Quite a while back I was sent a 1999 long action to repolish and smooth up. The owner foolishly told me to take my time and that he was in no hurry. This may not be the best approach to use when talking to gunsmiths or taxidermist for instance. Anyway, this was my first opportunity to really closely inspect one of these actions. I've looked at them, handled them, and even done some measuring on one but have not had one set up in the lathe before.
In this case the customer wanted the raceways and feed ramp smoothed up and the receiver repolished on the outside. He also told me to do whatever I felt was necessary to improve function.
When I looked at the action the polishing was about on a par with a post 64 M70 and not a particularly good one at that. Lines, corners and edges were obscurred to point of, in some cases, disappearing. The bolt body was out of round with some small flats near the rear of the bolt. The trigger guard and floorplate were not too bad though a little thick. The bolt sleeve was nicely done. The raceways and feed ramp were as cast (and as advertised). The machining of the receiver face and inner collar as well as the threading, was apparently done on a mill and seemed decent.
The bolt sleeve lock suffered from the same malady described earlier on AR. That is, it didn't work! This was another problem to be addressed.
The polishing was not a big deal and raised only small blisters on my hands, In levelling out the surfaces though the markings were mostly removed and I had to cheat a little to retain the serial number. The etched on markings look nice but are not very deep. The raceways and ramp were easily smoothed up.
I decided to set the action up in my truing fixture to measure the face of the receiver. In order to do this I had to make a new mandrel for the MRC receiver. The inner collar doesn't allow the mandrel for the M70s to pass all the way through so I had to make one with a small end which would clear. On the MRC action, only the rear bridge is reamed. The front of the receiver is left as cast and is about .015 over bolt diameter. The opening in the inner collar is only about 5/8". The locking lug seats are as cast.
I had previously made up a test piece to check on the concentricity of the threads and their alignment with the bridge. I knew the machining was all done prior to heat treating and this always results in some warpage. I wondered how much. Well, in this case it wasn't too bad. With the receiver set up to run true with the reamed bore in the bridge, the threads showed a total indicator runout of about .014" so the threads were offset by about .007". Since this measurement is taken about 5" ahead of the bridge, it's not all that bad. The face of the receiver and the inner collar ran out about .002". I refaced them. I didn't like the as cast locking lug seats and the small opening in the inner collar made access difficult so I opened the collar up then went in to machine the seats. This was where an interesting aspect of the MRC action made itself known.
On virtually every other action I've ever worked with the recesses behind the threads and ahead of the locking seats is round. This makes sense when you consider that it is machined at the same time as the threads. Not so on the MRC.
On most actions which use a Mauser type extractor (excepting the Mauser), the right hand lug, or the one under the extractor when the bolt is open, is shorter or shallower than it's fellow lug on the other side. On my pre war M70 for instance the right hand lug is .124" while the left lug is .145. The MRC is .117 and .146 respectively. A P14 is about the same at .124 and .146. Nonetheless these other actions are, as I said, machined round. The MRC though is not machined in this area at all and the bottom of the receiver is left thicker than the top. What this meant was, when I recut the seats, I came to the bottom of the cut sooner than I expected to. When I looked (using my trusty snake light and the magnifying visor which is a necessary accessory for the over-50 gunsmith)it was apparent that the lower seat was completely cut while the upper seat had about .020 to go. I ended up simply advancing the cutter and rocking the chuck back and forth by hand to finish cutting the seat (putting the "man" back into manual machining!). It worked out fine. I elected to not recut the receiver threads because, (a) They weren't that bad, and (b)I didn't want to mess around cutting threads up to that inner collar. My threading bar wouldn't get close enough and I didn't want to make one up that would. For a target rifle I might do so but I didn't feel it was necessary here. I then set the bolt up and cut the face and the backs of the lugs. When all was said and done there was no measurable variation in the distance from the receiver face to anywhere on the bolt face or from the inner collar. So it was OK.
The bolt sleeve lock is a little oblong plunger which (when it's working)fits into a notch at the rear of the bolt body when the bolt is opened. This plunger is held in place by a little screw. The plunger has a little recess cut in it for the head of the screw and this, in combination with the necessary clearance in the sleeve, turned out to be the problem. The Plunger could turn just enough that a little edge would get caught under the head of the screw. If you just touched the plunger it would pop into position. Donning once more my mandatory visor, I stoned the edge back so it no longer got caught under the screw. Problem solved. At the same time I cut a notch at the back of the bolt body into which the cocking piece would drop when the bolt was opened. This is a redundant feature which I think should be there.
After a little subtle reshaping of the handle the thing was done and I was mostly satisfied with it ( I'm never totally happy with anything!). I blued it and it looks good. The customer will probably barrel it himself and, judging by his BR accomplishments, will likely do it better than I could. I expect I'll hear how it works out. Regards, Bill.

