My new benchrest rifle...

D

Dick Wright

New member


In 2015 I found a Unertl scope at a gun show at a good price and couldn't resist. Once I had it, I decided it needed a gun. I found a Ruger No. 1 action in .458 and started this project. It was supposed to be a 1960's varmint rifle. I ordered a .22 barrel in 14" twist from Douglas and a Kepplinger trigger from Brownell's. It is now a .222 Rem. I have had lots of sad experience with the factory triggers. A local custom gunsmith put the metal work together for me and I was off and running.

Over the years I have stocked a number of hunting rifles. I had a set of factory take-off stocks (shown in the pic.) and modified them till I liked the lines. I, then, sent the pattern stocks and a two piece set of Turkish Circassian walnut blanks to a gun maker friend who has a machine that pre-carved the good blanks to my patterns. I got everything back last October and started whittling...

The stock in the background is a partially completed CZ sporter that I made for a friend. A picture of the finished product along with an identical rifle I made for myself can be found on the rimfire forum in Butch Lambert's thread on his tin can shooter.
 
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BR gun... cont'd.



After a few hundred hours of stock work this is what I have. I just sent the gun, minus scope, to my pal in Colorado to be checkered and rust blued a couple of days ago.

I will receive it back by mid-March and will spend as much time as necessary working up loads to make it shoot as well as I can. I did shoot it in the pattern stocks last summer and had excellent results... under 2/10" at 50 yds. and under 4/10" at 100 yds. on my own range. This with no load work-up at all.

Since my old pal, Matt Dardas, is now running the matches in Winn, MI, I plan to shoot it there this coming season. All my real bench guns are gone and this is the closest thing I have. This will qualify for either the Custom or Factory class. I'm hoping that, with some load work-up, I can make it shoot even better than it did when I test shot it. I don't expect to win anything but I really don't care. I just like to shoot in matches and this gun will give me an opportunity to do so again.

I have a ton of pictures that totally document the building process. I will share if there is some interest. I've always loved these old falling-black single shots and have very much enjoyed making one for myself.

Dick Wright
 
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Dick

That is a beautiful piece of work. Nothing like a classic, rust blued rifle, stocked in fine walnut. They will never go out of style.

Gene Beggs
 
Really nice looking rifle, like your style. Hope to see more pictures of the rifle when you get it back. BTW very nice work as always.



Chet
 
Dick Wright said:


After a few hundred hours of stock work this is what I have. I just sent the gun, minus scope, to my pal in Colorado to be checkered and rust blued a couple of days ago.

I will receive it back by mid-March and will spend as much time as necessary working up loads to make it shoot as well as I can. I did shoot it the pattern stocks last summer and had excellent results... under 2/10" at 50 yds. and under 4/10" at 100 yds. on my own range. This with no load work-up at all.

Since my old pal, Matt Dardas, is now running the matches in Winn, MI, I plan to shoot it there this coming season. All my real bench guns are gone and this is the closest thing I have. This will qualify for either the Custom or Factory class. I'm hoping that, with some load work-up, I can make it shoot even better than it did when I test shot it. I don't expect to win anything but I really don't care. I just like to shoot in matches and this gun will give me an opportunity to do so again.

I have a ton of pictures that totally document the building process. I will share if there is some interest. I've always loved these old falling-black single shots and have very much enjoyed making one for myself.

Dick Wright
Click to expand...
I would like to see more pics if it's not a problem. More info about the scope that style of scope interest me, what are they like to look thru I have never had the pleasure. Priced a few but don't really know enough about them to know if iam getting a deal or getting a bad deal. The whole package looks awesome, total work of art.
 
Rust blue...MmMmMmmm

Sucks to do, fun to look at..... Classic

Olde Schoole Plum Browning is another classic. A Plum Browned blackpowder gun looks as righteous as good rust blue.

But they suck to shoot lol
 
John Kielly said:
... and even more to clean after.
Click to expand...

Yeahh....that's actually what I meant.

I live on a fairly large property, timbered and backed up against a small "mountain" of 1800ft (600m) and it's almost worth it when we bring out the Sharps' and have a Quigley bash at the gongs.....that rolling rebounding POOOM of a misty morning is just sooo sweet. Even the Navy revolvers sound cool...

but then you gotta' clean...

pewwww

And when we do muzzleloaders we take 'em apart and drop em in the bathtub....so we just DON'T very often
 
Hi Dick.
I had one of 5 rifles built to exacting standards. All 5 where Ruger #1's. The one I had was a .375 cal and I loved it. Lots of luck because they will shoot. The 5 rifles are a .22 Hornet, a .222, .243, .308 and the .375 and how you can tell the difference? they all have barrel bands on them. The .375 had a barrel band on it but it was the only one, the other four were not manufactured with barrel bands.
 
Wjesswheel,

I've had a lot of Unertls over many years. To me the optics are excellent. Right now they are a very good investment... they just keep appreciating because they aren't making many of them any more. As I understand it, Unertl is still in business but are doing mostly government work. I could be really wrong on this... they have been in and out of business many times since the old man died.

Unertls are a high quality product and, if you can find one in excellent shape, you will never lose money on it.

