Fyi, Whittakers is listing lefty Montana Arms ASR and Xtreme rifles in their lefty rifle section in case anyone might be interested.

Enabler...

Enabler's not the half of it. Check out those tasty chamberings.

I was pretty close to pulling the trigger on a LH Tikka T3 of some kind due to their closeout prices but I think you just upped the ante on me by a few hundred bucks....

Well, that wasn't a difficult decision. A LH 6.5x55 ASR is on it's way.

Thanks for the heads up!

As in in .257 Roberts?

Yes, that was definitely the other one.


I would include the 7x57 but I hear those are gay....

Yep. My LH MRC .243 is currently sitting in a nice AI wooden stock. Looks pretty sharp. While the MRC wooden stocks are "functional", thinking a LH .257 Roberts sitting in a "nice" wooden stock would look kinda snazzy..

There is a LH PO Ackley Mauser on GB with octagon barrel chambered .22-250. Thought that would be nice (and more functional for me) rebored/rechambered for .257 Roberts AI.

Thanks for the order Jim. I smiled when I saw the order come through on my email a while ago.

My goal is to keep all the left hand commodities in stock and I try to order as much unique left hand stuff as I can.

When Cody put them online this week, I'd a bet money the left hand X2 in 338 Federal would have been to the first to go!

Y'all are welcome. I, my own bad self, would prolly pull the trigger on the 257 Roberts except for the fact that 1) I just ordered a CZ 452 lefty from Whittaker's after I read on RFC that they might be drying up (I go to pick up said such 452 on Monday), and 2) I head out on vacation the end this month and $$ right now are being conserved for the sojourn.

I don't know all that much about Montana Arms (I'm actually going to Montana on vacation!), but were the extra coin laying around I'd nail that 257.

Glad to be of help, gents. Us lefties gotta stick together!

Shortaction,

I've heard good things about your company. My brother just bought a Ruger American through y'all, and I just ordered the CZ. Speaking as a lefty shooter, we DEEPLY appreciate your efforts to provide us with not just lefty firearms, but unique and interesting ones as well! Kudos, sir, and much obliged!

having been working out a lh 308 extreme 2 the last month, it loves 168 ttsx, about 1/2 inch groups at 200 yds, gun is a little heavy but i new that when i ordered it. would highly recommend anyone to buy one, you will be
over 8 pds after you add a scope, but thats ok not every gun needs to be carried up a mountain!

I saw that one and drooled...just not in the cards for me right now though. Going to watch it just to see what the final prices is though.

I'm a little curious on the final price as well. the one LH PO Ackley rifle that was discussed here a couple years ago (IIRC 7x57) went for the $3500 BIN price a day or so after it was listed on GB.

The current offering looks (to me) like it has had the lettering on the action buffed pretty hard during a refinish. Not as sharp/defined as the one other LH Ackley action that I have seen pictures of. Not sure if that will affect the price ? Or, if the fact that this is "1 of 50" ever made will override some of the nuances ???

Fun to watch...

Dont know if it's the same one but Cabelas has a LH PO Ackley 7x57
And there's 10% off all pre-owned firearms right now.

Orion,
Could you post some links to the rifles you are talking about?

current one is here:
http://www.gunbroker.com/item/576825949

I think it is the angle of the pictures. Not any indication that it was reblued.

Gone... not to me...

Sorry for the slow response. Ken's got the link above to the PO Ackley LH Mauser I was admiring on GB. Here's the link to the LH MRC chambered .257 Roberts at Whittaker's:

https://shop.whittakerguns.com/product/3733575

FWIW, I have purchased two LH MRC X2 rifles from Whittaker's in the past year. Good folks. Easy to deal with. No qualms doing business with them in the future...

Got the email that my LH 6.5x55 ASR shipped today and will arrive Monday. Another brown truck is bringing a box of assorted 6.5 bullets, another 100 cases and some scope mounts to get here on Thursday.

Anticipation, an-tis-i-pay-ay-shun....

Bummer. They must not have updated their website, it's still listed as "available".