Bill,
How much time was involved in bringing the 1999 Long Action to the point where you were "mostly satisfied with it"? I've been sitting on one of the first delivered stainless short magnum actions for about 7 weeks. Since it arrived too late for this year's deer season, I'm in no big hurry to build on it. Not owning a lathe, my amateur gunsmithing (other than stock work) is relegated to minor tasks, only. I'm just curious as to how much time (money) should be devoted to it before barrelling.

Heck, I'm not even sure about my cartridge of choice anymore. Why I ordered a short magnum action is beyond me. I already have a 7mm-08, 7-08AI, a 7mm Rem Mag, and a 300 Win Mag for medium size game. I thought about building a 7mm SAUM or WSM (like it would be needed to fill a niche in my middle lineup), but I think I'd probably be happier trading for one of the magnum long actions in chrome moly to build an Alaskan Thumper.

So what is the bottom line here? Is the action trash or what?

I to am interested to hear "the bottom line" what is the deal are they good or bad ?? There does not seem to be much good in your post Bill, by the same token I know nothing about gunsmithing.

oh boy...!!!



I hope this is the exception and not the rule. I am getting ready to drop some money (several grand!!!) on a pair of rifles building off of the soon to be revealed PH action.





So Bill,



When you add up the issues addressed in your post....Whats the botton line?



Are the issues you saw correctable "within reason" by a good smith or just plain bad news and should not be present in the first place?





Regards,

Dave

I think you guy's are jumping to conclusions. Bill said in his post he's never happy with anything, but was able to give this action a passing grade with a little work and some polishing.

Sounds acceptable to me for a $465 action.

Terry

My apologies guys. When I post something like this I suppose I should take the time to put it into perspective.
Keep in mind that I was working on this action (a long action) with an eye toward having a pretty good look at it and seeing what might be necessary to improve one. The action is, as I have said before, entirely on a par with those from Remington, Ruger, Winchester etc. If I want to I can tear those apart to where you might want to take yours out and give it a decent burial! I wrote this as a matter of interest to some of the other 'smiths who frequent the board as much as anything.
On these actions, the surfaces which are "as cast" are quite smooth even so. Both lugs were contacting and I could probably have gotten away with a bit of lapping just as on any other production action. Perhaps my description of this area was unclear.
What I didn't mention in my post was all the things which required no correction and which were really pretty good. The fit of the trigger pieces was great and very little was required to make a great trigger. The bolt sleeve fit well and cocking was smooth and easy. The tolerance between the bolt and the receiver bridge, about .006" was better than many of the other actions I mentioned. By way of comparison, a Howa I worked on recently had a tolerance of .012" and a Win M70 .009.
The misalignment of the threads with the receiver bore (at the bridge) was better than either of the pre-war M70s I built rifles on last year and worlds better than some of the new M70s I've seen.
So the bottom line is, the action is just fine. I detailed the obvious flaws and they are similar to what I find on any similarly priced action.
I do not think the action is perfect in design or execution but I don't think it's all that bad either. I will be picking up four of my own shortly and don't feel bad about it. I will make some changes when I use them but I make some changes to virtually every action I use of this type.
Naturally I make no changes to such actions as Stolles or Nesikas or RPAs but at the cost of these I don't expect to!
As I said in my previous post, the MRC's are as advertised. They say the raceways are left as cast and that is true. They are absolutely usable this way or they can be polished as this one has been. The action below the stock line is as cast. I polish them to improve the bedding surfaces but it would not be considered necessary. I polish and, if necessary, remachine the bottoms of M70s too but this doesn't mean they are bad.
In my previous post I detailed some perceived shortcomings from a really nit picky perspective and, perhaps, did a bit of a disservice by doing so. All were fixable and without too much difficulty. When I said I was mostly satisfied with it this was true. What I didn't say, and what might put things into a better perspective, is that I wasn't totally satisfied with the best action job I've ever done.
When I build myself a prone rifle on one of my short actions I'll do everything I can to make it the best I can and, in the end, I'll be pretty satisfied with it.
The important thing is that the actions still appear to be a reasonable platform on which to build a rifle.
Again, sorry if I painted too bleak a picture. It was not my intent. I was just commenting as a matter of interest. Regards, Bill.