I started competition shooting right out of college... NRA gallery. I scraped my pennies together and bought a M-52 Winchester target rifle and a Unertl just like this one except it was 10X. As I recall, it cost $65.00. This one would sell on eBay right now for $700.00 to $750.00 and it almost certainly not depreciate.
 


Since there seems to be some interest, I will post a few pics showing my progress in making the gun.

I used a lot of Bondo reshaping the factory take-off stocks till they looked like I wanted them to. This shows the butt stock ready to go to Colorado for machining. An old friend for forty-some years, Charlie Grace, lives in Trinidad and has a duplicating machine. He will machine stock blanks to your or his patterns. I sent him a good set of Turkish Circassian walnut blanks to be machined to my patterns.

These pattern stocks have no need to look really good. I just want a shape that can be duplicated in the good wood. I want a little too much wood so I can shape it to my own idea of graceful, elegant and totally functional. Sad experience has taught me that it's easy to take wood off but a S.O.B. to put it back on.
 
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Before I shipped the gun and the good wood to Charlie I shot it in the take-off stocks. Before I spent a lot more money I wanted to see exactly what I had. I shot a couple of groups at 50 and 100 yds. on my own range, just outside my office door. My 50 yd. group was under 2/10", the 100 yd. was under 4/10". This with no load work-up at all... I just guessed. See below.

After a couple of shots to sight it in, I took three shots at 50 yds... the first shot went where it was supposed to. I couldn't find the second shot. ????? Finally decided that it went thru the first hole, barely opening it up. The third shot made the group a little egg shaped. The 100 yd. group confirmed things. This is when I decided that I could shoot it in the matches we will have at ICSC next summer.

Very important... I bought a Kepplinger trigger for it from Brownell's... a set trigger made in Austria. These are expensive, around $300.00 plus installation, but worth their weight in plutonium. I've spent too many years fighting with No. 1 triggers.

Back in the day Remington used to send groups with their .222 40X target rifles with the load used written on the target. Most of the loads were 23-1/2 gr. of 4895. I used that load and seated Bart's 52 gr. bullets (moly coated) into a hard jam. That will be my starting point when I do serious load work-up.
 
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I have a gazillion pictures totally documenting the making this gun. If there seems to be continued interest in my wood whittling, I will post more showing the complete process. I am waiting on pins and needles for the gun to come back. This will contribute to keeping me out of bars this winter... something of which Glorya totally approves.
 
I'm surprised that no one has jumped all over me for even thinking about shooting a Ruger No. 1 in benchrest matches... "How can you be so stupid?"

The truth is I have sold all my bench guns. This is the only rifle I have that will be remotely suitable. Glorya and I have two really good custom deer rifles that shoot very well but, no way, they kick way too much to have fun shooting in a match. At my age (I'll be 80 before the first match.) and with the health problems I've had the last few years I'm not about to start over and buy new equipment. The little bit of shooting I've done with this gun has been encouraging enough to give it a try.

I've shot competitively since I got out of college, starting in 1961. I really like matches and competing in same. I'm sure Matt will let me shoot this in Factory or Custom class and, if I can be kind of competitive, I will be happy. I'm looking forward to the lunches at the bar after the matches where everybody can tell me that, if I had a real gun, they would still be beating me.
 
This is truly the most exciting project that I have watched (whether it was smallbore, highpower, or benchrest) take shape. Back in the days when I used to shoot the smallbore matches between Saginaw and Midland, we would always be huddling in the scoring rooms at the clubs. Talk of making guns, making bullets, this, that and everything else made the matches something to behold - especially for an 18 year old kid (me)! Remembering Dick talk about doing this and that with his rifles was awe inspiring.

Dick's rifle is going to be the talk of the town when he brings it out. I can't wait to see Dick shoot it! I will post pics of course! And I consider it a factory rifle. Surely, there will be a lot of talk at the Judge's Bench about it I am sure!

Waiting impatiently for the season to start in 12 weeks (hopefully we won't have to shovel snow off the bench tops).

Matt
 
Matt,

I too am waiting impatiently... I need to shoot it as much as I can before the season starts. Ruger No. 1's are finickly re: fore end bedding. Just cause it shot in the pattern stocks doesn't guarantee that it will in the new ones. The new fore end is bedded very tightly. I may have to do a lot of tweaking before it shoots like it did last summer. Hopefully there will be enough warm days after I get it to do so.
 
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When I sent the metal, pattern stocks and good wood to Charlie, this is what I got back, minus the scope. He glassed in both pattern stocks so that, after the good wood was machined, the inletting would be easy. Then he inletted it for me and shipped it back completely together. In the past I have done my own inletting but I am very slow. Charlie is better than I am and very fast. Since time was a big issue here I asked him to do it.

When I met Charles Grace back around 1970, he was a cherry farmer and had just graduated from Trinidad State Junior College gunsmithing school. This is regarded as the best gunsmithing school in the country. He is a long time member of the American Custom Gunmakers Guild and served as president for several years. Years back he sold the cherry farm and moved to Trinidad, Colorado where he makes rifles and is now part of the school administration. He did me a big favor doing this work quickly. He has at least two years backlog of rifles to build.

Over the years Charlie and I have gone to many gunshows together, attended guild meetings in Vegas and, even, spent some time at Micelli's Bar, one of Clare County's culture centers.
 
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