lesvoth
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Mar 17, 2017
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Another Single-Shot Fascination
By Les Voth
In 2013 I wrote a story for longrangehunting.com about my lifelong fascination with single-shots. If you'd like to read that article it can be found here. At the bottom of the article you have to hit "Single Shot Saga" to get to the next page. It's so old that only a single picture remains, but you get the story.
Since that story was written some of the one bangers that had been pictured are gone, some have been added. This week I got another plinker that may satisfy a few shooting disciplines and desires. It's a bolt action single-shot with a Remington 700 footprint, threaded for barrels with Savages.
A couple/few years ago a new Canadian action company called Pristine Technologies began producing actions based on a model of innovation that is quite brilliant. The guys at Pristine procured and studied a truckload of popular actions and their features, threw the best ideas into a hopper, and built an action with the most useful characteristics deemed effective for accuracy, reliability, longevity, strength and market compatibility.
Two months ago Gary Eliseo of Competition Machine, Inc put out a YouTube video about the Pristine action that caught my eye the day he posted it. Always on the hunt for something cool, I appreciated what Gary said. Two months later I was opening the box containing my own single-shot Pristine Technologies action.
But there was a problem . . .
The barrel I'd ordered for my PRS rifle, a Proof Research .264 bore, 8 twist, Competition contour, wasn't here yet. Changing my mind, I'd already decided that when it got here I would stick it onto the Pristine single-shot as a 6.5 Creedmoor, and keep shooting my PRS rifle as the 6mmBR it was born as.
What to do? What to do? I can't stick an action on the shelf and not look at it until all parts are in hand . . . unless it's a Savage 110E. That thing's stayin' there until the cows come home.
Well, heck, Savage barrels fit! The 110E's 26" EABCO.com 6.5 Creedmoor "Accuracy" barrel that was used for experimenting/fireforming/making brass back when you couldn't get stuff was in the corner of my office. My first Creed brass was 22-250 brass necked up and blown out to fit the 6.5 Creedmoor chamber of my first custom rifle.
It was this blueprinted (Story from longrangehunting.com in link) Remington with a 27 1/2" Krieger Remington Varmint contour barrel I'd begun shooting long range with and learned to refine my reloading skills. That rifle's gone, but project parts remain.
The abused E. Arthur Brown barrel screwed onto the new Pristine action like it was made for it. Next came a single stage, no safety, Bix'n Andy 700 Competition trigger.
A comfortable Xylo chassis from ARC was recovered from the corner, put into action, and now cradles the Pristine barreled action. This adaptive chassis can be made/adjusted into whatever ergonomic form fits your hopes/dreams/desires. I've shot PRS matches with it and killed freezer-filler whitetails, too.
Glass! Need glass! A buddy - Gale C. - former three-time archery World Champion during the late '70s who still holds a couple of World Records, contributed an unused Burris 8-40x50 F Class scope to my project. 40 power? The .39 square used as a point of aim on my 100 yard target looked huge at 40x. The center dot on the reticle literally swam in that square at that distance.
Just as I can't leave an action laying on the shelf, it seems my talent at leaving a rifle unfired suffers as badly. (I bought a 10/22 one morning years ago and had a 500 brick through it by lunch!)
With gale force winds howling out of 5 o'clock, rain coming and clouds obscuring the sunrise, I commandeered the right hand seat of my "Look at ME" yellow RHD Jeep Wrangler, and thrashed off down the nearest minimum maintenance road to zero the F Class Burris in its Hawkins rings.
A few rounds later I figgered I could join the POI with the POA at 100 yards with Hornady's bulk factory 140 grain BTHPs, tossed the rain splattered shootin'n toys back in Ol' Yellow and mudded my way back home.
What's the ultimate goal? Be the best 600 yard guy in eastern North Dakota? Maybe. The best-est I can be, anyway. What will that take? The new barrel (The one that's not here yet.) with a pristine bore threaded onto the Pristine action mounted in the new Revolution stock with the 3 inch wide forend purposefully created to "ride the rest." The new 300 Lapua SRP brass and 140 grain BTHP Match bullets from Mead Industries sitting impatiently on my desk will help tremendously.
