SCJ429 wrote:Five cut and recrowning? What did that cost you? You will lose a little velocity but that barrel will be nice and stiff. What ranges did you want to compete at?
Not competing - just fun and hunting...I didn’t build the gun - a local shop owner did and i was then in the right place at the right time and I’ve now done a couple of my own mods - but the hard yards was all local shop and local Smith.
I was told before purchase that With 120gn Nosler and 45.5gns ar2209 it’s shooting 2 inch groups at 500 metres with an experienced rifleman and 4 inches with a newbie / anyone. Whilst I was initially very sceptical of these claims, I can now say with some recent lands testing - that I’ve witnessed the capability and have personally shot a group of 3 to 13mm at 200m which blew me away - as I’m pretty useless. See pic.
It was cut .5 inches a time to ensure velocity
was not being given up holistically and the chart shows that only some 50fps average was lost from the 24 inches to 21.5 with the above load and apparently even less with 140’s. I’d guess it may lose a little more with the lighter projectiles (it was shooting well over 3300 FPS with hornady 95’s at full length but due to the work put in - they stuck with120’s as a middle ground for full testing - so I’m told anyway). This shorter barrel completely screwed with my head - as growing up in something of an “ignorant” firearm household I was lead to believe that longer barrels = speed and whilst that remains true to a degree, its definitely snot clear cut.
I’ve never owned a centre fire like this - one that Instills so much confidence. It’s a bloody good feeling lol and that’s part of the problem - because now I want a light weight 06 hunter to do the same lol and it’s prob not realistic (sad face).
I’ll try and load my first photo - if it works it’s 260 lapua cases, 120gn Nosler, 45.5 ar2209, cci primers, bi pod and desk with Caldwell rear bag at 200m.
Slight confusion now is that this group was matched whilst testing, with a projectile that was seated out 1.9mm further - a hairs breath away from touching the lands so now I need to test again both lengths again.