[picone]

I am looking to build a Remington 700 Long Range weapon. .308 will most likely be the caliber unless someone can talk me into a different one. I am not a rookie shooter but I have never taken it too seriously.

I'm hoping y'all can give me some basic direction and recommendations before I start buying. Here is what I want to do with it:

Usage:
-Learn to shoot long range and shoot well.
-Learn to build (or piece together) a gun and modify internal parts as needed (i.e. triggers).
-Learn how to reload and keep shooting records of the ammo I've reloaded.
-Non competition use. I only shoot with my friends out in the desert.
-Distance: Far as possible

Can I buy a used 700 and start with the action or do people actually sell a stock action separately? How do I look for damage when I purchase? Are parts that actually need to be measured? I am choosing the 700 because there seems to be an enormous amount of aftermarket parts available, so I would imagine that if I got a damaged action, it could be repaired.

What type of barrel? Length for .308?

Do I just pick which stock looks cool or is there more to them?

I live in CA. Can anyone recommend a place to find deals on some of the parts?

I know it's a bunch of ?'s but thanks for any help you can give

 

[morpheus]

Well I hope I can answer a couple of your questions. If I can't answer all your questions you will definatly find them from the other people on this board.

First, how much are you willing to spend? I ask this only because the sky is the limit pretty much when you start adding things on.

But for what it sounds like you are going to be doing a Remington 700P would fit in nice with maybe a Leupold compition scope. If you buy a new one you will not have to worry about anything being damaged (and if it is you can send it back and they can repair/replace it). That package would get you started of really good. It comes with a barrel long enough to get all the velocity you will ever need out of the .308 and the stock is good.

But this is just what I think would fit your discrpition on what rifle to buy. Others will post and you can draw your conlcusions from them.

 

[picone]

Thank you.

I sort of want to be able to piece the thing together myself (making it MY custom gun). I would also like to put different stock on it...mostly so it doesn't have the 'hunter rifle' feel to it, and again, to make it MY piece. I've got a safe full of nice hunting rifles and such, so just buying a remington 700 at the local gun store doesn't quite get me excited about getting into it.

 

[Jeff_850]

.308s fine for a rookie
good balance of accuracy, factory ammo available and later handloads, also good for hunting, not too much recoil either

the 700 action is a good action for customs

22, 24" should be fine
26" is what is on the stock 700P which is my personal favorite of thier line of Rem 700s for long range use might be a little better probably not by that much
you might want to go 1:10 twist which will allow you to shoot heavier ammo

my uncle is a gunsmith and i know he bedded the action, trued it, changed the barrel, kreiger stainless and put a finish that sticks on it
the stock rifle a 700P shot .6 - .8 moa and its now another 1 hole wonder @ 100y with federal gold medal match ammo if i do my part

McMillian does make a few stocks to sell immediately, its worth giving them a call
they had an M40A1 HTG stock inletted for a BDL action for a varmint contour barrel for $393
top it off with a Leupold scope... check the optics page for a GREAT deal on a mk4 lr/t

i would seriously reccomend you get a stock that is built for the shooting you will be doing
stocks make all the diffenrce since its all about comfort and control and balancing the weight etc

 

[murray]

Like everyone else said I would go with a 700p. Keep the stock and barrel till you shoot them out. At least the barrel. Then go from there. I am going to buy another 700P soon. There are great starter guns and help you get on the learning curve.

 

[JRP3]

If you want a new 700 action alone I beleive the best route would be to be one from bronwells.

http://www.brownells.com/aspx/NS/Store/ProductDetail.aspx?p=19564

Otherwise you will be stuck with buying a new rifle and stripping it, since it doesn't sound like you would be using any of the other parts that would come standard on any remington rifle, or you will have to go the used route. I am no expert on that route so I will leave the advice to others herre who are much better suited to give it.

