Hi guys,
When I first read of the problems with this particular action I had a pretty good idea what I was going to see when I looked at it. I offered to look the action over not to do the guys at MRC a favor but to be able to assure myself and my customers that MRC was open to criticism and would act upon it.
The criticisms leveled at this action in particular were; It was extremely rough. The bolt sleeve would flip when the bolt was open and allow the striker to fall.
Now to the evaluation. I decided to go ahead and evaluate the whole action including but not limited to the alleged faults.
The Receiver:
First impression is that the metal finishing is about what I would expect to see on a mid-priced factory rifle (think M70 or Ruger 77).Screw holes are very slightly dished, edges slightly rounded. Neither to an extent that is objectionable. Surface is then bead blasted.
The locking lug raceways are "as cast". The cast surface is mostly quite good but for some surface imperfections in the left raceway. These are on the back surface and are not contacted by the bolt so have no effect on function. I venture to say they would be unnoticed by most people. This raceway is the dovetailed raceway which is intended to match a corresponding shape of the left lug.
The bore of the action measures approximately .702". I say approximately because all measurements are approximate unless done in controlled conditions using certified guages.
The Bolt:
The bolt measure .6966 in diameter at the front and .6962 at the rear. Measurements taken at 90 degrees to these are .6966, front, and .6960 rear. This means a diametric clearance of about .005-6" which is better than a Howa and a Win M70 I checked at home. It is slightly looser than my own 40x Remington at .0045.
The bolt sleeve is threaded 1/2NC and is a decent fit in the bolt body. End play is only about .002. Side play is .009" total indicated.
With the bolt open about 2.500" the side play of the bolt body in the receiver(measured 1.750 behind the receiver ring) is .030 indicated or .015 each side of center. By way of comparison, this is much better than my FN mauser but not as good as my short action M70. It is slightly better than my pre-war m70 target rifle.
Vertical play at the same point is .012 total indicated.
In operation the bolt exhibits the slight "stickiness" I have come to associate with stainless steel. I'm not a real fan of stainless but understand it's attraction.
With the bolt sleeve level there is approximately .017 clearance between the cocking piece and the receiver (on the bottom of the cocking piece). This is a problem IMO.The cocking cam was excessively polished and the rear of the bolt lacks any detent notch. In fact the cocking piece rests upon a surface that is still sloped significantly.
Now, the problem this action exhibits re. the flipping bolt sleeve can be attributed to two things. First, the over polished cam and the lack of a detent notch. Secondly, the excessive clearance between the bottom of the bolt sleeve and the receiver. This clearance means that the bolt sleeve does not rotate far enough for the bolt sleeve lock to reliably engage. Once I saw the problem I was able to achieve a near total rate of failure by manipulating the bolt correctly (or incorrectly depending on your viewpoint).
It is my opinion that the perceived roughness when cycling the action has as much to do with the material and heat treat as the finish. Stainless always seems to have an affinity for itself especially when the hardness of the two pieces is similar. Hall benchrest actions have always demonstrated this pretty well.
So in the end there is no question this action was flawed. The functional problem arising from this flaw was missed during testing simply because it didn't always happen. Once the causes are known (which they now are)a visual inspection will uncover any potential problem.
The guys at MRC are aware of the problems and aware of the improvements which will correct them. I am pleased that they are receptive to criticism and suggestions.In addition, this malfunction was certainly not universal but was limited to this particular action.
Now for a couple of personal observations.
If I had received this action I would no doubt have complained but I would have done so privately. Any shortcomings were easily correctable. Frankly, I would have corrected them myself simply because I think I could do it as well as they.
I still consider the actions to be a good value whether purchased for the initial special offering price of 350.00 or the standard 410.00 retail price. I look upon them as a M70 equivalent action and not as a competitor for the Dakota. I think they have a lot of potential. They leave the gunsmith a bit of work to do if he wishes just like a new Winchester action. It is a better action in many respects than the Winchester (the one piece bolt and better fitting bolt sleeve come to mind) or the Ruger (trigger).
I'm confident MRC will continue to make improvements in quality control and assembly so actions will not have the shortcomings exhibited by this specimen.
Of the three of us I consider myself the least expert and perhaps the others will see something I missed. This is my evaluation though FWIW. Regards, Bill.

