Hey guys, yeah, I have used more HS stocks than about anything else. Several Boyd's, B&C, 1 Manners, 1 McMillan, a few of Stocky's offerings, and 1 AG Composites. That said, there are several iterations of each, but most especially the most expensive 3.
Keep in mind, my objective is to cut as much weight as possible. This wil need to be a carbon fiber project. Anything with an aluminum block is going to be too heavy. AG Compsites would be my first choice, but not sure how they are at custom inletting. They do inlet for more than they have listed, but you have to contact them, and their customer service isn't on the same level as McMillan's. That wasn't always the case. The one experience I had with McMillan was so bad I held a grudge for nearly 20 years and refused to even consider one. Because I need for somebody designing and machining part of this to kind of be responsive and help walk me through the process avoiding pitfalls, McMillan is the only one stepping up doing that.
That said, I have a guy who can do inlet modifications and get it to fit right if I can get it close to start with. Here's what I found by Googling ".30-06 AICS." I knew there had to be a magazine that would work with a standard long-action cartridge or ARC wouldn't offer a long action standard head combo.
PMags popped up first. There was a warning about sometimes they work, sometimes they don't in the bottom metal. Cheap, but LIGHT!
Next, I found the HS Precision mags in their proprietary bottom metal work well, and can even be flush mimicking a BDL type. Proble there is the long actions are backordered 10 months already. So I start thinking I may have to build another .280 Ackley and use the PMags.
Finally, I found what I needed! ACCURATE MAG!!! Read the reviews and guys are running the .30-06 family and .284 Wins in these with no issues! I can seat to COAL of 3.715", I believe, which by all accounts were more than was needed for what everyone was loading. Found a place with like 3 left, so I snatched 1 up. Cost a cool $300.35 shipped, but still cheaper than HS and without a 10-month wait. The best part is the bottom metal in this length was under 4 ounces! Steel magazine was close to the same. I can still get a polymer PMag and modify it to save another ounce if I want to.
So I had this nice CarbonSix .284 Savage small shank prefit in .284 I intended to use on this, BUT Dave Kiff finally came through and my 6.5 WBY RPM reamer and Go gauge came in today! Got a box of 130gr Sierra Tipped Game Kings in yeaterday... I'm going to have to think really hard for a good reason not to get a shouldered barrel for this thing now! I could get another pre-fit done with the reamer and switch back and forth with the 2, but there's no need to. Whichever one I build will be the one I use for everything. I actually have a drawing of a wildcat based in the 6.5 RPM necked up and improved, but that's an additional $380 for tooling plus 5 months plus lots of wasted components and time fireforming. I believe at this point, I'm going shouldered barrel, and I want it no larger than .700" at the muzzle and fluted to get as much weight off as possible. Also, I want to leave it as ling as possible. Weatherby missed the mark on an otherwise great design. They only offer this chambering in slim 24" barrels. I'm seeing many reports of .94 - .96" 3-shot 100yd groups from the highest end Mark V. Typical Weatherby. I believe this can be a great cartridge and very capable for most all North American game. It needs enough barrel to burn all the extremely slow powders it ahould be fed. You could basically interchange data feom the .264 Win Mag. Weatherby didn't put much freebore in the design, either. I have .250" in my wildcat design. Dave's reamer I got today is all SAAMI. It will fit nicely in the 3.715" box.
Yeah, I talked to ARC about the bottom metals, and basically, it will run anything in AICS pattern up CIP Lapua-length mags. You just have to get the right bottom metal to gonwith your mags of choice (or vice versa is how I look at it). He said the only thing it wouldn't work with was AW mags and BDL bottom metal.
So I can't find much info on Accurate Mag inlets. I can talk back to my man at McMillan, but what I'm going to so first, is get the assembly in hand, then see how close it is to dropping in a BDL inlet. If it isn't far off, I can just order an AG Composites Visigoth (lightest weight option for a decent sized barrel) in BDL and have my guy inlet it to fit. In the meantime, I can talk to both McMillan and AG, if I can get the latter to answer or respond to emails, and see if they would do the inlet. McMillan was offering to take my components and inlet the stock to exactly fit what I had! That's a pretty darn good option!
What I should end up with is bottom metal with mag weighing in under 1/2 pound, trigger (have to figure that out next! Thinking TriggerTech Special 2-stage) about 3 ounces, stock about 26 ounces, action 34 ounces (or an ounce or so less if I have the bolt sent off and fluted and the knob replaced with a carbon fiber one), and a barrel finishing right about 4 pounds, but maybe as light as 3 lbs 12 or 13 ounces. Trying to stay under 8 pounds, but it's going to be tough. Probably in 6.5 RPM with something like a 26 1/2 - 27" barrel of magnum sporter contour. May need to get LRI to do some really aggressive fluting. Should be fun... and expensive. Just don't want to buy twice because I bought wrong the first time.
mcmillanusa.com
