Montana Rifleman Company

[ryno]

Gents,
Remington is now making a 700 with a DM in 300 win mag. I am considering buying a bull barrel from the Montana Rifleman Company for this gun.
First question: Anyone delt with these folks before? They seem very good with E-mail, and my favorite dealer spoke to them briefly at the big show in Vegas, but has never bought anything from them. It's not a ton of money that they want, but would like to know more about them from anyone who has purchased.
Second question: They offer some fairly inexpensive accurizing options, but won't square the action because their gunsmith thinks squaring the action is too big of a pain, due to the extractor. This being said, can the action be trued by someone else after the new barrel has been installed?

 

[Fiftydriver]

Ryno,

I do not mean to talk down about another company in the shooting industry but if their smith says its to much of a pain to accurize a Rem 700 that tells me alot about the attitude at the company.

Cutting corners will get you a general purpose big game rifle like you can get off the shelf at any sporting good store.

If you want a shooter, spend a little more money, get a barrel from Lilja, Rock, Hart, Kreiger, Broughton or any other well know accuracy minded barrel makers. Send it all to an accuracy minded gunsmith and you will get vastly superior results for your investment.

It will cost a bit more but you will forget about that when you are punching 1/2 moa or better groups consistantly instead of every once in a while.

I have built on a few of the MRC receivers and fitted a couple of barrels. The barrels shot pretty well but they were fitted using match quality barrel fitting techniques, no corner cutting and on fully accurized receivers.

The MRC receivers are fine for general big game rifles, not for extreme accuracy rifles in my opinion.

Kirby Allen(50)

 

[ryno]

Kirby,
Thanks for the reply. You made some very good points. If I can bug you for some more info, it would be much appreciated. Can you suggest any other barrel makers? I looked at all of the manufacturers you listed, and none seem to list a .300 win mag as an available caliber. They seem to all go from .308 to .338. As well, I was unable to find Rock. (I assume you were suggesting Mike Rock rifle barrels) Could you provide a website for that?

Thanks for the help, I really appreciate it.
Ryno

 

[Fiftydriver]

A 308 cal barrel blank is the correct barrel for any 30 cal round including the 300 Win. A 308 blank can be chambered in anything from a 30-30 up to a 30-378. As long as they all shoot 30 cal bullets they all use the same barrel spec. Only the twist rates will change in most cases.


I used Lilja barrels mainly but the Rock barrels are world class as well.

Kirby Allen(50)

 

[James Jones]

here are some links Ryno

Broughton rilfe barrels www.rifle-barrels.com

Mike Rock barrels www.rockcreekbarrels.com

Lilja rifle barrels www.riflebarrels.com

Kreiger rifle barrels www.kriegerbarrels.com

you will get world class tubes from any oth these folks.

An like Kirby said barrel makers list their 30 caliber barrel as 308 because thats the bore diameter of all common 30 caliber rounds , those are the barrels you want.

 

[ryno]

Gents,
Thank you both for the education! As you can tell, I don't don't know much about rifle building. Which is one of my main reasons for taking on this project (and ending up with a one of kind). Thanks for all of your help. I will likely be back with more questions later. Thanks again.

 

[ryno]

Gents,
I have gotten some prices from some of the companies you suggested. Ouch...to say the least. It looks like approximately $1300, from Krieger, which naturally does not include the glass, the stock, or the original gun. It looks like, I would have close to $3200 in the set up. Ouch again. However, what can I expect for my investment?? Will this be a 1/4 moa gun, or a 1/2 moa gun?

 

[James Jones]

Well $300 for a barrel
$300 for barrel fitting and action blue printing
$300 for a good stock
and that should have you complete rifle

I'm not sure what your supposed to be getting from Krieger thats costing $1300

But for $1300 you should be able to get BR quality parts and have a BR quality smith do a BR quality job which should give you the 1/4 moa your after if your doing your part at the reloading and shooting bench.
I have seen a few guns from Pac-Nor that had their barrels and their smith fit the action and barrel that would shoot consistantly under 1/2moa with several differant loads , But I have alos heard some bad things.

What exactly is it your looking for as far as the guns specs go?

 

[ryno]

This is how I broke out the pricing:

#17 Heavey Varmint Barrel $265.00
Thread for an action $65.00
Thread and install muzzle break $200.00
Install/chamber $270.00
Truing Service Level III $240.00
Finish Blue barrel & action $225.00
Engraving $50.00

Total $1,315.00

Please be brutally honest with what I have selected. Am I going overboard? I thought it would be best to have a muzzle break being a 300 wing mag. I also thought the action should be trued??? Thoughts???

 

[James Jones]

Ryno , the basic break down that I mentioned is what I have payed in the past. typicaly what I would do is send the smith my new barrel , unmarked , unthreaded and unchambered along with my action (Rem 700) and a money order for anywhere from $300 to $400 and I get back a fully blueprinted action with the barrel installed chambered and the caliber marked on the outside , all I have to do is mate the barreled action to the stock of my choice which I choose to do but your smith could do it not sure what that charge would be.
As for fitting the brake to it I would thinkthat $200 for a good brake that is indexed and has a knurled cap also is a good price. I personaly don't think that a brake would be needed on a 300win mag of this weight would need a brake. I have a 12lb class 300 that is not bad to shoot at all with a well desgined stock.

I think that you should check with some of the smiths here on what kind of price your looking at to have your rig built , but to me your prices see to have a few extra cost that arn't needed to be added in a build.

I can vouch for Shawn Carlock and Chris Matthews's work as being top end and great guys to work with. I haven't had Kirby do any work for me yet but look forward to it one day but from what I have seen and heard from other guys he is also one of the best around. I'm having 308Nate build me one as we speek and his work promises to be great also , I'm waiting eagerly.

I'm not a big fan of having the barrelmaker put my stuff together as I typicaly can never speak to the smith to to see exactly what work is being done and what kind of tolerances hes holding. The term "action trueing" is a very broad area of what is to be happening to the action. If I'm paying for a Trueing-blueprinting job I expect to have the action setup and running true in the lathe being indexed off the bolt raceway , then the reciever face and bolt lug recesses are cut that way the action is true and square to the bolt shank , then the action reciever threads are recut , the bolt is then trued in the same fashion being indexed off the bolt shank the rear of the lugs are trued and the bolt face is recut square this way everthing is strait the bolt and when the barrel is threaded and chambered after it has been set to run strait being indexed off the bore.