The bulk factory ammo I sighted in with put three under half an inch - then a flyer. My fault. (Temps in the 40s with winds gusting over 30 miles an hour proved I wasn't half as steady as I used to think I was . . . )
The Pristine single-shot action is stout. The body of the action, compressed into a Remington 700 footprint, has extremely thick walls. I don't have the proper measuring dial to be precise, but my indicator showed approximately .330" behind the tenon. Zero flex there. Before custom benchrest type actions became readily available, shooters/gunsmiths would sleeve Remington 700 actions to "stiffen" them. Excessive flex robs accuracy. Strength of structure is built in here.
F Class/Benchrest/PRS shooters want to avoid upsetting the rifle when working the bolt. Movement necessitates rebuilding your position between shots. The design of this bolt allow the manipulation of the bolt in loading and reloading without undue effort. It is cock on open and it closes without effort because of the roller cocking piece in the rear of the bolt.
So the action is slick. It has a roller cocking piece. It's fully nitrided. The action body will withstand a siege. Why else choose this single-shot action for long range fun, competition and plinking?
Lug orientation.
A few years ago BAT Machine and Bullet Central collaborated on a benchrest/F Class model of single-shot which is manufactured by BAT Machine, called the Neuvo. It is now very popular among precision shooters.
One of the changes from the norm that BAT and Bullet Central made was the reorientation of the lugs from vertical to horizontal in the locked position. This was so there would be lug contact on both lugs before ignition. In some actions with a vertical lockup one lug may not have much or any contact because of the rear of the bolt dropping, pulling it out of contact.
This condition would likely only happen in bolt action rifles with loose tolerances, granted, but the horizontal lug design during lockup has proved effective and popular. Pristine Technologies has added this feature to all their bolt actions, not just the single-shot.
https://shootpristine.com/
By Les Voth
In 2013 I wrote a story for longrangehunting.com about my lifelong fascination with single-shots. If you'd like to read that article it can be found here. At the bottom of the article you have to hit "Single Shot Saga" to get to the next page. It's so old that only a single picture remains, but you get the story.
Since that story was written some of the one bangers that had been pictured are gone, some have been added. This week I got another plinker that may satisfy a few shooting disciplines and desires. It's a bolt action single-shot with a Remington 700 footprint, threaded for barrels with Savages.
A couple/few years ago a new Canadian action company called Pristine Technologies began producing actions based on a model of innovation that is quite brilliant. The guys at Pristine procured and studied a truckload of popular actions and their features, threw the best ideas into a hopper, and built an action with the most useful characteristics deemed effective for accuracy, reliability, longevity, strength and market compatibility.
Two months ago Gary Eliseo of Competition Machine, Inc put out a YouTube video about the Pristine action that caught my eye the day he posted it. Always on the hunt for something cool, I appreciated what Gary said. Two months later I was opening the box containing my own single-shot Pristine Technologies action.
But there was a problem . . .
The barrel I'd ordered for my PRS rifle, a Proof Research .264 bore, 8 twist, Competition contour, wasn't here yet. Changing my mind, I'd already decided that when it got here I would stick it onto the Pristine single-shot as a 6.5 Creedmoor, and keep shooting my PRS rifle as the 6mmBR it was born as.
What to do? What to do? I can't stick an action on the shelf and not look at it until all parts are in hand . . . unless it's a Savage 110E. That thing's stayin' there until the cows come home.
Well, heck, Savage barrels fit! The 110E's 26" EABCO.com 6.5 Creedmoor "Accuracy" barrel that was used for experimenting/fireforming/making brass back when you couldn't get stuff was in the corner of my office. My first Creed brass was 22-250 brass necked up and blown out to fit the 6.5 Creedmoor chamber of my first custom rifle.