So... Did ya shoot it yet ? Pictures ?

Well, since you asked...

50 rounds through it so far, mostly in 4 shot groups working up loads with some 200 yard plinking thrown in. No pics yet but I'll try to remember to bring my camera the next time I have it out to the range. In your post above you mention the stocks are "functional" in quotes and I know just what you mean. More on that later.

Summary: It really shoots, stock is functional and feels great if not pretty, wood is blah. Like all MRC rifles it's heavy, 7 lb 13 ounces for the bare rifle. It had a feeding issue that was easily fixed but should have been caught the first time someone ran a magazineful of rounds through it. I give it a 7 out of the box, but after playing with it some it's starting to really grow on me.


The OCD details:
I'm among the 10 worst bench rest shooters in the world but 41.0 RE15 and Hornady 100 A-Max gave a 4 shot group of .631 but 3 of those clustered together in .140". I've taken those to 43 grains RE-15 at just over 3000 fps and the group opened up some but as I said, I suck at consistent bench technique so I'll give it another chance. The Hornady 129 SP gave a best 4 shot group of .514" at 2830 fps with 46.0 H4350. I've only fired 10 groups so far with those two bullets and just consulted John Barsness' "Loads That Work" for the powders and charge weights to start with, starting a few grains lower of course. I have some 123 gr. A-Max bullets to try and maybe try some other powders as well. Recoil even with the max loads was very mild.

At current seating depths the rifle seems to shoot three and one or two and two which tells me to seat a tad deeper. Which is kind of funny since the 100 grain A-Max is already in a different area code from the lands and the 129 spire points are also pretty far off. Seriously, with that super long old world European throat the 100 grainers touching the lands are completely outside of the case and even long 129 grain flat base bullets are only a tenth or so into the case. So I'm just seating everything with the base of the bullet even with the base of the neck for now. As I work with it I'll move them forward or backward a tad to see if that helps, but even with that nice 3.1" magazine box, hitting the lands just ain't gonna happen except maybe with some 160 grain round nose bullets.

There was a little quirk with feeding at first, and with my experience with my X2 .243 from the group buy not feeding reliably at first I said some things that would show up as a very long series of bleeps here. But I quickly discovered the problem and a little file work fixed it. The circumferential cut where the extractor collar goes around the bolt was a tad too deep and left a sharp 90 degree shoulder. When feeding a case from the right, the one below it on the left would be tipped downward slightly but enough so the base of the case sliding under the bolt would catch that sharp lip and the tip of the bullet would be jammed solidly into the front of the magazine box. I mean it completely and abruptly halted forward motion of the bolt. However, I beveled that lip with a file and polished with 600 grit paper and now everything works fine. It's still kind of annoying as this thing jammed the very first time I tried to run a magazine full of rounds through it. Makes you wonder if they even try that at the factory. It does direct the noses of the rounds directly into the chamber.

The wood on mine is nothing to write home about, it's kind of a light almost bleached out looking piece of walnut with, and forgive me for saying this, a finish that makes it look like Walmart office furniture. Seriously, I'm not impressed at all, current Ruger #1's have better wood and that's not a compliment.

But it is functional. The pistol grip is well shaped, not too open, nicely rounded and it provides a good grip and presents the finger to the trigger well. The forend is flat around and in front of the magazine but rounds out smoothly toward the tip. The whatchmacallits (longitudinal indentations) along the top of the forend look a bit "different" but again are functional and give a good grip. There are two checkering panels on the forend and with the little bit of room left to them they look too small. But the stock really feels good in the hands and shoulders well, they just need to do something about the wood finish.

The metal work and inletting are very nice. Wood to metal fit is good, the barrel is perfectly centered and free floated in the channel and has a nice matte finish. The barreled action was glass bedded with black epoxy at the recoil lug and tang and they did a really good job of it. Various gunsmiths around here would charge $85-$100 for work like that and some wouldn't do as nice a job.


