Problems with my Model 7

D

dagger47

Inactive
I have a Model 7 Remington Stainless Synthetic chambered in a 308 win. It's got a Leupold 1 piece dual dove tail base & ring set along with a 4.5x14 40mm VX III scope. I obtained the rifle in a trade and it was new in box. Put the Leupold set up on it, boresighted it & fired it. It walked rounds all over on a 3ft x 4ft target holder at 200 yards.
Took it apart, free floated the barrel, bedded the action & recoil lug. Put it all back together and that didn't seem to help at all. Took the VX III off and sent it back to Leupold. They took it apart and said nothing was wrong with it. They even called me on a Sunday & asked if they could put it on a target rifle and take it to the range. I said yes - they called back & said the scope was fine and that it drove tacks on their target rifle. So then I took the rifle to a gunsmith who actualized the action, trued up the face of the bolt & the lugs & recoil lug. He also ran a reamer down the chamber to make sure it was true with everything & it still didn't make a difference. Still walks all over on the 3x4 target holder @ 200 yards. Took the Leupold scope back off, rechecked capping job on the rings & checked base to make sure it was tight. Everything was perfect. Put a different brand new Leupold scope on it, bore sighted it & started the process all over again. No difference. The rifling in the barrel looks perfect & we even had a the gunsmith put a target crown on it. Still no difference.
Does anyone have any ideas on what is going on this? Thanks
 
Do you shoot other rifles well?
Have you tried letting someone else shoot this rifle under the same conditions?
My .308 Model 700 carbine is not an easy rifle to shoot well. The Model 7 is basically lighter so likely maybe similarly difficult to hold good groups.
 
Wow, that's terrible, and I certainly don't know the answer. That stinks.

But I would say the first step, for your own peace of mind, just as a formality, is to put that scope on another rifle and test that. This will NOT solve the issue (i.e. the other rifle will shoot fine with that scope), since Leupold already tested it, but at this point, you may go insane if you don't rule that out and see it with your own eyes. Just as a starting point.

Beyond that, I'm at a complete loss - unless you're using ultra-long bullets exclusively - have you tried various ammo? You've certainly tried everything else.
 
Years ago I had a buddy with a Remington that just flat would not shoot worth a darn. It sprayed bullets all over the place. I did everything I could think of to make it shoot, but failed. All I could ever figure was that the barrel was bad, since the hotter it got the worse it shot. Think 6 inch groups.

If I had your rifle, I'd check the scope mounts and tighten everything down again and try another scope. If that didn't work I'd probably sell it and buy a Tikka, but if you don't like that option, I'd suggest taking it to a gunsmith to get the action squared up and rebarreled. It's cheaper to go with the Tikka option.
 
Welcome to TFL Dagger47

Ok, always a bummer when the gun won't shoot well. Don't take this as any personal attack, but I think you went about this the wrong way.

You got a new in the box rifle. It wouldn't shoot well. You don't say what ammo was used. We don't know if YOU can shoot well. Did anyone else shoot the rifle, with the same results??

You worked on the rifle. No improvement. You had a gunsmith work on it, no improvement. You had the scope checked by the maker. Why didn't you at least call Remington??? (and why not before doing any work on the rifle??)

And what ammo was used??? It does make a difference.

I heard a story from the Philippines, some time back. A guy had a Steyr SSG, and was unhappy with it, because it shot like crap 4-6" groups at 100. He was shooting Philippine Army surplus ammo. A friend talked him into shooting some quality match ammo. Presto! Instant MOA and less.

Ammo matters.

I would have contacted Remington. Who knows, maybe the warranty still applies??? I'm in the camp that says if the gun is new, and doesn't work right, you always give the maker the first shot at fixing it.

At this point, all I can offer is to contact Remington and see what they say. They may still work on it, despite all you have done, they may not.

Good Luck
 
I can't argue with the suggestion to send it back to Remington, but I would first pull the scope, tighten the mounts, and put a borrowed proven scope on it. That's relatively quick and easy and worth the effort.