I don't think you painted a "bleak" picture at all Bill! Appreciate your views on the action.

Good, straight forward observations.
Well done, Bill.

Bill:

It seemed a well reasoned description to me, as well.

Thanks for your opinion.

Folks, the more I think about it the more I believe that we should be ever so thankful to have someone like Bill Leeper commenting on this board. When was the last time you saw someone of such ability and honesty give his opinions on a product..
Sure the M1999 can use some tweaking but any action or other product can be critiqued and improved too.
Thanks for stepping forward Bill. It is refreshing to see people of your caliber are among us!
Pat

Bill,

Have you looked at the Prairie Gun Works actions and in particular the M18.

Mike

Rancher,

I agree with you 100%!

Regards,
Dave

Thanks Bill for the honest review!

So what is the bottom line (cost of course) to do all the truing and polishing described above? Are you from Canada and can you accept jobs from the US? Thanks!

Mike 375,
Since you asked. Yes I have looked at the PGW actions and have barrelled a couple. Standard single shot actions both. Both were SS receivers with 4140 bolts. The receivers were blackened by some process and I honestly can't say what. The bolt was nitrided I believe.
The bore and the raceways are EDM'd and are very smooth and straight. Up 'til now, all subsequent machining has been done manually but I think they've just started putting in some CNC machining centers.
The approaches to the locking lug seats (closing ramps?)are machined in a rather strange, though clever, way using a rotary fixture on the mill and cutting the ramp in tiny steps. The result is like a minature staircase and when you close the action it is noticable. Kind of a "zip". The cocking cam is made the same way and exhibits a bit of roughness as a result. I honed the cocking cam and it fixed it right up. The closing ramps smooth out with use.
These actions are straight. The locking lug seats are square and lug contact is full. One interesting feature is that the root of the bolt handle acts as a third lug. Not a safety lug. It is lapped into full contact. The root is an integral part of the bolt. the handle is threaded into this.
Early on the bolt handle appeared to have been beaten severly with an ugly stick! Thankfully they changed the handle design and it no longer induces nausea!
One action had some serious misfiring issues which were cured by replacing the striker with a 40x unit. After some discussion PGW acknowledged and corrected the problem.
From time to time PGW has experienced some growing pains but are trying to work through them. They have been trying hard for a military contract to get on the govt. gravy train. This has been a bit detrimental to there customer base I think but I'm not much of a busnessman so could be way wrong on this!
When the actions were 900.00cdn I thought they were a pretty good deal. At 1200.00 not so great. This is getting into Nesika and Bat territory and I think they are a bit better. The bottom line is I think they are a good product and should continue to improve. They will also continue to become more costly.
There are a plethora of BR quality actions out there now. Breaking into that market is both difficult, due to the competition, and easy, the parameters and requirments are established. Today's actions are better than their predecessors by a huge amount.
Nonetheless I compete against rifles built on these actions with my rifles built on reworked factory actions and I win quite a bit (in "F" class. Not in short range BR where there is no longer any room to fool around!). I do this because it's a part of gunsmithing I kind of like and it makes the rifle more personal IMO. Also, I can't afford a BAT! Regards, Bill.

Mingbogo,
Actually, I'm backlogged to the point that I dare not accept anymore work for a while. In addition I'm working full time as a machinist. If I don't look after my current customers they may turn on me like a pack of savage dogs! And not without justification!
I would expect that a full accurizing job on these would run about the same as on a Winchester. On the order of 150.00 to 250.00 depending on requirements. There are a bunch of guys who can do this as well or better than I. And a bunch are AR members.
I consider virtually all factory actions to be action "kits" and include the MRC in this category. This doesn't mean they are not usable "as is", just that there is room for improvement. I don't grant the expensive custom actions the same leeway. When one has to cough up 1100.00 to 1800.00 for an action it should be flawless IMO.

Thanks Bill for the reply! Well maybe by the time my PH action is ready, you will be ready too to work on it.

Happy New Year!

Bill,

Thanks for that.

They are now $1100US for repeater and of course with no trigger.

In general finish and function how would you compare then to a Wby and Sako actions.