Bill thanks for your efforts. I am sure it will go a long way in making a better product.

Thanks Bill

Wally

Nice report Bill.........My question is are the Charter Issue Actions going to have the necessary corrections made, or will subsequent actions be corrected?

I hope cost of correcting these doesn't become an issue to the loyal customers that helped fund this start up venture.

The good news is MRC cares.

Thank you for the evaluation. I believe Dan and MRC will take the steps to make everything right prior to any actions leaving the factory.

Thanks Bill.

Chuck

I was perhaps not as clear as I should have been. The problems with this particular action were not related to the design or the manufacturing process but to a flaw in inspection procedures. None of the flaws seen represent anything which was not correctable. I don't think it likely that there will be any changes in the basic product just in inspection procedures at each level of manufacture. Any remedial work should be easily accomplished.
As with all products, there will always be individual items which require attention. No manufacturer ever bats 1.000. I know of rifle actions costing 3 times what these do which required warranty attention.
Custom gunsmiths anticipate occasional remedial work to improve rifle actions. Witness D'arcy Echol's 83(?)different operations performed on the M70s he has used.
I signed on for a couple of the charter run of short actions and don't feel bad about it at all. I do feel bad that I did this when the Canuck Buck was at an all time low! Cost me an extra 60 bucks per action. As a businessman I hardly rate! Regards, Bill.

Here's a question for you BIll.

I understand from your post that......

" Any remedial work should be easily accomplished.
As with all products, there will always be individual items which require attention. No manufacturer ever bats 1.000. I know of rifle actions costing 3 times what these do which required warranty attention.
Custom gunsmiths anticipate occasional remedial work to improve rifle actions. "

I'm buying my stainless actions from Montana, barreled and bead blasted. I was hoping they'd be ready to drop into a stock and use.

Is this an unrealistic expectation?

Thanks, Rob

The MRC action as viewed by Caspar of the three Magi. If you have not read my long detailed discussion of salient points related to the Walex complaints please go to page 4 post 141 of the thread which set this visitation off.

I have no connection whatsoever to Montana Rifleman inc. I like to see an enterprise succeed which has done its homework and is trying to do things correctly. They have a product which can nicely fill a much larger niche of the market than is available to me ,but which can provide a rifle action with better and safer features than many others on the market. Particularly pricewise.

