Gentlemen, Is there any advantage in building a custom rifle off of an old Remington 700 action as opposed to one of more receent manufacture? I am NOT referring to the new rifles with the ISS bolt lock. But rather 700s made in 2000 versus one made in the late seventies. Is there anything to be gained with the older units? Thank you, Matt.
Posts: 525 | Location: Virginia | Registered: 26 January 2001
On a full custom job wherein any deficiencies of the action would be corrected there would be no difference. For a while Remington tried a snap-in extractor that was less than satisfactory. Other than that there have been no significant changes. Regards, Bill.
Remington actions are really a great starting point for a custom rifle if the action is properly trued by someone who knows what he is doing. The biggest problem I've seen is receiver threads that are not true with the centerline of the action. If you don't fix this don't expect .25 inch groups you will only see 1 MOA.Ha Ha This seems to occur once the action is heat treated by Remington and the action warps slightly.Old ones or new ones they all are fine. Replace the trigger with a jewell.-Rob
Posts: 6314 | Location: Las Vegas,NV | Registered: 10 January 2001
I've assembled several rifles off M700 actions and will tell you the older actions are better in dimension and fit and finish. Some of the new ones are downright ugly in terms of the receiver threads, squareness of the bolt face and mating of the locking lugs. Generally, and there are exceptions, the older the better in terms of meaningful quality differences.
Maybe one of you has done this already, if so tell us how it went.
Pick up an adl rifle for your builder, get rid of everything except the action (true it up) and install the HS precision floor plate conversion. New stock and barrel. I like the HS products I have several of their stocks. How 'bout it guys?
quote:Originally posted by Matt in Virginia: Gentlemen, Is there any advantage in building a custom rifle off of an old Remington 700 action as opposed to one of more receent manufacture? I am NOT referring to the new rifles with the ISS bolt lock. But rather 700s made in 2000 versus one made in the late seventies. Is there anything to be gained with the older units? Thank you, Matt.