I had a similar situation with my 223. Bought it, mounted a good new scope on it. Started load development. It shot Ok, but not great, and the longer I shot it the worse it shot. Was making me crazy. Saw a gun mag article that suggested trying another scope, so I did that. The rifle shot quite well. Bought a new scope and was happy for a year or two. Then decided that I wanted a tack driver barrel, so had that done. Started load work up with the new barrel. It shot poorly and would string vertically as it heated. Was making me crazy (again). Figured no way it could be the scope, but I swapped it out for an old Vari-III 4.5-14 that just had come back from a refresh at Leupold. The gun shot great, and still shoots great and does so even when hot.

Point is that it could be the scope even when there's no way it could be the scope. And recheck the mounts.

And, for the record, the first failed scope was a Nikon Monarch 4-16, and the second failed scope was a Leupold VX-2 6-18.
 
Scope mounts with dovetails are the most difficult to mount properly. You really need to know what you are doing and some special alignment tools certainly help. They can work if mounted properly, but I refuse to use them. There are so many better options out there that work better, cost less and are far easier to mount properly.

That would be my guess.
 
This may be a bit off the wall but quite a few years back I got a rifle that the seller said was a totally rotten piece of junk Price was very right so I took it. (I love a challenge. :roll eyes: I tried just about every factory load for that rifle running 150, 165 and 180 gr. loads to no avail. Six to ten inch groups were what I gave. Tried reloading various bullets and powder charges with sometimes a bit of improvement but mostly no change in results. Now a smart man would just say "To hell with it" and dump the rifle off in trade or sale but not me. I'm stubborn and to be totally honest it was a rifle I really wanted badly. Well it took two year and change to finally get a load I could accept. My goal was five shots in 1.5" later dropped to three and the barrel was very light and heated up rapidly. Two more of that same make and model turned up cheap for the same reason, lousy accuracy. The load I found that worked for the first rifle worked in all three A minor bit of tinkering on part of the stock brought groups down to 1.25" and I'll just quit there. All three rifles are Ruger M77 RSI's, the one with the wood stocked to the muzzle. Powder was W760, normally considered too slow and the bullet the 165 gr. Speer Hot-core. Winchester brass and standard primer. I won't give the weight as it's up there. Velocity 2550 FPS. Those rifles have taken deer from six feet to 250 yards, all one shot kills. I do love that rifle in .308.
Not saying that might be the problem with the OP's rifle but I'd sure like to shoot it myself just to see if I could figure out what's going on.
On another note, I have a Remington 660, also a .308 that went through two stocks before I found out it was the muzzle blast that made the gun seem to kick so hard. Wearing a decent set of hearing protecters took all the bite out that rifle. That was back in 1973, ok? Wonder if the OP was wearing good hearing protection? Just random thought on what might be part of the problem.
Paul B.
 
I would slug the bore to measure the actual groove depth. It's possible that the bore and grooves are out of spec. Not likely, perhaps, but whatever the problem is, it will be something unexpected.
 
"Bad" barrels are not common. Even very basic commercial barrels, 99 % of the time, will produce better than 6" groups at 100 yards. So, I think it likely that the problem lies elsewhere.

The OP mentioned that the rifle has a synthetic stock. He also stated that he free-floated the barrel. I cannot be certain....but one thing I know for sure. Remington synthetic stocks are known for being overly flexible. In truth I have never seen a synthetic-stocked Remington (with a factory stock I mean) that did better free-floated, than with the pressure pads in the fore end (as they come). I have also never seen a factory synthetic stock that worked properly with glass bedding. Most bedding materials just won't adhere to the plastic used in those stocks very well. Even when it does stay adhered, the stocks are substandard as regards stiffness anyway.

In short, I strongly suspect the stock might be the culprit. I would recommend trying the barreled action, with scope as is, in a stiffer stock, such as a wood or laminated one....or even a high-quality glass fibre stock. Properly bedded, of course. Not a cheap proposition, I know. However, the performance of the rifle as described just does not seem likely with fairly uniform, hammer-forged barrels, which is what Remington uses.

Nothing is impossible....but as I said, barrels that bad are just not common at all.
 
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I'd have to agree with all that. As unlikely it is that "bad stock" or "bad bedding / stock fit" would cause that much inaccuracy, it's even more unlikely that it's "bad barrel". But it's got to be something. So yeah, tell us ammo/bullets used so far, and what kind of rest you're using.
 
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