Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Weatherby Ultra Lightweight

Shooting a Mark V 270 Weatherby Magnum with a buddy of mine today, he's getting ready for a Montana Missouri breaks mule deer hunt. It's a pretty nice setup believe it's the ultra
lightweight rifle with that long whippy 26" fluted barrel has a Leupold 3.5-10x on top

It was spraying Nosler factory 150 LRAB ammo into a 8" group @ 100m off the Leadsled, we went thru all the non shooting rife protocols. He took it home as we were 12 rounds in & making zero progress. I suspected the culprit was copper fouling, sure enough there was lots a blue in his afternoon cleaning session.

Anyway, I'm thinking about having him get some of the Weatherby Factory ammo with the 130 grain Norma spitzer as it's the least expensive of the factory ammo and I think this rifle might turn out to be a bit of a spring/summer project. All I know for history on this rifle is it belonged to his late uncle and it was used on a few hunts in Alaska & Colorado.

Like to get you guys input on getting a lightweight barreled Weatherby to shoot and any info on that 130 grain Norma bullet that you have.

41

With a 8" group i would be looking for a mechanical problem. Any loose screws with the rings or base? Maybe a bad scope.

I've got a .308 ultralite. It did not shoot all that impressive or bad when got it. best i remember 1.5-2in. I then skim bedded it and floated barrel it now shoots very well ragged hole to tight clover leaf type groups IF ONE DOES NOT GET BARREL HOT. If the barrel gets hot it will go to chit.

Leadsled? Is he scared of the rifle? That can be part of the problem.

those rifles sometimes have an issue with 300 wby. I would send it back to Weatherby and have them look at it.

8" groups = something drastically wrong with the gun or shooter

I have a .300 Wby Ultralight. After a lot of tinkering & different loads 1.5-2 MOA is about all she'll do - with a cold barrel. Think the barrel is just a little too light for a .300, to be a tack driver. And that may be true of a .270 Roy as well.

At some point I will have it rebarreled to the same contour, but no flutes, which I think will work better. Especially with a PacNor or similar quality barrel.

The action screws were tight, while we were at the range I couldn't check the torque setting of 50-55 pounds.

Didnt have the correct bit to check the scope screws. I'll get my hands on this rifle soon & go over all the possible loose ends.

Just how slow do you shoot Idholton?


He's none to fond of his lightweight 338RUM, this one is a pussycat in comparison. He's an excellent shot,

I fired it twice exact same results as him. 1st shot bullseye 2nd moved 4" left next 3" vertical of #2. There were 2 shots that missed the 10x10" target completely.

Neither him or I flinched, it's def the rifle.

41rem,

I would also suspect some sort of mechanical problem, which might simply be that some rifles have an aversion to the very long boattails on high-BC bullets--especially Weatherbys with "freebore." If a rifle starts spraying them, then I normally do what you're thinking about doing, trying flat-based bullets.

Also, lightweight rifles often don't respond very well to being placed on relatively hard rests, even if padded, and a Lead Sled fits that description. I'd also try folding a towel at least a couple of times and draping it over the forend rest.

If neither of those work, the next suspect would be the scope, especially if it's brand-new and hasn't been proven on another rifle.

In general, I've found Weatherby Ultra Lightweights shoot very well, especially in calibers from 7mm down, which result in a somewhat stiffer barrel. Have seen a few in larger calibers that didn't shoot very well, but not many.

I have a 300 Weatherby ultralight and I almost shot the barrel out trying to find a load.... must have tried every slow powder and good bullet combo out there..... then I started seating the bullets very deep in the case like ogive barely out of the case mouth and Shazam it started shooting like a house afire..... I've never seen a gun respond to seating depth the way that one did.

Btw....those lrab are very fussy in most guns I try them in.

Get yourself some 150 grain Hornady Spire point and I'll bet it becomes a shooter..... and don't be afraid to hunt them on anything theyre an awesome bullet....not sexy....just a great bullet.

Good advice all, I'll put it into play on range round #2.

This should be an interesting project, good thing the hunt is off in November.

My one experience with a rifle shooting a pattern like that was my old Rem 725 in 280 Rem using old style Barnes bullets. I had them seated out almost to the lands the way you're supposed to (not). And was getting a 7" spread for several 3-shot strings. Seating them deep made a huge difference.

Check all the scope mounting,and clean the barrel like you are doing. Also check the crown. Change the scope if all that seems OK.

I would also want to know how well it shot for the guy's relative and if he shot it enough or enough times without letting it cool to have damaged the barrel.

See how the action sits in the stock without the screws. See it it rocks or will slide back and forth.

I would pull the barreled action out of the stock(if it's wood) to be sure the stock is not cracked in action area. Then I'd check mounts and rings to be sure things are tight. Not farmer tight, just tight. Scope rings must not be too tight as scopes can be damaged. In my experience Weatherby's just don't like BT bullets so try FB bullets. I think MD suggested that too. I'd also take a spare scope to the range because if you still getting 8" groups the scope is likely bad. I will not repeat what has already been said about not using the lead sled. Good Luck.

Free floated one hole shooter, that goes to chit when it gets hot? thats interesting.

I have one in .300 Wby. It will shoot about 1 MOA with 180 grain partitions, three shot groups.

When I was working up my load, I let it cool after every three shots. I got an air mattress inflators operating with four D cells, a plastic tube, and pumped air through the chamber to cool it.

Are the sling swivels making contact with the rest on either end?

I'll shoot the first two like 2-3 minutes apart and wait at least 5 min between next shoots.
I have said on here before through trial and error with thin barreled guns I have discovered with non floated or just touching stock to barrel and whimppy stocks ore worse (not saying the stocks on these ultralites are) but heavy cheek pressure and front rest too far out on end of stock can POI a bunch

FWIW, a parenthetical comment in general about these rifle "cradles" including the Led Sled though I haven't specifically used that one: they can be very hard on rifles of substantial recoil including cracked, fine, wooden butt plates and transmit a lot of stress to the stock.

The barreled action seeks to move backward into a mostly immovable stock; wooden ones are especially prone to cracking in the tang and grip area.

The way you describe a wandering point of impact jumping all over the page sounds like a bad erector in the scope. I have had a couple of recent Leupold variables go belly up in less than 30 rounds and I had the exact same results you are describing.

I would try switching to a proven scope before you do anything else. You may save yourself a lot of frustration.

Chet

Weatherby rifles (and Remingtons for that matter) are very sensitive to the torque of the action screws, particularly the front one. I'd loosen it all the way out, then tighten it up to 50 lbs. Then try tightening in 1 lb increments between groups until to see if it improves.