Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats First custom stock: Model 70 Alaskan in .375 and Echols Legend

Yeah - Winnie.. I keep 'em in stock..

And they're reliable?

No. That's why he keeps them in stock and uses them.

Outch!

I should have asked whether they are as reliable as the standard spring. If not, I don't mind using them for elk, but a dangerous game hunt might call for reverting to the factory spring. Unless some compromise is being made, why wouldn't Winchester use these as factory standard?

Just giving you a rough time. Winchester manufactures the spring and who knows why they could never find a spring that worked and stuck with it. The seem to be fickle.

After almost a year, here's the final chapter for this particular project.

I contacted D'Arcy, and he couldn't have been more helpful or gracious. He had a Legend stock in standard fill available, so he shipped it with crossbolts to Lee Christianson.

Lee took care of all the metalwork, replacing the factory barrel with a #3 Pac-Nor SS 5groove barrel cut to 23.25, profiling the barrel to fit the stock, did a little work on the trigger and other forms of dark arts.

Hill Country Rifles did the stock work, installing crossbolts, inletting, pillar bedding, jeweling the bolt, etc.
Metal: Graphite Black

Finally, McMillan painted olive with black speckle.

Matt Betterworth at HCR and Lee conspired to get me the rifle just in time for the opening day of elk/deer in Northern Idaho. Performance was unreal. I've never shot a more comfortable rifle, especially in .375. Accuracy is terrific, well under MOA and with Barnes TTSX 250s this rifle is shooting little bugholes at 150.

Unfortunately, I took a long journey down a rockface in Idaho (note: never go down unscouted avalanche chutes); so the barrelled action went right back to Kampfeld Custom who was there in N. Idaho. Karl buffed out the scratches and refinished in Graphite Black. McMillan repainted the stock in its original colors.

Here’s the final product:



With a 2.5x8 Leopold B&C (with the Timney rings champfered slightly to fit the scope), weight is right at 8.5 lbs on the money.

That's a sweet 375H&H. So much for the notion that 375H&H's have to be heavy.

Hard to beat D'Arcy's stock in anything 7 mag and up.

Among the nicest looking handles on the current market, that is a sweet piece.

I had two of the first Legends to come into Canada, in my gunroom, some years ago, they were for P-64-70s. I was going to fit them to my matched pair of cherry .375 and .300 H&H factory rifles.

I found, that fir ME, the ergos were not quite there and so I put a pair of Rimrocks on these and a minty pair of P-64 Alaskans-.338WM, as well. This stock works well for me and has fir 20+ years, I have several of them and wish they were still available.

Another pattern, somewhat like Darcy's, is the one from Hill Country, I have one on my first Dakota 76-.338WM and although I would prefer less of a ridge on top of the PG, it is pretty nice and works well for me.

So many rifles, hunts and gunshows, so little $$$$ and time........

Geez, how perfect is that, great job on your project decisions....I hope you enjoy many days afield with that rifle.

Thanks guys. So far it's swatted a number of whitetail, and took the heads off a couple dusky grouse for campmeat with some low-velocity cast loads. Already looking forward to next elk season!

Range report:

At my NC CCW class earlier this year I ran into a nice guy who said he has a little land to shoot on. Turns out his "little bit of land" is about 1500 yards of a powerline cut, with a nice sharp upward slope at the end. So Sunday afternoon I went to test out some loads from this .375, as well as with a suppressed .308FN-PBR to play with the steel that arrived this week.

What a great day to shoot: clear, calm, and 68 degrees.

I tested three loads:


(1) a full-house load, with a Barnes 250gr ttsx over RL15 in a Norma case. I started light, at 66.6 grains, and worked up to 74.6 grains, shooting two-shot strings with the following velocity results:

66.6: 2564, 2564
67.6: 2595, 2620
69.6: 2670, 2678
71.6: 2704, 2726
73.6: 2791, 2812
74.6: 2828, 2834

I didn't perceive any pressure signs, though recoil increased significantly over the last two loads. I was seeing very good accuracy in these last two loads, so will work from there using seating length to tune accuracy. 4500 ft/lbs should do it for anything I'll be hunting anytime soon.

These 250gr ttsx .375s are pretty slick. With their bc of .424, a 200rd zero was shooting 1.5in high at 100, 7in low at 300, 22in low at 400, and 45in low at 500. They track perfectly with the Boon and Crockett reticle in my Leopold vx-3 2.5x8.


(2) a recoil reduced load for plinking, using a Barnes 270gr TSX over SR4759 with the following results:
38gr: 1968, 2000
40gr: 2048, 2055
42gr: 2117, 2137

This load exhibited an easily 50% reduction in recoil; a hot .308 comes to mind, but with a much longer recoil impulse. I was able to keep my eyes on the 200 yard steel through the scope on full recoil. Very impressive load, and at 2500f/p it is hitting just under .308 terminal performance, with a much larger hole. I could have easily shot this load all day with no issues. By the end we were banging on the 500 yard steel with a MASSIVE holdover (I think something like 105 inches). However, with a 100 yard zero, .3in high at 50yards, 2.6in drop at 150, and 7in. drop at 200 gives a very nice bug-hole generating plinking load.


(3) a low velocity cast load for cheap practice, using a water dropped Saeco 373 250gr flat point gas checked bullet. I shot this over SR4759 with the following results:
30gr: 1815, 1806
32gr: 1894, 1844
35gr: 2012, 2012

Recoil on this load was extremely mild, perfect for plinking, snap shooting, etc. and very accurate. I've shot .243s with a sharper recoil impulse. At $.20 a shot, I may actually be able to afford shooting this .375!

Now that I have my velocities, I'll start working on tuning the full-house loads for accuracy. I don't think I'll do much more with these reduced loads, as they are already very accurate and a joy to shoot.

Veddy nice! Congrats.

Nice looking rig there sir; looks like you're getting fantastic results! Love the "one rifle" approach you're taking with reduced and cast loads... very, very cool.

Glad you made it through your fall too... I've been in those situations and they're no fun.

Here's a link on my NH M-70 .404J build with a Legend stock, std. fill, cross pins, etc.

DF

http://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/topics/7846376/5

Timney rings?

He was thinking Talley and his fingers typed Timney...

DF

That is one very nice setup, and very useful with your reloading abilities. It just plain looks good, and fun, both!

Yep. Oops! Matt at HillCountryRifles sent me a set of the Talley QDs free of charge with the finished package, and I really like them. Those rings might be a tad high for a tight checkweld if my face were skinnier. But for now... I'll put that face fat to use.

Classy setup, DirtFarmer, that's a lovely rifle. Though that dense walnut stock is also gorgeous.

Based on optimal barrel time I'm going to bump the full house load to 75.2gr RL15, which should put me right at 2865fps and on my fourth pulse node (1.118ms). That's a 105% compressed load, at 62,751psi and about as much recoil as I care to shoot more than five or six times. I'll post how it does at the range this weekend.