What would you change?

[Starbuck]

Yeah, it's a Leupold VX6.

I know people like to identify with their scope brands, and I'm not trying to start a tangent argument with the following comment, just sharing my experience.

If you can be sure your mounting job and materials are good, I'd try your rig with a different, known entity scope before spending money or effort on any further improvements or fixes. I've know a few guys who went pretty far with expensive fixes only to find that their optics and or optics mounting job was causing trouble.

 

[Karey Kimmel]

I know people like to identify with their scope brands, and I'm not trying to start a tangent argument with the following comment, just sharing my experience.

If you can be sure your mounting job and materials are good, I'd try your rig with a different, known entity scope before spending money or effort on any further improvements or fixes. I've know a few guys who went pretty far with expensive fixes only to find that their optics and or optics mounting job was causing trouble.

You're right Starbucks. I had the scope mounted/ shimmed/leveled by a Smith with some good rings. I agree that some people will buy a high quality scope and then mount it with cheap rings…. Terrible results. You're absolutely correct.

 

[CNY Yote Hunter]

Practice, I wish I had more time behind the gun.

 

[Starbuck]

You're right Starbucks. I had the scope mounted/ shimmed/leveled by a Smith with some good rings. I agree that some people will buy a high quality scope and then mount it with cheap rings…. Terrible results. You're absolutely correct.

I wouldn't be afraid to swap any brand of scope out if my accuracy wasn't up to potential; it's just process of elimination to rule out potential causes, as anything mechanical can fail.

But . . . certain brands seem to have more trouble holding and returning to zero than others, even in their higher end offerings.

 

[6pakzak]

Wow! I can't believe I made it to the end. OP had a reasonable post and received some reasonable responses. 6paczac's responses completely lost their effectiveness when getting caught up in a battle with others on this thread. A simple "I disagree" would suffice. I always try to eliminate equipment issues from the equation first and continue to work on becoming better shooter with fundamentals and practice. Good luck with your rifle.

Wow! I can't believe I made it to the end. OP had a reasonable post and received some reasonable responses. 6paczac's responses completely lost their effectiveness when getting caught up in a battle with others on this thread. A simple "I disagree" would suffice. I always try to eliminate equipment issues from the equation first and continue to work on becoming better shooter with fundamentals and practice. Good luck with your rifle.

You can only change the rifle, that is the question, I agree shooting fundamentals are the most important thing but it's only about the rifle and assume scope and mounts are good and assume your shooting fundamentals are fine also.

 

[jeremy_f24]

Yes, I do them myself. I own three Tikka's and ALL with, New Springs,.. Search it, on YouTube under, Tikka modifications.
Most Tikka's, can be adjusted with the Factory spring to, a crisp 2.5 - 3 Pounds and your Instruction Manual should show how to do this,.. IIRC.
New Springs, require taking the Trigger unit, OFF the Action, to replace them ( still not, hard to do ).
Be careful, choosing your Spring, as some ( like the Elay Precision ) are, VERY, Light, and good only for, precise, Target and Varmint shooting, use,.. IMO ( as they are only, 1.0 to 1.5 Pound, pull weight ! ).
My .270 WSM Tikka, used as my Elk Hunting Rifle, has a Yo Dave Spring set at 1.75 to 2 Pounds ( I carry shells in Magazine, UNTIL ready to, shoot ).
Good luck and BE,.. Safe !

Thanks. I have a 22-250 varmint T3x. I adjusted it down as far as it would go but feel like it could be better. Glad to hear that. I will check it out.

 

[TXTrained]

If you can choose the one best thing you could do to make a firearm shoot better what would it be, which one thing would you change over everything that would make the biggest difference, basically the first thing you would do to make a gun shoot better, but can only do one thing, what's most important.

custom blueprinted barrel

 

[FatOldMIHunter]

Load development. For that you need a solid rest to ensure repeatability. The combination of a good rest and a good load will give you a baseline for any improvements you make to a rifle.

 

[kfreeze]

If you can choose the one best thing you could do to make a firearm shoot better what would it be, which one thing would you change over everything that would make the biggest difference, basically the first thing you would do to make a gun shoot better, but can only do one thing, what's most important.

I would say that above the trigger, get a rifle that is known to shoot well first. For lower end stuff, that would be savage, tikka, or browning imho. They are known to shoot well and all already come with an adjustable trigger that will get down under 3lbs. Probably before that, I would say make sure that you can shoot 1/2 moa or better every single time, or at least 90% of the time. That way you will be able to know if it's you or the rifle. Sometimes the rifle just wont shoot well for you though. Then it needs to go away or be modified to shoot for you.

 

[Deleted member 48126]

You can only change the rifle, that is the question, I agree shooting fundamentals are the most important thing but it's only about the rifle and assume scope and mounts are good and assume your shooting fundamentals are fine also.