When I visited the plant I made straight for the assembly area, was able to view bolts with sleeves and then looked up Dan. He brought out the offending B& A with the sleeve and firing pin assembly turned 90 degrees and jammed against the tang as described. I turned the sleeve back to correct position and cycled the bolt, with and without safety on. Dan took it from me, brought the bolt smartly back against the bolt stop and the sleeve/pin assembly spun 90 degrees. There are ways of duplicating this effect by how you bring up the handle from the fire position and start the bolt to the rear. If there is something wrong with the sleeve lock plunger it can be caused to miss aligning with the hole in the rear face of the bolt, fail to engage and as the bolt is withdrawn will start to rotate as the bottom of the sleeve flanges start to clear the receiver tang raceway flats, just aft of the bridge. This happened and was repeatable.
The machining on the bolt sleeve, though glass beaded still did not look like that on the sleeves I had just viewed prior. At my puzzlement he volunteered that this was the case. There was a much larger gap than the others had shown between the forward face of the bolt sleeve and the rear face of the bolt. I asked for a receiver and bolt and bolt sleeve not yet fitted and he brought them forthwith. The ammount of this gap was about .080" (+) but the unfitted one when screwed into this bolt had perhaps .010" clearance at the point. On my own bolt sleeves I make these even closer to fit than this, but it is not necessary. I trim them to clear and just so on an individual basis. You can do this with one offs. Examining the one which belonged to the Barrel and action the surface for the bolt sleeve lock plunger retainer screw seemed to be just as far back from its face as the corresponding face in the new unfitted sleeve. This would mean that the entire bolt sleeve lock was to the rear by at least .070 from the unfitted example. That would therefore create the condition wherein the sleeve lock did not have enough engagement with the bolt body and the source of the problem. My reccomendation for that was a search and destroy mission. If there are other sleeves like it and they must be retained for some reason they should at least be unfitable. (as well as locked up)
The fit of the thread on the regular sleeves is very close. In stainless steel the sleeve that was used is probably about correct for a stainless steel bolt. It had no meaningful end play between the threads for stainless steel and wouild cause no firing problems. I was able to duplicate the wobble later in my shop using 2 MRC Reject bolts I have here. About half that ammount in a standard premium sockethead cap screw (1/2" 13 threads per inch) and a standard nut of that size same ammount of engagement in the bolt so as to match the nut. The underside of the bolt sleeve on the flat sections corresponding to the lug raceway flats is more than needed. It is about similar to that which is on the typical Wichester and there is little need for that much. If it was an allowance for the occasional humped up casting, then that part should be altered during the milling process. This is one of those things despised by custom gunsmiths, and why many aftermarket sleeve makers mill that portion file to fit. The old Howe bolt sleeve aperature sight with full windage and vertical adjustments was made that way. In an action having the 70 Win style sear release and corresponding cocking piece there is an angle of 55 degrees measured off the horizontal flat. If there is an ammount greater than .010 difference in bolt to bridge diameters getting a consistent trigger pull starts to get unreal. This because the meet of cocking piece to sear release is not always caught at the same location. Putting the safety on and then off lifts the cocking piece off the sear release and at return changes the pull again. A reasonably close fit of sleeve to raceways insures that the cocking piece must meet the sear release at the same place each time.
Most bolt actions used a straight wall opposite the cocking cam of the bolt. MRC and the post 64 M 70's do not. If the sleeve and firing pin assembly release while removing a live round from the chamber the cockingpiece nose engages a slope opposite which is not a spiral cam and this slows down and reduces the blow which might be transmitted to a cartridge still engaged by the extractor so much so that there is minimal chance the pin moving forward through the bolt face could set off any but an already energized primer being removed from chamber for failure to fire that was still held by the extractor hook. Unlikely, but then, never say never.
I suggested that a manual be included with the actions. It could be made up with decent graphics and on the order of the warranty repair manuals put out by the factories. My venerable Remington manual goes back to shortly after the rolling blocks and was quite well done. The Winchester manuals were reasonably good also but assumed a bit much . I don't know if the suggested detent at rear of bolt would accomplish the desired mission. When the safety is on half position, used to remove live rounds it would be disengaged. The temptation might be too much reliance on it, if there were problems showing up in the sleeve lock.

The problem with this one certainly did exist but it was more of a one time thing. I don't see much chance of this happening again. It is still a very good action with many desirable features.

Caspar, one of the three.......
AKA

Tom & Bill,
Thank you for your upfront, honest evaluation of the barreled action in question. We at MRC made sure that before either of you viewed the action in question that no modifications or corrections were made to it. We wanted to "take the high road" so to speak and let your inspections tell the real story. Even before the inspections were made by the two of you we made our own visual and functional inspection of the rifle and found flaws. When both of you arrived I did not immediately relate these flaws as I wanted to see whether either of you found the same things that we did. While I only put a dial caliper to the action, both of you went into it in more depth. After we found the flaws immediate steps were taken in our assembly and QA areas to ensure that the functional flaws were looked for as they may have been missed before. As to the "as cast" appearance there is little we can do about this without adding extra cost to the action. There are gunsmiths out there that can "spruce up" this action realitively easily, but at a cost. Mr Burgess showed me some polishing tools he makes and uses in his shop, they are diamond tipped and work exceptionally well. We tried them on a fresh from the foundry action and it took out the roughness rather quickly and with little or no effort. I do not know whether he makes them for sale but if he doesn't he should as he would make a lot of gunsmiths and laymens jobs easier. The could have many practical uses. You should contact Tom for more information.
We still have one more inspection to be done, and that is by Mr. Belk. I am confident that he will find the same things that both Mr. Burgess & Mr. Leeper found.
I am here to say that "yes" this barreled action was not up to our standards, but believe me our standards because of this have gotten a lot tougher than before. I am confident that no other actions will go out of this shop with the flaw in the shroud like this one did. Because of this flaw we have instituted new QA checks on all actions.
There was a question about the Charter Issue actions and whether they would have these flaws corrected before they left the shop. I am confident that you will not find these flaws in any successive actions.
I will be taking more pictures (although not professional photographer quality) of this action and forwarding them to a member of this board so that he may post them. You should look for these early this next week.
If any of you have "ANY" questions about anything please contact us at MRC. You can find our contact information at www.montanarifleman.com or email me at mtrifle@montanarifleman.com

