Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles MRC group buy #2, Part Another One.

I had a feeding problem with my 300 MRC that I bought a couple of years ago. I sent it to my smith and for $150 plus shipping, got it fixed. It is really accurate and now reliable so was worth it to me, though initially disappointing.

Bullet seating depth can affect how a CRF feeds cartridges. If bullets are seated long, many times the bullet will hang up before the cartridge can raise up over the action rails and be captured by the extractor.

Maybe I missed it in the text if you've tried that, but before I got out my files, etc., I'd play with seating depth, or maybe at least buy a box of factory ammunition to see if it feeds factory stuff and then go from there. Chasing the lands on any rifle is fine if you can but I have a few CRF rifles in my closet that feed with deeper seated bullets and also shoot extremelt well. Even though the internet word is that no rifle shoots well with a deemed more than needed bullet jump. Reliability trumps pristine accuracy for me in a hunting rifle.

You got a decent offer to buy it "as is", but you want far more than you paid for it originally. Is the difference for the usual "pain and suffering"?

Will there be a "MRC group buy #3 "
Place your bets now......

This is the route I will take if mine doesn't feed. But I am still waiting for it.

I have tried various seating depth and OAL, even to the point of trying to feed some dummy 6mm Remington rounds I had. Short, long or in between, everything without a sharp plastic tip gets the nose jammed into the C collar instead of being fed into the chamber.

Something is pushing the rounds way too far left as they are coming up from the right side of the magazine, and every now and then one coming up from the left side gets pushed too far right. I thought it was the feed rails but I may take this to a local guy just to get his opinion. If he thinks he can fix it for a reasonable sum I'll give it another go. If not, I'm not sure. I've spent a whopping $27 extra over the price/shipping/FFL fee sending this back so I can afford a little more, but am not going to throw money into a pit with no foreseeable bottom.

And to all - not going to sell it while it's not working properly. Folks are free to do what they please in their lives and if someone wants to get into a morals and ethics urination match over this next sentence, please start without me (referring to a thread in the Classifieds IIRC). But I can't in good faith let this out into the general left hand public in its current condition.

Now that I've slept on it, it's certainly worth trying another remedy. Other than this feeding issue I like it quite a lot as it is a very nicely put together rifle overall. Kind of like an otherwise beautiful woman with a big hairy wart on her nose - if you can take care of that wart you're left with a beautiful woman. If I can't get it to work no way no how then I might sell it with full disclosure, or not. The future is always uncertain.

I bet it would still easily sell on Gunbroker or similar if it comes to that.

I'd add "had magazine feeding problems with some bullets that I tried that were not tipped. Tipped bullets fed fine. Also, have not shot it enough to see what loads give the best accuracy. Nothing has been changed or modified since it came from the factory."

The problem with having any work done on it by another smith will be that if it still does not work and function properly, then that also should be disclosed, and that can bring up buyers questioning if the gun has been modified outside of the factory, voiding any company coverage of problems. Can't really add metal back to rails once it's filed out.

Jim, any smith that knows crf could likely get it "right" in short order. Think Dennis Olson in Plains, MT, or our own Redneck.

OTOH, I think I'd contact MRC first, get them to pay return shipping, and put the onus on them...

Not placing blame ,nor excusing any responsibility,just saying it COULD have been a wonderful thing. Not many times you have a retailer and manufacturer work together directly with customers to produce something unique.

Send it back til it's right. That's a thought. MRC paid for the shipping both ways for my 260 group buy rifle. My rifle is perfect now. I understand the frustration, but MRC went way beyond my expectations to make things right. See if they will feed some of your ammo when it's in their hands.

I had one of the Montana charter sale lefty ss actions. It didn't feed for crap until I had some work done, and though I understand those initial actions weren't supposed to be perfect, the whole process left a pretty poor taste in my mouth regarding MRC, or whatever they are now.

Reading through these threads, I can't help but think we are seeing the second coming of Forbes. I trust Darrik when he says the situation is much different and Montana builds some nice rifles.....but the parallels are hard to miss.

MRC'S QC and CS screams Kimber and that is as bad as it gets in the rifle world

Did Alex (director of Kimber USA CS dept.) leave New York and move west?

Finally got my group buy LH MRC .243 out to play with this afternoon. 95gr NPT's will be my primary bullet for this rifle. I also have some Berger 105gr VLD's on hand. NPT's are in the lands at 2.710". VLD's are in the lands at 2.850".

I made up 5 dummy loads with Winchester virgin brass and 95gr NPT's at 2.700", and, 5 dummy loads with the VLD's right at 2.850". Long story short, no failures to feed with either bullet type. Rifle held level, inclined 45 degrees, vertical, or upside down. Slow cycle, or as fast as I could work the bolt.

So far, both of my LH MRC's have been zero drama. Waiting for a weekend when I am off and the weather will cooperate to start load workup.

Most have zero drama. A few bought the wrong rifle for their needs and complained that MRC failed and wanted MCR to make that right. Amazing.

Jim,

Most excellent advice right there. 100% on the money and that's exactly how I would handle your issue.

"Wrong rifle for their needs"- If that means they needed to have the rifle function properly, shoot accurately, and be to the specs as stated when ordered, I suppose that is correct.

That's exactly what I did. Emailed them and asked for a prepaid shipping label which they sent me.

Shipped the rifle to them on Jan. 19th. Got a phone call on Feb. 9th apologizing for not getting back to me sooner but they were busy with the SHOT show, but that they understood my frustration and would get to to work on it and make sure it's right.

And that's the latest news as of today, just waiting patiently.

A question about the process on how they make their actions. If the actions are cast do they then run them through a CNC machine in order to clean up the surfaces and make all of the actions exactly the same? If not, why not since it seems as if this process would insure that all of the actions are exactly the same and remove a lot of the issues.

I hate reading about stuff like this, it hurts all parties concerned in one way or another. Hope you get a good resolution out of this and I am sure you will.

Unfortunately there also has to be a certain amount of fitting required on CRF actions. Claw extractor tension, follower spring , follower and feed rails have to be just so for it all to work right.

IIRC the actions are cast at Pine Tree Casting (Ruger) and sent to Smith & Wesson for final machining. That info is a few years old so things may have changed since then.

It is irksome that both of my LH Model 70's will feed empty cases (three if you count a LH .375 H&H I used to have) as will a LH Ruger Hawkeye .243 - meaning the cartridges are fed straight into the chamber from the magazine and don't rely on a pointed tip to guide the round into the chamber.

But I'm calmly waiting and not going to bug them anymore. Don't want to pressure them any more than I have in the "blunt" correspondence sent with the rifle since I don't want anybody rushing things. I did ask them to make sure that two people verify the rifle feeds all of the dummy rounds that were included with it.