260 AI: Running the Gauntlet!

B

bluhandluke

Guest
Happy New Year all!

I'm new to the forum and new to benchrest. I'm attempting to build a 260AI. I've been given a chalenge to get this rifle ready for the NBRSA 600 yd. Nationals in Sacramento and I'm running out of time. Set-backs have been routine here. I've had the action for 8 months, the barrel blank and stock for 2 months and custom dies are out 16 weeks (I like how they say 16 weeks. As if we can't divide!)

Barry Davis has come to my rescue. Very nice guy. He will be doing the smithing on this rifle as well as reaming some Newlon die blanks. Hopefully I will have some time to work out the bugs.

I understand the 260 AI has seen some succcess on the 600 yard range. I would appreciate any and all comments and suggestions regarding this topic.
Hope to see you in Sacramento!

Brian Christensen
 
bluhandluke said:
Happy New Year all!

I'm new to the forum and new to benchrest. I'm attempting to build a 260AI. I've been given a chalenge to get this rifle ready for the NBRSA 600 yd. Nationals in Sacramento and I'm running out of time. Set-backs have been routine here. I've had the action for 8 months, the barrel blank and stock for 2 months and custom dies are out 16 weeks (I like how they say 16 weeks. As if we can't divide!)

Barry Davis has come to my rescue. Very nice guy. He will be doing the smithing on this rifle as well as reaming some Newlon die blanks. Hopefully I will have some time to work out the bugs.

I understand the 260 AI has seen some succcess on the 600 yard range. I would appreciate any and all comments and suggestions regarding this topic.
Hope to see you in Sacramento!

Brian Christensen
Click to expand...

Brian, I am a customer of his and you will be done a perfect job. I shoot a .260 improved as well, it shoots at 1000 too.
What reamers are you using? If you need, I have a chamber reamer and a sizing reamer that can be used, if that will help your time frame. pm me if interested. Ron Tilley
 
Hey, thanks Ron! Barry said he'd have a really good turn around time as well as he came very well recommended. Really nice guy!
 
Where is Barry smithing at in norcal or where?
Rudy Manuel
 
Fire-formed!

I just fire-formed a batch of Nosler 260 rem. brass today. I'm using a friend's reamers for the chamber and re-loading dies. Used his rifle to fire-form. The Nosler brass worked well and streamlined the process (Vs. the Lapua alternative). We had 100 rounds fire-formed, cleaned, bumped, necked, chamfered and primer pockets uniformed by 12:30 today.

I should be getting the barreled action and new dies next week, just in time to do some load development and get it ready for Sacramento. Too bad I'll need to be in Sac. for something else that Saturday instead of the NBRSA Nationals. Oh well. I'll be there Sunday to watch and learn.
 
Bluhandluke

Brian
We shoot at Sacramento every 4th sunday of the month so don't wait until April to try it out.We are shooting 1,000 yards this sunday unless it rains so if you want to check things out show up before 8AM.

If you want to shoot let me know and you can shoot some of my guns to get a feel for the sport.
Lynn
 
Lynn

Thanks for the offer, I appreciate it. I will want to come down and shoot eventually. Do you guys alternate 600 one month and 1000 the next? Ya know, we have quite a crew up here in Siskiyou Co. just starting to cut our teeth on 600 and 1000 yard BR, are you sure you want us down there?;) We were at Tehama last weekend. One of us had bullet stabilization issues. He took his targets home (scored dead last) to his wife and moped around a while until she suggested he build a nice new 1000 yd. rifle! Nice gal huh?
 
Bluhandluke

Brian
I used to hunt the power lines in Siskyou for grey squirrels in a bunch of pine trees and rolling lava flows years ago with my cousin.
My father and myself got started in the longrange game so we could have built and shoot better longrange hunting rifles for deer and ground squirrels.
Tillroot1 is from up your direction and always shoots well and is a nice guy to boot.I believe Everett Smith the NBRSA shortrange Shooter Of The Year and Bob Reed are both from your area as well so I am used to getting beat by you guys.
On the alternating schedule we kind of use a modified version of it now.The 600 yard nationals is in April so we shoot 1000 yards this month then switch to 600 yarders for a while so we can tune up for the big match.
We then switch over more or less to 1000 yards because we have 25 covered benches and 100 degree plus heat for most of the summer and the 1000 yard nationals in October.
That isn't written in stone its just a guideline of why we do what we do.
Lynn
 
Barreled up

Barry Davis called to say the receiver and barrel were together and that he was just waiting on Newlon to send the die blanks. Looks like I'll be getting it all back soon.