I am tempted to get one to make a Rem Ultra on but Australia is a long way from Canada and we have no agent for them down here which adds to the difficulty.

I am not interested in one them from the point of view of getting better accuracy as I have played around with benchrest long enough to know that a Rem 78 Sportsman might do just as well as a Stolle. My interest is more along the lines of making a nice gun with a nice action.

Mike

Excellent posts, Bill. And may I compliment you on your grammar and syntax. So often the writing in these posts is only marginally above ebonics. Yo yo, what up, G? See what I'm sayin'? Straight up. Check my bling bling, Holmes. Word. Peace out.

I have an MRC on order as well. It is getting time to plan its first anniversary in waiting. I'm thinking a slow-burning cigar...

Gunsmithing and metal artist/machist aren't Bill's only talents.

I wasn't going to say anything, but Bill is also a top notch individual to deal with in every way. Very knowledgeable, and very helpful when it comes to answering questions and putting my mind at ease (I tend to encounter sleepless nights when it comes to putting a rifle together).

Having him build a rifle is also alot of fun and hope to be getting back to his shop shortly to watch him slave away on this project in progress.

Bill, Thanks again for your Candor. In a perfect world we would never hear about the defecentices of the type you have mentioned. I have a short action barreled in .300WSM and am having Lone Wolf stock it for me. This is the first time I have ever done any long range rifle building and have enjoyed the roller coaster ride of emotions. Many folks see the sky falling and the glass half empty. I want to find the pony in the room full of horse biscuits! Thanks again for you time and will try to let others know how the short action works out. I liked the price and have had nothing but good treatment from the folks at MRC. < !--color-->

Great review Bill!!!!!!!!!!
That's the kind of review I been waiting for, for a loooooong time now! Damn, and it was veeery well wrighten!! Thank you very much!!!

Mike,
What are they charging $1100 for exactly, just an action? Have they doubled in price or something?

Brent,



This is from their website



"M15 and M18 actions are our 1.355 diameter target/varmint/hunting actions.

Available with bolt faces to up to 378 Wby. These actions fit Remington 700

inlets and will accept all 700 type triggers. Long shank in single shot models standard.

M15 and M18 single shot $800.00 USD

Titanium add $300.00 USD

Repeater add $300.00 USD"



So as you can see you have $1100US for a repeater and more if Titanium.



The helical bolt fluting is another $150US. I think that would be similar to Nesika for their Hunter action. However, I believe Nesika is not getting involved with export licences but PGW have no such problem being in Canada.



We have an agent out here who among other things brings in NighForce scopes, HS Precision rifles and stocks and was also doing Nesika but the agent has said Nesika won;t do the export permit.



Mike

Bill, If you don't mind me asking, what actions other than the Nesika and the Stolles would you consider. I don't mind paying a little more for an action if I don't have to send it out to be trued and "fixed up" . This will be my first custom rifle. I want to build a light weight mountian gun for sheep , goats and such. Thank you for the report on the MRC , it was very detailed and well thought out. I appreciate your willingness to share that information with all of us.

Wild One,
To tell you the truth, I consider almost any type of action that isn't pure junk! There are a different kinds of custom rifles which have different requirements. Also there are different customers who attach greater or lesser value to particular attributes.
For hunting rifles I really lean toward the classic type and style. Consequently, the M70 and Mauser type actions are fine by me. It is possible to make solid 3/4 moa or better sporting rifles using actions of this type. This includes the MRC.
Understand, I see nothing wrong with the idea of building a hunting rifle on a Nesika action and trying for a 3/8 sporter. I just know this is not necessary for the purpose. If the use of a target oriented action is what gives a person a feeling of pride, then it is a worthwhile expenditure! The same applies to the employment of one of the well known (and very capable) gunmakers. The pride of ownership is a valuable commodity.
There are a great number of well designed and well made actions out there. So many that I confess to not knowing about many of them. I can't think of any which are absolutely perfect except for the BR actions which are perfect for their intended purpose.
My personal hunting rifles are built on Mausers, M70s, Sakos, and even a Lee Enfield (go ahead and laugh!). My target rifles are M70s and Remingtons with an MRC to come. In most cases I'm concerned mostly with the enjoyment I get out of shooting a particular rifle than I am it's makeup. If it works well as a whole it's a success. Sorry I can't be more specific as far as recomendations go. I truly have no overriding preference. Regards, Bill.