Out of the box or custom?

[Bill Allen]

What would be the difference in accuracy between say, two new Remington 700s (or whatever) : One used as the factory ships it and the other highly customized with a new stock, bedding and a barrel?

Since I am a hunter only, would all of the extra expense pay off for me? What would be the difference in groups at 100 yards or 200 yards? I need a new hunting rifle but I don't want to waste money nor short myself.

What guns shoot the most accurate out of the box?

Thanks. ;)

[fabsroman]

Unless you are hunting mosquitos or knats, almost any out of the box high power rifle will do the job at 100 to 200 yards, especially if you are hunting larger size game such as deer, elk, caribou, etc. As Rocky Raab would say, most of those rifles are going to minute of animal without a problem. No need to waste all the money on customizing a rifle unless you are anal like me and want the bullet to be in the exact place on the animal that you are aiming. My rifles have all shot well enough out of the box to kill whatever I was hunting, but I can never leave anything alone. I modify my cars, my house, my guns, my trucks, my computer, my bicycle, I guess you get the point. Didn't replace the barrel on any of my rifles yet except for my 10/22 and that one is a POS, but I did replace all the stocks and most of the triggers.

The easy way to do this is to buy a rifle from Ruger, Savage, Remington, Sako, Tikka, or whomever and see how it does on paper at 100 yards. If it is accurate enough for you, then don't worry about all the other stuff. Or you could just go and buy one of the custom rifles made by Nosler for $4,000 or one of the ones made my HS Precision for a couple of thousand and you won't have to worry about accuracy. HS Precision guarantees 1/2 moa at 100 yards. That should be good enough for any animal that you are shooting at out to 200 yards, unless of course it is a knat or mosquito, but I guess they are technically insects.

[HPBTMTCH]

Bill, like fabs said, that all depends on what you hunt and at what range. Most factory rifles will shoot 1 1/2 inch 3 shot groups or better at 100 yards, with a factory load it likes, and under 6 inches at 300 yards. If you figure a deer has an 8 inch kill zone, that is still about all the accuracy you need. A custom rifle should shoot 1/2 inch groups or better at 100 yards, and under 3 inches at 300. If you only take shots at 300 or less, either will do the job, but you could buy better glass with the money saved by buying the less expensive factory gun. All shoot well, but rifles are individuals. A buddy and I both bought factory M700 .308 police snipers on the same day, at the same store, Mine was one of the most accurate rifles i have ever seen, it would shoot 3 shot 1/4 inch groups at 100 yards, under 2 inches at 500 yards with federal 168 grain match, and would shoot all most any hand load under 1/2 inch, and a few in the low .2`s. His on the other hand would shoot inch with only 1 or 2 hand loads, and horrible with most others. We tryed all summer to make it shoot, but never got any better than 3 into an inch at 100 yards. For the money, IMO, you can`t beat a savage. So, if you`re an accuacy nut, get the custom rig, if not, factory will do.

[Jack]

Bill, IIRC, you were asking about a deer rifle.
A factory bolt action deer rifle will be accurate enough for deer at any reasonable range. What a reasonable range is depending on how skilled you are.
I would suggest planning to spend nearly as much on a good quality scope as you do on a factory rifle.
Now, if you WANT a custom rifle, that's between you and your checkbook.
But will you get more shots or more deer with a custom rifle? nope.

[Cal Sibley]

Most of my shooting today is at the range so I'll spend the extra bucks to glass bed, float the barrels and work on the triggers. If I were using the rifles for only hunting I wouldn't bother. Your improvements are going to be in the tenths of an inch at best, so it's not really worth the added expense. You can shrink your group size considerably with a bit of careful handloading. If you've got a real stinker on your hands you may have to shell out the extra money for decent accuracy, but that's not the usual case. Best wishes.

Cal - Montreal

[trex]

Sako is guaranteeing there rifles at 1" or better at 100yds. Hard to beat that!

[M.T. Pockets]

Buy a factory rifle and spend some of the money you saved on ammunition and shoot, shoot, shoot some more and you'll be just fine.

[Bill Allen]

Good information and advice from everyone. I have read the thread through several times. However, I did make the mistake of going on the HS Precision site that fabrosman mentioned so now I am lusting for one of their rifles. :( ( I will probably get over it in time .....) I know it is overkill for how I hunt but right now I am thinking of how good I would look posing for a picture with that rifle and the monster buck I just harvested. :cool:

More likely, is that I will buy a more practical rifle and do a few tweaks to it if need be, like all of you suggested. The Sako sounds like more than enough for my purposes. A gun that will group an inch at a hundred yards is definitely good enough for me. I also think I will take the advice of spending some money on a good scope. What do I need? Maybe a 3x9x40? Which scope? I want a good one. The rifle I currently shoot has a Simmons scope on it and it has never been comfortable for me to look through for some reason. It doesn't seem clear enough and I wear glasses on aging eyes so I need all of the help I can get.

[PJgunner]

Bill. Have you tried adjusting the focus on your scope. I'm horrendously near sighted and I have to adjust my scopes so I can see something through them. (20/800 in my shooting eye.)
I have several Simmons scopes and with adjustment of the focus, they've worked just fine. Try it and see if that doesn't help some.
Paul B.

[srab]

3x9x40 is pretty reasonable, though there's nothing wrong
with a fixed 4 power if it's a deer-hunting rig for shots out
to 300 yards.

If it's not a magnum cartridge that you are shooting, I'd
look closely at Bushnell Elite 4200, or for a little less, the
3200. Reportedly, these are great scopes, but I've been
led to believe that eye-relief is a little meager, so putting
one on a heavy-recoiler might be a problem.

My last scope purchase was a Sightron SII series 3x9x40,
also a great scope for the money.

