Tale of a Bergara Mountain Rifle/Kimber Mtn Ascent 280AI FINAL

[thinhorn_AK]

I love kimbers.

 

[Wrench]

your initial pics of the bedding show obvious screw contact with the stock.

Thats a great way to have accuracy issues. In the future, if you see or suspect screw contact.....or any contact that isn't the floorplate or action (barrel too on fl bed)....you need to do some relieving for clearance.

Glad you are on the right track now.

 

[MallardSX2]

Are you shooting this rifle out of a lead sled? I have heard/seen issues with firing guns from lead sleds.

 

[Murtfree]

your initial pics of the bedding show obvious screw contact with the stock.

Thats a great way to have accuracy issues. In the future, if you see or suspect screw contact.....or any contact that isn't the floorplate or action (barrel too on fl bed)....you need to do some relieving for clearance.

Glad you are on the right track now.

The initial pictures were from the Bergara that I test fired right out of the box without checking any bedding. When it didn’t shoot very well I decided to bed it and then found the screw issue. I fixed the stock and got it shooting fairly well. This thread is probably a little hard to follow because then I started comparing it to a Kimber I bought because I was unhappy with the weight of the Bergara. The Kimber had a few issues as well in the bedding/inletting area so I bedded and relieved it (don’t think I ever posted pictures of that job). When I started the thread I never expected it to take the turn it did; sorry for making it a bit confusing. So the last target pictures are from the Kimber MA and have nothing to do with the Bergara and the cracked stock.

 

[Murtfree]

Are you shooting this rifle out of a lead sled? I have heard/seen issues with firing guns from lead sleds.

No, just off bags on a bench for now

 

[JeffRaines]

And to think I almost didn’t buy one because all I ever heard was, “They are complete junk!!

I think at one time they may have been

 

[AK Troutbum]

Finally got a chance to sight in my newest, lightest wt., outfit. I bought the cheapest ammo I could find, $21/box of 180gr. .308 win. 6 rounds shot about 10 seconds apart, give or take.

Stock Kimber Adirondack without any mods or work done to it.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Murtfree]

Excellent! I have become a believer......

 

[passinggas33]

@Murtfree and @MuleyFever - I too am shooting a kimber mtn ascent in the 280ai and trying to shoot 160 ABs. Currently I’m having to seat the bullet back quite a bit and having a substantial “jump” so I can feed the next round out of the mag? Are you guys having similar issues? Or should I be doing something different?
I’m currently using fed premium mag primers and 58.5g of 4831sc averaging 2830 FPS. Are you guys having somewhat similar loads or are you guys finding something even better. I’m always looking for ways to improve this gun as I love it. Thanks in advance.

 

[MuleyFever]

@Murtfree and @MuleyFever - I too am shooting a kimber mtn ascent in the 280ai and trying to shoot 160 ABs. Currently I’m having to seat the bullet back quite a bit and having a substantial “jump” so I can feed the next round out of the mag? Are you guys having similar issues? Or should I be doing something different?
I’m currently using fed premium mag primers and 58.5g of 4831sc averaging 2830 FPS. Are you guys having somewhat similar loads or are you guys finding something even better. I’m always looking for ways to improve this gun as I love it. Thanks in advance.

I'm using about the same load as you in my Montana. I cannot get much better that 1" groups when seating to mag length. Once I seated out a few thousandths off the lands I got .5" groups. Just have to single feed the rounds.

 

[Murtfree]

My 160gr AB load is Fed 210M primer, 62gr RE26, Nosler Brass seated to a length of 3.330” with a velocity of around 3090 FPS. This is a hot load so if you want to try a SIMILAR load I would start at around 58gr and work up and watch for pressure signs. They fit the magazine fine but as I stated earlier in the thread, there is some difficulty stripping a round from the magazine, although it can be done. I haven’t had a chance to make up some dummy rounds to see if repeated cycling eases that problem

 

[passinggas33]

Thanks guys for the advice. I’ll have to see if I can try any of these things and see any improvement. Some days the gun is shooting 1 MOA and then other days it’s shooting 1/2 MOA. Definitely some user error but was hoping for maybe more consistently hitting that 1/2 MOA more consistently.