I am doing the same thing. My smith is building a 300 PRC. Below are the specs. My smith is in Charleston

Manners TA mini chassis with BDL type bottom metal
Remington 700 LA Mag
proof Carbon Sendoro contour
He is truing the action
fluting the bolt

[ShortMagFan]

Having had a few customs built by a couple different gunsmiths my takeaways:

- barrel matters a lot. I’ve used Hart, Bartlein and Hawk Hill. I think almost all of the big names produce a very high quality barrel so my advice would be to use the brand your chosen gunsmith recommends.

- don’t go too heavy on the barrel. Heavier barrels are easy to make shoot but you need to keep in mind finished weight. An 8lb rifle before optics doesn’t sound really heavy but by the time you put that 2lb Nightforce on it that rifle will be a load to for an easterner to carry on a western hunt. After making the mistake of a too heavy barrel I tell people if you plan to carry the rifle a Bartlein 2b or 3 from most other makers is probably as heavy as you want to go unless it’s going to have a bore bigger than 30 cal. Every barrel makers has slightly different contour specs so compare measurements as opposed to contours across barrel makers

- in addition to a quality barrel, everything needs to be straight and concentric. Paying a good gunsmith to blueprint/true your action is probably a good idea. Maybe you got lucky and your action is perfect but that’s unlikely and you won’t know until the gunsmith puts your action in the chuck.

- being straight also means ammo. If you don’t hand load (which I don’t) work with someone like Copper Creek and their load development process. Before you send your barrel to your gunsmith get a dummy round with the bullet you want to shoot from Copper Creek and have your gunsmith throat your chamber for this dummy round. That’ll make load development go easier. Then actually do the load development process as recommended by Copper Creek. It’s take 2-3 range sessions and 50-75 rounds of Ammo.

- a quality stock and bedding job matters too. Have one gunsmith do all the work so he “owns” the end product

- fluting bolts is purely cosmetic. I like the look but it’s not necessary

- I like the peace of mind of larger scope base holes especially on a 30 cal magnum

- recessed crown would be my choice for a hunting rifle

- bolt handle probably not necessary and impacts extraction, not accuracy

- Timney triggers have a great reputation. I’ve never had one. I hear TriggerTech is awesome too

- McMillans are great stocks. The sporter is pretty beefy though. Sporter vs Classic vs McM hunter (not Remington Hunter) is all a matter of personal preference.

- after market bottom metal is all the rage whether an after market BDL or dbm. I’ve never had an issue with Remington factory bottom metal

- 300 H&H is an awesome cartridge and should feed like butter with no work

- my last 2 rifles have been done by Jon Beanland in Oklahoma but there are a lot of good options out there. Gunsmiths are notoriously bad communicators so finding someone that will communicate is key. Source the parts yourself and deliver them with very specific instructions.

- if your standards are “minute of deer” or something less than tack driving accuracy (which, to be honest is not needed for 99pct of hunting) then you can throw out much of the above. I’ve had takeoff factory barrels in a cartridge I wanted screwed onto factory actions with no additional work done shoot acceptably for my purposes too

Good luck with it and PM me if I can help at all.

[rrconductor]

1. Douglas
2. 11 degree crown
3.Blueprint
4.8-40 Scope mount holes
5.McMillian
6.Shilen or Timney
7.PTG obendorf bottom metal
8.Karl Kampfield or Chad @ Long Rifles, Sturgis, SD

[Whackumstackum]

All ima add is Get up with Griffin, his work is nice and he's local.

[Biggie1976]

All ima add is Get up with Griffin, his work is nice and he's local.

thats who is doing mine.

[Saltydog235]

I like my Timney triggers but the Trigger Tech on my Cooper OC is fantastic.

And if I’m building a walking/mountain rifle I’d be looking at a carbon barrel and a carbon stock to shed that weight.

[Tha Dick]

My new build:

Manners EH1 Carbon fiber stock
Curtis Custom Helix action
Proof Sendero carbon barrel
Accurate-Mag bottom metal
Trigger Tech trigger

Still waiting on Manners to ship my stock. At least I finally got the invoice a couple weeks ago, so hopefully its only a couple weeks out....

[Two Barrels]

I appreciate the feedback and suggestions. I need to decide on a finished weight including optics and work backwards. That should help with some decisions.

[FLS]

1. A detachable Mag is silly on a hunter. The necessary hardware is just extra weight. Same for oversized bolt knobs and all the other tacticool stuff. If you want it, so be it but I feel like it was a total waste of money everything but my match rifles.
2. A premium Sporter weight will shoot just as accurately as a heavyweight, it will just heat up faster.
3. Trigger Tech.
4. I prefer McMillan. Long solid reputation. Their mountain rifle stock is what Remington used to use in their custom shop. The KS series rifles were some of the best factory customs ever built.
5. Have one guy do everything, preferably one with a good bit of experience and a solid reputation. A lot of folks have jumped into the “ custom rifle” business. They’re not all good gunsmiths.
6 If you do want a heavy barreled Mag fed rifle, look hard at a chassis. No bottom metal, no bedding and a lot of the extras you’ll pay for in a McMillan or Manners are included. MPA, MDT and XLR all offer light r wight options gear towards hunting.

[FLS]

B7F376DF-4912-4C26-8AA2-8F07A6BC12CF.jpg

If you’re starting with the optic, take good look at this one. Vortex nailed it. And before all the Vortex haters start their bullshit, the Razors are as good as anything out there.

[Griffin]

Good info above. Just a couple of my notes.
1. Barrel maker doesn’t matter as much as people think any of bigger names in cut rifling barrels will do just fine. It’s more about who has what contour available in a time frame that fits with yours.
2. Always true a 700 action if you go that route. For factory actions a tikka is a better/cheaper route. The price of custom actions has come down considerably and normally they don’t cost much more than a factory 700 action that has been fully trued.
3. Time and tig depends on the serial number and some luck. Any decent smith should be able to tell you if you need it or not.
4. 8-40 scope base holes are generally not needed on anything besides large caliber.
5. Stocks = manners or McMillian. There are no others.
6. Bottom metal is a personal preference but factory BDL is hard to beat on a hunting gun. However if the gun is in and out of a truck a lot a DBM is nice
7. Timney and trigger tech both make fantastic triggers. Anyone who says one is better than the other is full of shit. It’s purely a personal preference.
8. Off the shelf and between the two calibers listed go 300 win mag and make sure whoever does the work uses the “match” or “tactical” reamer aka long freebore
Let me know if you have anymore questions. I am not a full time gunsmith but I will shoot you strait on anything gun build related no matter who is building it.

[Biggie1976]

This guy knows whats up........