In one of the other posts there was a reference to remingtons 2005 catalog. they are coming out with some nice add-ons for their LE division. A 700p with a 40-x trigger is a nice way to go. You could change out the barrel and stock as well as do the accurizing work and I think that might suite your needs for YOUR custom rifle. It would also give you the familiarity with building a rifle since you will have to do all of the work anyways. This might end up being more expensive than buying all the parts seperately, I'm not sure. You will just have to check it out

J

 

[spade]

Everything that everyone here said is all very good. If I could tell you to take a look at the 6.5x55 caliber though; it is a very accurate cartridge and is capable of 1200m shots on a perfect day with an expert marksman. It is my opinion that the .308 likes to crap out at anything past 1000m. The .338 lapua is a good cartridge as well, although quite a bit harder kicking. It is every bit as capable as the 6.5x55 and will extend your range to quite a bit father than the 308 and even the 6.5x55.

As JRP3 said, brownells has a good deal on new 700 actions. Im starting to like the new montana rifleman actions that mel has introduced us to and would trust this action as much (or mabye even more if it preforms as expected) than the remington 700 action.

McMillian also inlets their synthetic stocks for these actions, so you may choose any of them. Kreiger or shilen are good for barrels. If you want the best then buy a lilja barrel.

The one thing to worry about that i must say, is when you are pieceing together a rifle from aftermarket parts, you may find that the rifle will be a bit unbalanced. For referance, the balance point should be close to the very foward most edge of the floorplate.

 

[Jeff_850]

.338 lapua is great but it cant fit in a rem 700 action

plenty of great barresl out there

.308 isnt that great for byond 1000m but if your a newbie it would be a fine first custom rifle for a newbie
of course its a good rifle for a pro too, the military uses it but in my opinion there are better for extreme range and even without the recoil and nosie like the .260 and 6.5*55mm sweede
endless capabilities if you handload

 

[Bead Drawer]

I'll add my two cents here:

Building a rifle yourself is going to very difficult, time consuming, and expensive. You'll need metal working skills of course and some specialized tools. As mentioned above, I would go with the commercial 700 action sold through Brownell's, however it is short action only and carbon steel only, factors to keep in mind.

In regards to the barrel, if you go with a .308 (and I think you should) a 1 in 12 inch twist should be completely sufficient. Remington uses 1:12" for all of their .308s, and they can shoot the 175 grain bullet out to 1,000 from a dead stock heavy barrel rifle with no problem. This twist rate also allows slightly lighter bullets than a 1:10" would, and I wouldn't use anything heavier than 180 grain bullet in a .308.

Your stock should be H-S Precision or McMillan, I have my eye on the Baker Special stock, but pick what you think would feel best. Handle a few if possible, from friends or in your local shop.

One last thing, you probably won't want this, but if all you do is target shooting, you may want to look at Federal's 155 grain Palma Match load, it is quite something, but you'll need a 30 inch barrel to get the best results.

 

[picone]

Thanks for all your help so far.

The 6.5x55 round is a .308 with a .260 slug? Is it called a .260 round? I don't want to sound like too much of a wuss, but I really want to be able to put a bunch of rounds thru the gun in one outting. My shoulder doesn't hold out for more than 20 rounds on some of the larger bores (7mag and such), so the .338 is pretty much not in the plan. The 6.5 sounds interesting though.

Round about pricing:
Action - 400
Stock - 250-400
Barrel - ~300
Trigger guard - 75
Magazine - ?
Total - ~1150
The 700police is about $950 at the local gun store. If I put it together myself, I end up with a stock of my choice and a barrel of my choice all for about $200 more. Did I miss any important parts?

About 5 years ago we had plenty of nice gun stores out here, each with their own niche in the gun market and friendly/knowledgable people behind the counter. Then it wouldn't have been hard to find a tactical store with stocks to try out and choose from. Now, I have to look on the net and visually decide which one will suit me best.

As far as stocks go, this was one that caught my eye, however, I haven't found separate pricing on the stock.

Should the barrel have a brake on the end of it?

What are the better bi-pods to choose from?

 

[JRP3]

That particular stock is an Accuracy International stock. AICS 1.5 They sell for around 5-900 depending on action and version.

http://www.tacproshootingcenter.com/Accuracy_International.html

The mags for the AI stocks are around 50-80 if I remember correctly.

The bipod that is on the HD Rifle you posted is a Harris.

http://www.hdrifle.com/sprifle/sphd.html

You can check out their site if you want to see what different parts they use. They make some damn nice stuff.

You can also get a versa-pod. I heard that the Versa-Pods are nice, I only have experience with Harris and I have no complaints.


