Improving a 243

[Takem406]

I'd like to dump some money into my wife's 243 to accurize it and set it up for hunting deer out to 400 and prairie dogs out to 500+.
She has a Rem 700 CDL Boone and Crockett edition. As is its a great rifle but I'm sure it could do more.
I was thinking of taking it to my gunsmith and having him accurize the action, port the muzzle (to reduce muzzle jump), work the trigger and bed the stock.
But I'm wondering if its worth the hundred bucks to have it Ackley Improved.
I see its only a slight gain in velocity but there are other benefits of seen like case life and even barrel life.
Is it worth it???

 

[Outlaw6.0]

If is shoots good now, I see no reason not to fix it up a little. If it doesn't, it may not after the "fixin" either.

The 243AI was my first wilcat so I may be a little sentimental

I thought it was a great little cartridge, velocity boost was better that "a little" at least for me. Still didn't kick, brass was easy to form & it was a plain hoot to shoot.

Is it necessary for what you're looking to do? Pobably not; then again, many of the "improvements" i've conducted over the years had very little to do with being necessary


t

 

[Takem406]

So probably could just go ahead and do the improvement and have the stock bedded? What exactly do they do when they "accurize" an action?

 

[B23]

If your wife's 243 is shooting to your liking now, I don't think I would mess with it until you were ready to rebarrel it then I'd consider doing a 243ai. I don't have a lot of faith in factory barrels so I would really struggle to spend any money doing anything to a factory barrel. At the most I would only have a muzzle break installed. I personally don't think much of the porting the barrel type muzzle breaks so I would only have one screwed on the end. just my 2 cents.

Outlaw6.0 if "necessary" was a prerequisite, my safe would be VERY empty.

 

[Outlaw6.0]

I like the improved chamber then again, i'm a speed freak

As far as accurizing goes, it depends on the 'smith.

This is what my 'smith does:
Tier One Action Work: (Work performed on a Kitamura MyCenter 2x CNC Vertical Machining Center-a process pioneered by LongRifles, Inc.)
Receiver Accurizing:
1. Resurface Receiver Ring square to bore centerline
2. Helically bore ID of receiver ring bore parallel/concentric to bore centerline
3. Resurface Lug abutments square to bore centerline
4. Qualify lug abutment/receiver ring height to 1.1350"
5. Interpolate/Thread Mill receiver ring to a thread pitch of 1.085-16tpi
6. Qualify Threads with custom built gauging- (we are the first shop to do this)
7. Truncate lead thread of receiver ring to mitigate galling during final assembly
8. Chamfer ID bore/receiver ring
9. Chamfer/relieve bottom of front scope base screw hole/receiver thread intersection.


Now, if your 'smith goes that far, you cannot use the factory barrel as the receiver bore will be larger due to recutting the threads to "true" them.



t

 

[Outlaw6.0]

....

Outlaw6.0 if "necessary" was a prerequisite, my safe would be VERY empty.

You know it brother!

For me, as long as the factory barrel shoots to my expectations, I run with it. Still have a couple in the safe that way....

If doing a complete action job, you're going to need a new barrel IMHO.


t

 

[WildRose]

The 700CDL is an excellent rifle right out of the box. I have one in .264wm and love it. It was shooting right at 1MOA with factory Nosler Ammo.

All I did to it was to pillar bed and bed the action with Devcon it it cut that by about half.

As for turning it into an AI that's not going to make it more accurate although it will give you a little better velocity.