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Re: Shim for #1
Here is the long version being as I went to the range today but they are closed for Easter and its raining outside so can't work on either car.
I took the forened off and free floated the barrel. Fortunately my wife didn't come down in the basement and catch me with sawdust and shavings all over the carpet. Went into the cabinet and found a Remington Hevi-shot box and figured it would do being as you weren't specific as to the type of box used other than it was Remington. Tore a flap off and tried to slid it under. Oh yeah, it would go under just fine infact it took seven layers to get contact between the forearm hanger and the barrel. This was the first clue that Murphy was visiting me. I sat there for a while looking at the forearm hanger and trying to understand what was happening when out of the dark recesses of my mind came a stray thought. When I was waitng on the gun to be built I talked to the gunsmith several times. This was a guy named Dave Bellm of Salt Lake City who was running or operating or renting Shilen barrel gun works back in 1979. The reason the gun was not finished durng that phone call was because the barrel contour was so thick that the foreend hanger had to be cut off and rewelded on at a different angle to get clearance. In a minute we will get to reason the gun was not finsihed the second time I called. So now I have a lot of foreend clearance and being as neither he nor I ever envisioned trying your method the foreend hanger in not paralell to the barrel. It has a slight twist in it. With left side clearance of 0.120 and right side clearance of 0.151. This creates left to right presurre on the barrel if I use a uniform thickness shim, which I did. Plus using so many layers of paper creates an additonal problem as we will see.
Second peculiarity of my gun is the scope mount. With the heavy contour barrel the quarter rib had to be remachined and that caused it to be low and not paralell to the bore and the scope objective would not clear so Bellm drilled and tapped the quarter rib and mounted a Bausch and Lomb one peice base on top of the quarter rib which was machined with an angle into the base to get back to paralell and then we put high extension rings on the Bausch and lomb base and finally got proper angle, height and eye relief. Then I took and cut the comb of off the rear stock and glued on a block of walnut and rasped it down to a new shape which fit my facial contours and eyesight . This stock shape was designed for prone shooting and forced me to use the same stock weld every time ( not much ability to move the head around and get a bad line of sight through the scope. What I did not understand was that I would get older and finally need bifocals. The gun can not be shot by me using graduated bifocal glasses. I can not hunt any thing except birds (intinctive shooting) with my bifocals beause of the way I hold my head when shooting. So naturally when I took the gun with your shim in it to the range I forgot my shooting glasses and with my bifocals just had theses blurry crosshairs to work with because of the stock design, scope mount just won't let me move my head around.
No Murphy had not gone home, he was still vistiing me. I had shot three groups and was highly perturbed with the results, which was in each of the five shot groups was two groups separated by about two inches, three shot in one and two in another location and the location was moving dramatically from group to goup (remember all those layers of paper which needed to be compressed. I was calling myself all kinds of names for forgetting my shooting glasses when I noticed the left side action screw was backing out. The little sweetheart does this about every hundred rounds. Got a stick and beat Murphy soundly around the head and shoulders and then tightened the screw up on both sides and went back to shooting. Same results, two distinct groups - remember the twist in the foreend hanger - and still drifting into a different place as the seven layer of paper compress.
Pulled the shims out while at the range and looked at them - clearly more indentation and pressure on the one side versus the other side. Put the paper base case cradle back into the foreend and tightened the screw all the way down and got my old familiar vertical stringing with very little horizontal. Did not have enough shells with me to shoot a group at half a turn loosened where vertical dispersion normally goes away.
Had a very interesting time trying your method but it appears my forened hanger is just not going to cooperate. I really enjoy fiddling with guns and have no regrets about trying something new.
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The Smokin Fur Rifle Club
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