J

 

[spade]

The 6.5x55 isnt a .260 as far as i know. I could be wrong about this.
HD rifles will apply that camo to whichever gun you build for a small fee.
You forgot the bedding materials and other small stuff. GunKote or teflon coating material.

 

[bagdrag]

If you do your research then you can get a PSS for around $500. or so. Since you are going to build your own the try picking one up on the for sale boards then you can sell the items that you are not going to use. I picked up mine for $500 shipped. It only had 50 rounds put down the tube. I sold the stock and picked up an ACIS 2.0 $700. added a Leupold tactical for $250 used. There are a lot of 700 rifles that are for sale on other sites. Check them out and you might get a good deal.


Tony

 

[caver101]

Picone,

I think what your are tying to do is great (putting a rifle together) & I would recomend it for the AR-15, but not a bolt rifle. To get the best accuracy out of your rifle it will need to be assembled by a good gunsmith. I am doing approx. the same that you are right now. I have a Rem 700 in .243. Going to make it a .300 WSM. Barrel is comming from Montana Rifleman $150, picked up a new H.S. stock (with floor metal) on ebay for $200. The gunsmith is going to true, square and mount the barrel, trigger job (another $300+). Going to use GunKote for the entire rifle (somthing you can do also). As far as bedding you can do that later, just see how it shoots in the bedding block for now.

If you want a easy way to get a cheep rem. action visit all of the local pawn shops and pick up one after hunting season for $350+/-. Then sell the old barrel, stock and floor metal on ebay. You can very well recoupe $25-50 for the barrel, $20-40 for the stock and $40-70 for the floor metal on ebay.

As you can see the price adds up very quickly on a custom rifle. Most folks will go with a barrel that cost twice as much or more. I got a great deal on the stock, a new one would run in the $300-500 range and the floor metal another $200.

I would recomend the 700 P for $699 out of "Shotgun News " Get the 26" barrel in 1:12 twist, SAVE YOUR MONEY FOR AMMO!!!! You can not hardly beat this rifle with a custom rifle that you will have triple the money in.

Don't dare pay $950 for a 700P, find another shop and do a FFL transfer for about $25 and order it from shotgun news!!

Let us know what you do and send photos!!

 

[picone]

Good call on the pawn shops and I'm in the hunt for a shotgun news.

In true rookie style:
Short action/Long action?
Short action is for the shorter rounds like .308....???
Long for longer rounds like 7mag, 30-06....???
Is the bolt, ejector, all the internals of an action the same for the different rounds? In other words, if I were to buy one action out of a different caliber than I wanted, could I still use it?

 

[mele]

I'm gonna try to clear up a few things from this thread:

I saw mention that a 1:12" twist will shoot heavier bullets than 1:10", this is backwards actually, the 1:!0" twist will shoot heavier than 1:12". But remington does indeed use 1:12" on their rifles, 175gr is the max I would shoot out of 1:12".

The 6.5x55 Swedish is different than the .260 Remington. The .260 is a .308 necked down to 6.5, the 6.5x55 is its own cartridge, a long action, with more case capacity than the .260. Both rounds are fantastic.

In terms of long action vs. short action. Yes, you got the general idea. .308 sized cases and shorter use a short action, anything longer pretty much goes in a long action. The case head diameter is the other thing you need to worry about. There are generally two case head diameters to worry about (not counting the .223, which would be a third size). The standard -06 case head diameter is .473 inches and includes the .308, .243, .30-06, .270, .22-250, etc. The magnum case head diamter is .532 and includes cases such as .300 Win Mag, 7mm Rem Mag, .300 Win Short mag, etc etc. So, when finding an action, you need to know what caliber you will chamber for, then you can get the appropriate action length and bolt face diameter. If you are looking for a .308 action, you can go with a remington action chambered in .308, .243, .22-250, .250 or .300 Savage, .260, and there are a few others, but those are the popular ones.

MEL

 

[Bead Drawer]

Not to be picky, but I did not say 1:12 shoots heavier bullets than 1:10, I said lighter.

 

[Jeff_850]

1:12 istn as good in my opinion
its not bad but 150 gr can be taken in 1:10 and 180 gr hell if you wanted to go to the heavy .30 cals