I'm still trying to get over seeing a friends reloading room for the first time: Awesome! Most every little gadget a handloader could want. Seeing what he does to prep his brass for BR comp. was educational and I picked up a few new techniques, but was not unlike what I already do for varmint and hunting rifles. I have never turned brass, but even that does not look all that intimidating after seeing what is needed to do it right. Hopefully with the brass I an using, I won't have to.

The neck of the chamber is 0.292". The case neck with a bullet seated measures 0.288". I'm wondering if 4 thou is too much? Should I have less slop in there?
 
It' here!

Got a pink slip in the mailbox yesterday, along with the invoice:eek:! I guess I'll be working on th stock today. I hope I have enough bedding compound?:D:D:D:D:D:D
 
Nosler Brass

I hope you have better luck with your Nosler brass than I did. My .260 brass had such thin necks that I couldn't resize it with a standard die and have it hold a bullet. I could seat them by hand and there was already a donut built-in, right from Nosler!

I think the Lapua brass is so much better that it is worth whatever extra work it is!

My neck is .294 as well. I like 2-2 1/2 thou myself.

Good luck
 
Slugger

Slugger
Factory brass usually has some taper built into the neck.If your chamber has a parallel neck you are swging down the brass nearest the neck/shoulder junction which makes it thicker.
In your post you said the Nosler brass came with a donut.If the brass has been fired it is likely to have a constriction in it from the firing.Does your bullet stop as you seat it by hand or click into place?
At our last match I seated all of my rounds by hand letting them click.My first 5 shots in heavygun were just under 1.3 inches at 1,000 yards.In my example it is not a actual donut.
Lynn
 
Nosler brass comes "ready to load" the expander ball striations are clearly visible in the new cases. They used an undersized neck in their reloading die to size this. Measuring necks with a bullet seated showed brass thickness around .0135ish. This was just too thin size enough with a standard, off-the-shelf die. Nosler told me to order a smaller bushing.

After firing once (using the brass as it came prepped from Nosler) and then resizing it once in a full-length die, but set up not to bump the shoulder, I could slip a bullet in by hand and it would bottom out against what had to be a donut. If I used a seater, I could push it past. Because of this either erratic or non-existent bullet pull- accuracy was not good. I bought a smaller bushing but have not used it as of yet.

This particular rifle is NOT a BR rifle, but was built by Greg Tannel with his .294 neck reamer. It was set up to use 140 SGK bullets as the primary bullet. For some reason, it doesn't like them too well and does better with the 108 Lapua and 120 SMK.
 
you just solved your own delima...

HI Slugger...the reason that your rig doesnt like the 140 class bullets is the "donut"....the long bullets are touching it and the short ones are not!! Just lengthen the throat the appropriate ammount and the 140/142's will shoot much better....OBTW...what is the ammount of FB now...I think .190" is common for the "big uns",,,Ron Tilley has one that shoots well,,I bet he can tell us what works in his.....keep shootin you will win out...Roger
 
expiper said:
HI Slugger...the reason that your rig doesnt like the 140 class bullets is the "donut"....the long bullets are touching it and the short ones are not!! Just lengthen the throat the appropriate ammount and the 140/142's will shoot much better....OBTW...what is the ammount of FB now...I think .190" is common for the "big uns",,,Ron Tilley has one that shoots well,,I bet he can tell us what works in his.....keep shootin you will win out...Roger
Click to expand...

I just looked at my reamer print, it has .200 freebore. I just bought a couple hundred of the Nosler brass and checked the n/d it ran from .0120 to .01230 the neck diameter for mine in my chamber is .292, if a person turns all the brass to .0120 it gives a .288 loaded round, that is not a bad fit in a .292 chamber and alot less work to make if it will work. I looked at a bunch of it inside with my borescope, I can not see the striations Slugger talked about, maybe he just got a bad batch, and the neck/shoulder junction has no donut or appearance of one, the flash holes look better than the lapua as well. I hope it works for Brian, if it does, I will be using this Nosler brass that i just bought. Good luck to Brian on his new build, he should have been shooting with us today, it was a great day. Ron Tilley
 
Tillroot1

Hey Ron, glad you had a good time at the Ranch! I'm headed over there in a few minutes to do some load testing off the concrete. I also wanted to show off the new build; Monte hasn't seen it yet. The first 20 down the pipe grouped 0.51-0.52 CTC at 100 yards. 47.5 gr. H4831SC/140 gr. Bergers: sitting on the lands. I loaded up 20 more with a 20 thou jam. I'm going to send em' out to 200 then 300 and see how they do.

Brian
 
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