did my hunting buddie just get lucky?Long story short.... he (new to the Encore game) ordered a 24" 7mm Rem Mag from one of the top aftermarket gunsmiths in the country...on my reccomendation of course..... It would not shoot to our satisfaction, factory or handloads proven in other rifles. Gunsmith told him it was because it was a belted case and that he should load it down. The loads he reccomended were along the lines of what one would expect out of a 7x57mm. After much nashing of teeth and numerous utterances of nasty words friend decides to give the TC customshop a try. This barrel shoots like a champ. The same factory and handloads have yet to produce a group over MOA. Anybody else tried the TC Custom shop recently?
Dave

I haven't ordered a custom shop t/c barrel so can't comment on it.

I will say a thing or two about the "gunsmith" that built the barrel. Blaming accuracy problems on a belted case is pure ignorance. This isn't to say that the belt is needed on the 7 mag case, but it isn't the hindrance all like to condem. Whoever made the barrel simply does not now how to properly chamber a barrel, period. He also should either refund the $, or make a barrel that will shoot. One doesn't buy a 7 mag to shoot 7X57 loads!

As usual, Paul's comments are right on the money.

I just hope the 'smith does right by your friend. I recently received a custom Encore barrel, also from one of the country's top aftermarket makers, that was far from the item I had clearly specified in phone conversation, e-mail and in a letter with spec sheet attached to my payment.

After realizing that I'd be in for a long, drawn out wait for another barrel, I decided to keep it. But I was lucky: this one shoots like a charm, and the accuracy helps me forget about the wrong length, wrong finish, wrong throat length, wrong set-up on forend, etc.

I have a T/C Custom shop .270win (26" tappered), that shoots .75 to 1.25 MOA with various loads. They are currently working on a 24" Heavy barrel in .338 win mag for me.

Exactly what we told them....bs. They tried to make it right but nothing changed...They have been in the business a long time, I wouldnt have thought they would have lasted if they were ignorant.....Maybe they got too busy to pay attention to detail or a bad batch of blanks who knows. But either way one shouldnt try to bs customers by blaming design features and loading practices. Bud got his money back and now has a nice shooting barrel. I guess I'm going to have to give the TC Custom shop a try.
Mark let me know when your .338 mag shows up.

Dave,
I have several barrels from the T/C custom shop for the Contender, one 13" Bull 17 MachIV, 15" bull 6TCU, 12" bull 25-20,11" bull ss 22CCM,24" bull ss 375win,and some others I will not list in case the wife reads this, all these barrels will shoot at least MOA and most shoot better, the 25-20 will shoot one ragged hole at 25 yards with a hot load and a 75 V-max, its my squirrel gun. I also have a 23" ss Heavy Varmit Encore barrel ordered from them (ordered Oct,18.2002) they said 10 to 12 weeks delivery time, after 14 weeks I called to check statis of order, was told it would be 3 more weeks, The Holidays was reason for the 17 weeks I was told, we'll see.
Albert