Thank You and Good Night from the mountains of Montana

Dan

Thanks for the update Dan and l only had one question regarding the following comment on your post:

"There was a question about the Charter Issue actions and whether they would have these flaws corrected before they left the shop. I am confident that you will not find these flaws in any successive actions."

By "successive actions" are you saying any actions that followed the Charter Issue actions or does it include the Charter Issue ones?

Thanks in advance for the information.

In regards to those 80+ steps. I told John Barness that we typically take 80+ steps to 100%complete 1 Legend. Metal work, stock work, painting, hardware, Test fire, etc. I'm not sure if I could find 30 steps to modify and change out on a Mod-70. But I'll keep looking!

Interesting point Chico,

Quote: By "successive actions" are you saying any actions that followed the Charter Issue actions or does it include the Charter Issue ones?

I would be interested in the answer to that as well.

Well it looks like I,ve butchered yet another name. That should have been Barsness, Sorry John.

D`Arcy

Thanks for the clarification on the number of steps you do on a Model 70. I have in the past questioned how you could perform 80 steps on one without starting from scratch. I appreciate you setting the record straight.

Many thanks

Thanks for the information Dan and that sounds good as l am on the list for a stainless short action.

Recoil Rob,
I have no reason to believe you would not be able to simply put these into a stock and go to work. My point was that a custom rifle builder plans on trying to make his mark on actions he uses. I was not saying that such work is necessary. D'Arcy performs the work he does on those M70s (somewhat less than the 83 operations I accused him of!)because he feels he can make the action better (and I'm sure he does so)not because the M70 is unusable or even substandard as is.
I want to emphasize that these actions are intended to be a somewhat better M70 action at a reasonable price. I think they are that and more. I personally have no concerns about the usability of these actions. Regards, Bill.

Good deal, thanks Bill.

Rob

I second Bill Leeper's comments above.

Dan, you and your company have taken every opportunity to be a class act when you could have done otherwise. Thank you for your efforts to tighten up controls and to listen to suggestions of the professionals you had review the action.

To Mr. Leeper and Mr. Burgess, your efforts to explain the issues are very appreciated by folks like me who are looking forward to these actions. We owe you a big THANKS! good work guys

Our stand as I have said many times here is to "Take the high road". We do not feel that responding harshly would be the "professional" thing to do. We realize that we are not perfect, but who is? When we make a mistake, we'll be the first to fess up to it. We are not going to try to hide anything or sugar coat anything. Mr. Walex pointed out some serious concerns on our rifle and after receiving the rifle back and checking it out for ourselves we agreed with quite a few of his concerns. His diligence in checking the rifle out has helped to ensure that these concerns will never have to be addressed on this board again as we have, as I have said before, tightened up our control over these actions. The rifle in question is enroute to Mr. Belk right now and he'll give his evaluation of the rifle in the next couple of weeks. I've also said it before but I want to thank all three (Mr. Belk, Mr. Burgess & Mr. Leeper) for their time in checking the rifle out and reporting back to you the future customers or current customers.

[ 07-10-2003, 22:45: Message edited by: Dan@Montana Rifle Co ]

Dan,

I gotta say that it certainly appears that you are "taking the high road."

I genuinely believe that folks in the community will respond by buying your product as that becomes understood.