After some debating between buying a used Kimber Montana in the $800 and change range or a new Hunter I finally decided to go for the latter chambered in 6.5 Creedmoor. They only weigh 7 or so ounces more, but at the $645 shipped I bought mine for (from KYGunCo) I figured I would have money left over to lighten it up.
I picked the rifle up on Christmas Eve from my FFL (who graciously only charges $10 for his services). Initial inspection showed a barrel nicely aligned, a very smooth bolt, and a trigger as crisp as any of the other Kimbers I've handled. Once home I took it apart to clean it up and look things over. From the factory, the trigger pull was set at 3lbs 12oz. This quickly came down to 3lbs with 1/2 turn of the adjuster screw. The rifle cycled and chambered fine from the factory with all 3 rounds seating in the magazine with ease. For good measure however, I polished the feed lips on the magazine which helped the feeding even more.
The bare rifled weighed 5lbs 8.4oz from the factory.
In mounting my VX3i 2.5-8 with Talley Lightweights, I needed to take about 2mm off the front mounting screw so as to not contact the barrel threads.
On Tuesday I went to the range with my dad to run it through its paces. It was about 10 degrees and dropping with a pretty decent crosswind.
3 Shots down range and I had it sighted in with Hornady's 129gr American Whitetail loads.
The first three round group (shots 4-6 from the gun & still learning) went into 2". The second 3rd group, with me having settled in behind the rifle and my fingers still having some feeling in them printed .43". Fantastic! After that I switched to Federal 'Non Typical' 140gr loads. My first 3 shots went in to about 1". At that point I decided to give a 5-shot group a try, but I pulled shot 4 really badly. Excluding that, the final shot went 1.38". My dad took to the bench for the next group with the federal, placing three in a tidy .9". My final group went 1.42" with a numb trigger finger.
Short assessment of my brief and cold range session is that I've got a shooter on my hands.
Mostly out of curiosity today, I removed the butt pad to weigh it as I was curious if I might drop the weight down by going to one of the Hastings air cell pads at 2.5oz. Somewhat surprisingly, the pad only weighed 3oz. There was some extra and unnecessary rubber on the inside that I cut out and shaved off .2oz
With the pad off, I noticed that the stock is filled with a rubbery clear resin. I assume this primarily serves the purpose of deadening sound in the stock (which definitely doesn't have the 'tinny' sound that many synthetics are derided for). This has me thinking, though, just how much might all that rubbery goo weigh? I can't imagine it weighing less than 5 or 6oz as it seems pretty dense and appears to fill all but the bottom 2 or 3" of the stock. My plan with this rifle is to see how much weight I can affordably take off and this might be a good place to start. Thoughts? If I find it too loud or hollow sounding I imagine that I could always fill it with some spray foam.
Scoped, the rifle currently comes in at 6lbs 5.5oz. I will probably have the barrel cut back to 20" in the near future.
'
I picked the rifle up on Christmas Eve from my FFL (who graciously only charges $10 for his services). Initial inspection showed a barrel nicely aligned, a very smooth bolt, and a trigger as crisp as any of the other Kimbers I've handled. Once home I took it apart to clean it up and look things over. From the factory, the trigger pull was set at 3lbs 12oz. This quickly came down to 3lbs with 1/2 turn of the adjuster screw. The rifle cycled and chambered fine from the factory with all 3 rounds seating in the magazine with ease. For good measure however, I polished the feed lips on the magazine which helped the feeding even more.
The bare rifled weighed 5lbs 8.4oz from the factory.
In mounting my VX3i 2.5-8 with Talley Lightweights, I needed to take about 2mm off the front mounting screw so as to not contact the barrel threads.
On Tuesday I went to the range with my dad to run it through its paces. It was about 10 degrees and dropping with a pretty decent crosswind.
3 Shots down range and I had it sighted in with Hornady's 129gr American Whitetail loads.
The first three round group (shots 4-6 from the gun & still learning) went into 2". The second 3rd group, with me having settled in behind the rifle and my fingers still having some feeling in them printed .43". Fantastic! After that I switched to Federal 'Non Typical' 140gr loads. My first 3 shots went in to about 1". At that point I decided to give a 5-shot group a try, but I pulled shot 4 really badly. Excluding that, the final shot went 1.38". My dad took to the bench for the next group with the federal, placing three in a tidy .9". My final group went 1.42" with a numb trigger finger.
Short assessment of my brief and cold range session is that I've got a shooter on my hands.
Mostly out of curiosity today, I removed the butt pad to weigh it as I was curious if I might drop the weight down by going to one of the Hastings air cell pads at 2.5oz. Somewhat surprisingly, the pad only weighed 3oz. There was some extra and unnecessary rubber on the inside that I cut out and shaved off .2oz
With the pad off, I noticed that the stock is filled with a rubbery clear resin. I assume this primarily serves the purpose of deadening sound in the stock (which definitely doesn't have the 'tinny' sound that many synthetics are derided for). This has me thinking, though, just how much might all that rubbery goo weigh? I can't imagine it weighing less than 5 or 6oz as it seems pretty dense and appears to fill all but the bottom 2 or 3" of the stock. My plan with this rifle is to see how much weight I can affordably take off and this might be a good place to start. Thoughts? If I find it too loud or hollow sounding I imagine that I could always fill it with some spray foam.
Scoped, the rifle currently comes in at 6lbs 5.5oz. I will probably have the barrel cut back to 20" in the near future.
'