Nothing wrong with Leupold scopes, but they are a bit
more expensive than the above for a comparable quality.
The down side is that they cheat a little bit on their
magnification. In other words, a 3x9 power Leupold does
not quite get down to 3x nor up to 9x (it's more like 3.3x
to 8.6x).

I've got several Swarovski, Zeiss, and even a Leica. All
are great scopes, but like the custom vs. stock rifle
discussion, it's not necessary to spend that much money
for good optics unless you just can and want to!

For more information, you might want to check out
www.chuckhawks.com. Look for the "guns & shooting
online" option, then go to the "scopes & sport optics page,"
then look for "selecting & buying scopes & sights," which
should take you to "scoping it out," by Randy Wakeman.

Another source of information that I found helpful was
www.shortmags.org. Look to the right, under
"guides," then hit the "scopes" option.

Good luck.

[Jack]

Which scope? Oh, boy, big question with a lot of opinions...
For an all around deer rifle scope, hunting a mix of open country and woods, 3-9 isn't a bad choice. Neither is a fixed power 4 or 6x.
For a 'brush gun' where the ranges are short, field of view is as important as power, and in the brush, the 1-4's, 2-7's, and 2.5 or 3 fixed powers are good picks.
What brand is another big question. Again, with lots of opinions. I'll say if you choose a Burris, Leupold, Pentax, Nikon, Weaver Grand Slam, Zeiss Conquest, or Bushnell 3200 or 4200 series, you'll be getting a high quality scope that will let you shoot as well as the rifle will allow.
I will say this for sure: you DO get what you pay for. There are no scopes that cost $100 that are as good as scopes that cost $400.

[Evan03]

how bout you spend 200-300 on used beat of remington 700.

toss a pacnore flutted barrel on it. 400 installed, then drop it in the hs stock.

youve then cut the price of the HS rifle in half.

[Bill Allen]

PJgunner, I wil try that and see if it helps. I had perfect vision and then I got older so now with glasses I hate to look through things like scopes as nothing ever looks, just right. ( All of you older guys with glassses know what I mean )

SRAB, What a great site that Chuck Hawks site is. WOW!! Tons and tons of good information. Thanks for your scope insight, also. I like the Bushnell 4200 that you suggested but I am a little concerned about the eye relief. I may require a scope with more.

Jack, You suggested possibly a fixed 4x or 6x scope. Would you use that when shooting from zero to 200 yards?

Evan, I may just do that. A good utility rifle is really all that I need, but damn, that HS Precision sure looks good to me.


:)

[srab]

Bill>>

You didn't ask me, but IMHO a fixed 4-power scope is a great
little scope for a deer rifle. That's exactly what I use on
my primary whitetail rig. It's also what I have on my
daughter's rifle. They're light, bright, and plenty of
magnification out as far as I need to be shooting with
my 7mm08. They are also less-complicated than variable-
power scopes, and, intuitively, at least, more durable.
They may be a little less expensive, as well.

However, if you do almost all of your hunting from a stand,
the weight of your rifle and scope are not nearly as critical
as if you are walking/stalking or taking off-hand shots.
And, in terms of resale, there is probably a bigger market
for a standard 3-9 variable-power scope.

[Jack]

Bill, a fixed 4x would be fine from 0 to 200.
So would a 2-7, 2.5-8, 1.5-5, 3-9,etc. Personal preference plays a big part.

[Bill Allen]

Thanks, for responding SRAB. I find all of your posts informative so please jump in and give me your opinion as often as you will.

A scope story.

I started deer hunting at the insistence of my brother, about four years ago. I had always wanted to hunt but other things in life kept me too busy so I just never got around to hunting. Anyway, my brother took me to the range for a quick rifle sight in and then sometime later when deer season started he kidnapped me out of my bed in the middle of the night, took me out to some remote area reminiscent of " Deliverance', hoisted me into a treestand, then disappeared.... ( damn, it was dark!)

Of course, I had forgotten all I had learned at the range the month before, so I sat in my tree, lost and steadily dropping my gear to the ground as the morning wore on. (First a glove then another glove, then my water bottle, etc... you get the picture.) After a couple of mornings of "hunting" I was sitting in my tree when I heard some commotion behind me. I quickly turned and there was a buck!!! The LAST... thing, I expected to see. Well, I brought my gun up to my shoulder and couldn't find the deer through my scope!:confused: I took the rifle down and looked and he was still there eyeing my decoy but I still couldn't find him when I looked through my scope again. Eventually, I did locate a big brown patch of hide in my scope so I shot......BOOM!!! the smoke blowing back over me....

Well, the problem was that my scope had been turned up to 18 power at some point while I was idling my time away in the tree.....:o Of course, in the heat of the moment I couldn't figure out what the problem was...

He turned out to be a fine 4 point. :( And the monster buck that was with him continued to concentrate on the decoy unmoved by all of the commotion. Why didn't I shoot him? Well, I heard a clank after I shot the four point. When I went to reload I looked down to discover that the CLANK, which of course, was my ramrod laying at the bottom of my tree. After that discovery, I watched as the big buck eventually grew tired of the decoy and slowly walked away never to be seen by me again.....:(

[srab]

Bill>>

Amusing story. I guess I'm just a little surprised that someone
would put a variable 18x scope on a black powder rifle! But,
your story does underscore the merits of a fixed-power scope.
You don't have to constantly make a mental note of where
it's set, magnification-wise, in the event of the need for a
quick shot. It also tends to cut down on the time it takes to
get that first shot off since you are never tempted to crank
up to the highest magnification before attempting it. And,
inside of 200 yards, and probably much farther, if you can't
hit a deer-sized target with a fixed 4-power scope, I
seriously doubt that you'd do any better with higher magnification.

Well, that's my $.02, anyway.