Despite my nit picking here, overall I'm pretty happy with it. First impressions weren't that great but the more I shoot it the more I like it. It only took me a few minutes to adjust the trigger so it breaks cleanly at 2 3/4 pounds with minimal overtravel. The stock feels very good in my hands, I'm built for a monte carlo stock and this one mounts with my eye looking right through the scope. The rifle is a tad heavy but shooting at a 200 yard 8" gong from the kneeling position that works in my favor as it's very "shootable" and settles down on target well. The bolt works smoothly, the safety is well timed, feeding and ejection are positive and even with that long tunnel of a throat the rifle looks like it really wants to shoot.

IMHO MRC still needs to get better at final inspections before their rifles leave the factory (or maybe I just got two Monday rifles, who knows?), but overall I'd say they make a good, accurate rifle (my .243 is very accurate as well) and as a left hander I appreciate that they chamber it in some fairly esoteric calibers. Now that Ruger quit making LH Hawkeyes MRC is the only place we're going to find new LH CRF rifles in cm and stainless, and only Tikka and maybe Savage make as many different chamberings for Lefties.

Thanks for the detailed observations. Been considering an MRC X2 in .30-06 and this helps a lot.
Bob

Appreciate the detail... Recall that I worked with SAS to have MRC build a custom 6.5x55 that mimicked the first MRC group buy with the exception of chambering "which at the time" predicated a Long Action from MRC. A couple interesting observations:

1) Where your rifle is getting better accuracy backing away from the lands, my rifle got best accuracy almost in the lands (0.005" to 0.010" jump) with the 123 gr Scenars.

2) Even tho long action, my rifle is chambered/throated such that six different bullets from 100gr NPT's on up to 160gr Woodleighs will touch the rifling with a COAL of less than the 3.125" short action mag box length. Of the bullets I have tried, only the Hornady 160gr round nose and the 140gr Berger VLD's need an extra 0.015" to 0.020" to touch the lands. Curious that you have several bullets that are "out of the case" without touching the lands.

Glad that you are warming up to the rifle. Look forward to hearing more about load development as you get time...

How about some pictures of those MRC X2s?
Bob

I posted some pics up in the Hunting Rifles forum.

http://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/topics/11413335#Post11413335

O.K. Start off with the 6.5x55. This rifle was a "clone" of the original group buy .260 Rem, except chambered 6.5x55 which MRC would only do on a long action at that time. Stainless, fluted, 1:8 twist, green stock...





Shoots like this. Load work up from bottom of target to top..



Next is MRC group buy #2 .243. Came in the standard grey MRC X2 stock. I picked up a an Accurate Innovations wood stock with the metal insert for LH SA Win M70 a few months ago. The MRC LH SA was a drop in fit for the AI Win M70 inlet. Looks like this:





The butt stock has a little figure that showed up really well in the early light this morning...



[img]http://i997.photobucket.com/albums/af91/schutzen2004/AI_Figure_LH_zpsncewmp1h.jpg[/img]

Still need to work up a load for the .243. But, based on Jim's experience with his .243, and my experience with the 6.5x55, not expecting any issues.

I'm in love with that stock! Something about stainless/walnut that trips my trigger.

Yes! The green stock on the X2 is also awesome. Thanks for the photos...thinking about a .25-06 X2 lefty with a green stock, if they'll do it.
Bob

Loosing my mind... Thought I responded...

tmitch,
The figure in the stock is not always that dramatic. But the lighting was just right this morning. That rifle is a porker at about 8lb, 7oz as shown with the AI stock. But, it should be comfortable to shoot even when I am an old geezer.

RGK,
Call Whittaker's and talk with SAS (Darrik). MRC charges for each "upgrade" on their custom ordered rifles. However, at the end of the day, it is still less cost than trying to cobble it together on your own. It is also easier to just order it the way you want it. As I get older, I am all about "easy"...

My apologies if this is a double post..

Thanks! Mucho helpful. I'll give them a call.
Bob

agreed 100%

Just bought a lefty X2 in .25-06 from Darrik...should be here Friday.
Bob