It came to me in a deal with 2 other guns the price was right. A Ruger wood stocked MKII in 338 wm. I really didn't need it but what the heck.

I was never really happy with how it shot with hand loads it hovered around 2 inchs.

I took it to AK loaded with 225gr rem sp factory because it was what my buddy was shooting and it would do 1.75 with them.(his rifle a stainless MKII well do .75 all day with the rems.

I do not like wood stock on working rifles so I put a ruger paddleboat stock on it new recoil pad Hey the price was right. Glass bedded it. It wears a Burris 3x9 and has a new trigger set at 2.5lbs.

I just got around to trying to get it to shoot. I have a whole mess of 250 hornday sp. I did pick up some 250 serria match kings to try and see if a great bullet would help. I loaded them and it would group around 1 inch with them. so I decide there might be hope yet.

I have always had good luck in seating the bullet up close to the lands.. But having read here that some people get good results with some rifle seating them back a bit. I thought I would that also.

So after playing aound with differant powder and seating depths I settled on a max load of IMR 4831 and a shorter seating depth so now with the 250gr Hornadays It is a 1.25 inch rifle for 3 shots and 8 groups measured the best is .75 the worse is 1.5 most hovering around that 1.25 inch range.

If i get a chance at some other 338 bullets cheap I might try them also. I am really temped to try some Barnes Tripple shocks just for the hell of it.

Not the most accurate rifle I own but now a very useful big game rifle.

So after owning this for 5 or 6 years I might even take it hunting a bit more.

I'm betting that whatever you point it at will never know it doesn't shoot under an inch!

JBD yea I know that one of my farvorite deer rifles is a savage 99 in 300. I have kill dozens of deer with it and it is only a 2 inch rifle.

But sometimes I get spoiled by my varmint guns that shoot well under a inch some in the .5 inch range. One gets to thinking they all should do that.

But I know one does not need that to kill big critters

It is just fun dinking around trying to get it to shoot better.

Even at 2 inchs it is min of elk out ot 400 yards or so.

I do the same thing. Right now I am working with a .375 H&H and have gotten it to shoot under an inch at 100 - better than any .375 I have ever worked with. Is it necessary? Of course not, but it is fun trying to get any rifle to shoot up to its full potential. Good shooting.