My Next Favorite Rifle. Really...

One evening, while my wife was watching the TV show NCIS, my eyes glazed over and I started daydreaming about building a Pro Street, big block something powered, ’40 Willys. When 500 labor hours, a $60,000 rolling chassis and $40,000 drive train began to seem reasonable, I slapped myself in the face, ran for the computer and quickly ordered two stainless steel, Remington Model 700 actions from Brownells. With firearm project parts on the way, the Willys project was no more. No second mortgage, no $100,000+ unfinished hot rod project and no divorce… qualifying the latter with – unless Mark Harmon begins to answer my wife’s email.

And meanwhile, back on earth…

We build AR type rifles in house, but usually use outside machine shop services when it comes to bolt action and single shot firearms. Lacking machine and machine operator capacity/capability to do more than fabricate or modify handloading tools and smallish firearm parts, we worry about reaching beyond our limits and ending up with… oddly shaped paperweights. There is an alternative that we felt would make for an interesting project, Brownells pre-threaded and short chambered barrels and action blue printing tools that do not require the use of a lathe or milling machine. We thought, if we paid attention and followed instructions, we might be able to build a quality, accurate bolt action rifle without outside shop assistance.

Based on intended cartridge selection, or at least cartridge family selection, one rifle would be based on a short action, the other long. The first would require a 308 Winchester size bolt face, the other sized to a 375 H&H standard. Remington Model 700 actions were chosen because they are high strength and have potential for excellent accuracy. They are also comparatively compact in size, low in cost and there are many readily available enhanced parts, accessories and specialty tools that would be required to complete the project.

Less Jelly and more fish…

There are a number of chrome moly and stainless steel Remington actions, each different to a minor or significant degree. For the purpose of this project, there are two, both stainless, a short and long Model 700. The short actions are available with a 0.378″, 0.473″ or 0.535″ bolt face (i.e. 223 Remington, 308 Winchester, WSM), but they are otherwise identical. The long action bolt face is sized for either the 0.474″ as Standard or 0.535″ Magnum bolt face – belted magnum or Ultra Mag type cartridges. There is a lot of room to finagle for case head and case length variation, but I’ll probably leave those modifications to professional… finaglers, at least for the time being. The salient dimensional differences between short action standard and long action magnum are noted below.

Pictured, Brownells # 767-000-868 Stainless Steel Remington Model 700 Short Action, short action. Bottom metal and rest of the rifle parts required. Buying the action at this level of assembly offers an excellent opportunity to be very selective when choosing the balance of the factory and/or aftermarket parts that will go into completing the finished rifle.

Actions can be blueprinted, like a performance engine. Blueprinting actions typically means slicking up all bearing surfaces for smooth operation and full contact and squaring surfaces from action to muzzle to assure equal pressure loading in use.

Where to now?

At the moment, I am going to stop. The next steps will be bolt lug lapping, receiver face squaring then bolt face squaring and clean up… in that order. Each step will be detailed in a segment as completed.