Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Kimber Roulette

I recently traded for a used Kimber Montana in 257. Before shooting it, I removed the action from the stock. There was a good sized bump in the stock on the left side where the barrel starts to taper. The barrel wasn't floated very evenly either. Before shooting it, I sanded out the speed bump and opened up the channel for better clearance.

The only ammo that I've shot so far is Hornady 117 SPBT factory. I'm getting about 1.5" for the first two shots and the third is at least 4" to the right. I'm sure that my groups would be better if I let the barrel completely cool between every shot but I wanted to see if I could possibly get a three shot group.

Any suggestions on how to get the most accuracy out of the rifle. I've ordered some Devcon to bed the stock. I'd like to do this before starting my load development. To start, I have hornady 100's and Barnes 80 TTSX and H4350.

Gee, I thought they were all bedded and free floated from the factory.

yet you are always right there with nothing to add but bile...

i suppose you'll PM me again to whine about bein' disrespected.

to the OP, go ahead with the bedding. try a temp. 'speed bump' in the barrel channel (sometimes LW barrels like some contact". also adjust the trigger if you can. both of mine will go down to 2.5#.

I saw one other thread relating to Kimber and accuracy but thought I'd start one of my own.

The "speed bump" was definately a defect from the factory. I removed it and opened the barrel channel up some.

The trigger is actually really good. I'll lighten it a bit though.

I didn't think to try adding a temporary bridge.

For those that have sent your rifles back to Kimber for work, what exactly did they do? re-barrel?

did you clean the barrel to bare steel to start with?

Lighten up dude. Thanks.

No I haven't. I'm doing that tonight and will do so again before shooting the Barnes. I just want to get the bedding job done before working up loads.

I have a Remington LVSF that doesn't settle in until 40-50 rounds.

I'm not too concerned yet. I normally can find a decent handload.

my first Kimber (7mm WSM Montana) started out kinda shaky, but i don't know whether i adapted to shooting the light rifle or the barrel came around, but it slowly got better 'till its a .75 moa rifle now with nothing but a trigger tweak. the second one (.223) shot great right out of the box.

I've never seen a "bad" Kimber,though I have seen a lot of boobs botch fine rifles. Most are stumped at the loading bench,in over their heads with bedding,are clueless about mount/glass selection,favor botching torque values,never give fastener lengths a gawk and are piss poor shots to boot.

Curiously enough,those constants do a rifle's precision no favors.

Flipside being,I've shot more tidy Agg's with rifles that "didn't shoot",than I could begin to count. A rifle can be no better than it's Operator.

I'll admit to being a novice at bedding and could botch a good rifle. Plenty of experience with the rest and confident I can find a decent load.

BS - any advise on bedding the montana?

My 84m Classic 7mm08 shot very well right out of the box. Get the barrel clean snug it down on the rest nice and firm so it dosn't bounce around and it will be fine. I have a frind with a classic in bob and it will shoot most any load less than an inch some right much less.

I bedded mine before shooting but just snugged up the lug. It's sub moa at 300 which ain't far but.......

I bedded my 84M with a thin layer of JB weld. Very easy to do.

Life is short. Sell the [bleep]' junk and get something that shoots.

I call dibs on it.


Seriously, let me know if you want to part with it.

A $1000.00 + rifle shouldn't need a bedding job to get it to shoot, I think I also would sell it and lose the headache, Kimbers are notoriously great or junk, too much of a grab bag for me........Good luck..........HB

I had the action and the first inch and a half of the barrel devcon bedded and took the trigger down to 2 1/4 lb before I fired the first shot. Shot sub inch from the start with Varget and 150 grain Corelokts (308).
Its had about 200 rounds through it now and it's just getting better and better.
Not sure if it takes a bit of time for the gun to settle or it takes time to develop the right bench technique.
Sure feels good when you win at roulette

I have had 3 Kimber Montana rifles. A 30-06 that I never did anything to that shot 1" right out of the box. A 300 Win Mag that I still have that I had the action bedded just like Osix did and it will shoot under 1" with 180 Accubonds and 168 TTSX. The 270 WSM bedded also and the crown redone and will shoot under 1" with 140 Accubonds and 130 TTSX.
I do think that if you get the rifle bedded and check the crown to make sure it is good that you should have a great gun. I do think some of the guys on here have some that need more work but I have been very happy. I have had Sako guns in the past and the two I had both had to have a new tube on them to make them shoot. Does that make Sako guns junk. I don't think so. It was just my bad luck to get two in a row that wouldn't shoot.

This ought to be good for another 6 pages!