In that case trigger

 

[Starbuck]

I would say that above the trigger, get a rifle that is known to shoot well first. For lower end stuff, that would be savage, tikka, or browning imho. They are known to shoot well and all already come with an adjustable trigger that will get down under 3lbs. Probably before that, I would say make sure that you can shoot 1/2 moa or better every single time, or at least 90% of the time. That way you will be able to know if it's you or the rifle. Sometimes the rifle just wont shoot well for you though. Then it needs to go away or be modified to shoot for you.

If reading on these threads has taught me anything, it's that everyone on the internet is capable of shooting .5" or better, even in a stiff crosswind.

You bring up a good point in that, depending on a person's skill and confidence level, if you're experiencing accuracy issues, sometimes it wouldn't hurt to ask a friend or someone else at the range to fire a group with your set up.

 

[WildRose]

Never heard anyone using oil based lapping compound, is there a name brand you use or your own mixture, how do you keep out of barrel, I would be afraid of making stuff to sloppy unless maybe a real light mixture

Well I'm an original about a lot of things. In the seventies the real serious shooters I knew would take a new gun apart spending weeks removing burrs and rough places with files and other tools to get a perfect "weld" so to speak between surfaces.

Had a buddy that ran a machine shop who used a lot of different lapping compounds for various applications, most of which are different sizes of grit suspended in oil.

Jewelers use the stuff that is like playdough but I didn't it very useful at least not until I got my first dremel which I'll use now to get the worst "roughage" removed.

There are LC's made specific to the firearms industries like those available through places like Midway and Brownell's but you can also buy them at your local automotive supply house.

Keyword Search | Brownells

Keyword Search | Brownells

www.brownells.com

As for the barrel I have and will continue to use lapping compound as part of my breakin procedure, for that I only use extremely fine grit compounds.

I wet a loose patch, run int through, fire a few rounds, clean, and repeat until my velocities and groups begin to tighten up nicely.

I came to that looking at the Tubb's method using bullets coated in lapping compound to accomplish the same thing but found it produced very uneven results. This works a lot better.

If you've got an action with serious QC issues this won't solve it but it's sure helped me with some that just weren't quite smooth enough to suit me.

Keyword Search | Brownells

Keyword Search | Brownells

www.brownells.com

Wheeler Lapping Compound Kit (1oz each of 220, 320, 600 Grit Compound)

A high quality silicon carbide abrasive paste that is used for lapping the bore of a firearm, the bolt face, bolt lugs and a hundred other uses where a...

www.midwayusa.com

Unless things are really bad I generally start with 600gr and will step things down slowly to 1200gr. If I'm lazy and in a hurry I may use a mix of 600, 800, 1,000 and 1200gr.

It's all done by "feel".

I never put anything harsher than 800gr down the pipe even on a really rough looking barrel for fear of making things even worse.

 

[kfreeze]

Y

If reading on these threads has taught me anything, it's that everyone on the internet is capable of shooting .5" or better, even in a stiff crosswind.

You bring up a good point in that, depending on a person's skill and confidence level, if you're experiencing accuracy issues, sometimes it wouldn't hurt to ask a friend or someone else at the range to fire a group with your set up.

Yes, but not always. Haha

 

[6pakzak]

Well I'm an original about a lot of things. In the seventies the real serious shooters I knew would take a new gun apart spending weeks removing burrs and rough places with files and other tools to get a perfect "weld" so to speak between surfaces.

Had a buddy that ran a machine shop who used a lot of different lapping compounds for various applications, most of which are different sizes of grit suspended in oil.

Jewelers use the stuff that is like playdough but I didn't it very useful at least not until I got my first dremel which I'll use now to get the worst "roughage" removed.

There are LC's made specific to the firearms industries like those available through places like Midway and Brownell's but you can also buy them at your local automotive supply house.

Keyword Search | Brownells

Keyword Search | Brownells

www.brownells.com

As for the barrel I have and will continue to use lapping compound as part of my breakin procedure, for that I only use extremely fine grit compounds.

I wet a loose patch, run int through, fire a few rounds, clean, and repeat until my velocities and groups begin to tighten up nicely.

I came to that looking at the Tubb's method using bullets coated in lapping compound to accomplish the same thing but found it produced very uneven results. This works a lot better.

If you've got an action with serious QC issues this won't solve it but it's sure helped me with some that just weren't quite smooth enough to suit me.

Keyword Search | Brownells

Keyword Search | Brownells

www.brownells.com

Wheeler Lapping Compound Kit (1oz each of 220, 320, 600 Grit Compound)

A high quality silicon carbide abrasive paste that is used for lapping the bore of a firearm, the bolt face, bolt lugs and a hundred other uses where a...

www.midwayusa.com

Unless things are really bad I generally start with 600gr and will step things down slowly to 1200gr. If I'm lazy and in a hurry I may use a mix of 600, 800, 1,000 and 1200gr.

It's all done by "feel".

I never put anything harsher than 800gr down the pipe even on a really rough looking barrel for fear of making things even worse.

I have lapped my rings before with the wheeler stuff and it makes a mess I can imagine the cleanup after would have to be pretty thorough, I think I would be afraid of going to far with it, probably best left for someone experienced with the process, beginner could make some costly errors.