It was this blueprinted (Story from longrangehunting.com in link) Remington with a 27 1/2" Krieger Remington Varmint contour barrel I'd begun shooting long range with and learned to refine my reloading skills. That rifle's gone, but project parts remain.
The abused E. Arthur Brown barrel screwed onto the new Pristine action like it was made for it. Next came a single stage, no safety, Bix'n Andy 700 Competition trigger.
A comfortable Xylo chassis from ARC was recovered from the corner, put into action, and now cradles the Pristine barreled action. This adaptive chassis can be made/adjusted into whatever ergonomic form fits your hopes/dreams/desires. I've shot PRS matches with it and killed freezer-filler whitetails, too.
Glass! Need glass! A buddy - Gale C. - former three-time archery World Champion during the late '70s who still holds a couple of World Records, contributed an unused Burris 8-40x50 F Class scope to my project. 40 power? The .39 square used as a point of aim on my 100 yard target looked huge at 40x. The center dot on the reticle literally swam in that square at that distance.
Just as I can't leave an action laying on the shelf, it seems my talent at leaving a rifle unfired suffers as badly. (I bought a 10/22 one morning years ago and had a 500 brick through it by lunch!)
With gale force winds howling out of 5 o'clock, rain coming and clouds obscuring the sunrise, I commandeered the right hand seat of my "Look at ME" yellow RHD Jeep Wrangler, and thrashed off down the nearest minimum maintenance road to zero the F Class Burris in its Hawkins rings.
A few rounds later I figgered I could join the POI with the POA at 100 yards with Hornady's bulk factory 140 grain BTHPs, tossed the rain splattered shootin'n toys back in Ol' Yellow and mudded my way back home.
What's the ultimate goal? Be the best 600 yard guy in eastern North Dakota? Maybe. The best-est I can be, anyway. What will that take? The new barrel (The one that's not here yet.) with a pristine bore threaded onto the Pristine action mounted in the new Revolution stock with the 3 inch wide forend purposefully created to "ride the rest." The new 300 Lapua SRP brass and 140 grain BTHP Match bullets from Mead Industries sitting impatiently on my desk will help tremendously.
The bulk factory ammo I sighted in with put three under half an inch - then a flyer. My fault. (Temps in the 40s with winds gusting over 30 miles an hour proved I wasn't half as steady as I used to think I was . . . )
The Pristine single-shot action is stout. The body of the action, compressed into a Remington 700 footprint, has extremely thick walls. I don't have the proper measuring dial to be precise, but my indicator showed approximately .330" behind the tenon. Zero flex there. Before custom benchrest type actions became readily available, shooters/gunsmiths would sleeve Remington 700 actions to "stiffen" them. Excessive flex robs accuracy. Strength of structure is built in here.
F Class/Benchrest/PRS shooters want to avoid upsetting the rifle when working the bolt. Movement necessitates rebuilding your position between shots. The design of this bolt allow the manipulation of the bolt in loading and reloading without undue effort. It is cock on open and it closes without effort because of the roller cocking piece in the rear of the bolt.
So the action is slick. It has a roller cocking piece. It's fully nitrided. The action body will withstand a siege. Why else choose this single-shot action for long range fun, competition and plinking?
Lug orientation.
A few years ago BAT Machine and Bullet Central collaborated on a benchrest/F Class model of single-shot which is manufactured by BAT Machine, called the Neuvo. It is now very popular among precision shooters.
One of the changes from the norm that BAT and Bullet Central made was the reorientation of the lugs from vertical to horizontal in the locked position. This was so there would be lug contact on both lugs before ignition. In some actions with a vertical lockup one lug may not have much or any contact because of the rear of the bolt dropping, pulling it out of contact.
This condition would likely only happen in bolt action rifles with loose tolerances, granted, but the horizontal lug design during lockup has proved effective and popular. Pristine Technologies has added this feature to all their bolt actions, not just the single-shot.
https://shootpristine.com/
