Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Anyone used a remington 798 as basis for budget custom rifle?

i was wondering as to the quality of these guns as you can pick up a new one for under $500 and then rebarrel to your favorite caliber. would this be worthwhile?

They are basically the same as the Mark X and Charles Day rifles (same maker), so with some effort to clean them up, they should make a fine rifle.

Some folks don't like the Remington's laminated stock, but I think that they are OK. The barreled actions are about the same quality as all of those Interarms and Charles Daley Mark Xs out there. Some of the Interarms Mark Xs came with pretty nice walnut stocks, so if you prefer walnut to laminated, a used Interarms Mark X might be a better choice than a Remington 798.

I recently put together a rifle for a friend that featured gun show odds & ends; an old Interarms Mark X action, a stainless A&B barrel in 7x57, and a Remington 798 stock. I think that he had $300+/- into the parts and all I did was put them together, cut the chamber (it was a short chambered barrel), shorten the barrel from 24" to 21", bed it into the stock, and mount a Wal-Mart special Leupold 2-7x33 Rifleman in an old set of Redfield mounts. It isn't going to win any beauty prizes with its polished action, matte stainless barrel, dull finished stock, and gloss mounts/scope, but it shoots 1.5 MOA groups with both of the 140 grain Federal factory loads and a little better with the 175 grain Federal factory loads. He is planning to take it on a deer hunt in northeast WY and I think that it'll do the job, if he does his.

Jeff

I think ITD (http://itdcustomgun.com/index.html) sells mauser barreled actions in your choice of caliber pretty cheap.. for someone who wanted a douglas barreled mauser that might be a fair deal.

itd is out of mauser barrelled actions. would a cz 550 be a better platform for a budget custom? i see they can be had for $599

What exactly do you want this budget custom to be?

I would probably go with the CZ, I would buy a Mannlicher stocked model. Right out of the box I would strip the stock to bare wood. replace the recoil pad with Pachmayer decelarator pad, glassbed the action, fill the wood pours with a combination of rottonstone and boneblack. This will give the stock some contrast and make it look very classic. Then I would rub it down with some Pilkingtons english red stain, seal and finish it. For the metal I would coat the bolt with valve grinding compound and sit in front of the TV and work the bolt for about 3 or 4 hours. After I got that smoothed out I would send it to Gentry and have a 3-position safety installed and call it finished.

If I went with a mauser. Well, that would take too long to explain and I'm sure I would go over budget.

Terry

TC, you go over budget on a mauser project, say it ain't so. I like the CZ idea, bu their mannlicher stocks just don't float my boat.

Plenty of wood there. You can get very creative, reshape the cheek piece, take the hogback off, add a gripcap, even slim it up until it's very petite. Of coarse you'll have to get it re-checkered and that adds to the cost.

Terry

Oh yea, here is a picture of the rottonstone & Boneblack treatment I was talking about. This with the english red stain is very impressive.

Terry

I like that Swirley.

"Plenty of wood there. You can get very creative, reshape the cheek piece, take the hogback off, add a gripcap, even slim it up until it's very petite. Of coarse you'll have to get it re-checkered and that adds to the cost."

While many people have both the Time and Ability to do such fine work, I have very little of either, lol. So turning a stock rifle into a piece of art as you do, becomes very expensive for me. At this point I'll start from scratch and pay someone to do it for me. Maybe in the future when time permits I'll give it a try.

Ditto here, plus you can add 'patience' to the list.. One little slip o' the tool and I'd be using it to stoke the woodstove.. Me too.. I know my limitations, and that's definitely one of 'em...

You guy's would be amazed at what you are actually capable of. We set our own limitations. Nothing described above is either hard or expensive. It can be time consuming, but that can be budgeted and can take as long as needed if this is for you.

I work an honest 65-70hrs most weeks at myjob and I'm out of town usually 3 nights a week. The company would work me more but the goverment say's they can't. I know better than most about the constraints of time .

Terry

just grab a cabinet rasp & have at it.
like terry said, you would be amazed at what your capable of. once that you've started doing a little bit of your own work you'll loose the fear that you'll mess it up.
one thing i'll add is to buy good quality files, chisels & carving tools then learn to keep them sharp.

Well, when your out of country for 3 months and then home for 2 weeks, the wife and kids don't take kindly to me going off and doing things like that. I've got a 223AI, 257 Bob, 7-08 and a 338Fed and only the 7-08 has about 10 rounds down the barrel. You can see where time is close to non-existent, and this has been going on for 2 years. Hopefully it comes to an end Christmas.

Is the remington 798 any different than the interarms mark x or the charles daly mauser? it looks the same to me. i would think with a little elbow grease the 798 would slick up to be a nice rifle.

Same, Same, just a different roll mark

I saw a take off barrel in 223 from a 799 or a mini mauser
today, its not mine, but if anyone is interested drop me
a line.

I used a Left handed CD Mauser (same action Remington uses..both made by Zastava) to make this custom 35 whelen. I had a gunsmith in PA named Gary Stiles do the work. New bolt handle. New 3 position safety. New magazine release made (I HATE the push button). The stock it Turkish Walnut. It is a GREAT shooter. The action was smoothed up & works like glass. Feeds like a charm. I plan on buying up a few more of the left hand actions if I can find them. They make great rifles.

Wish Remington was smart enough to see the market for left handed Mausers. Zastava still makes them ....but as of yet Remington has not seen fit to import them. I'd prefer to buy just teh action so I could do what I wanted. But I would start with a complete rifle if I had to.

Very nicely done, you have a keeper there.