Well I finally got this 338 Win Mag out to the range. There's good news and bad news.
Good news...it groups very well. I only put about 12 rounds through it today, but it was shooting roughly 1" groups at 100 yards. The trigger feels smooth and overall I like the rifle.
Bad news...it is shooting about 8" to the right and I don't have enough scope adjustment left to catch it. The groups are tight but not close to the center.
I roughly bore-sighted it about a month ago with one of those universal kits. I didn't like the boresight (had to go almost all the way to the right on the dial), and unmounted everything. Upon close inspection, the holes in the receiver for the scope bases appear to angle slightly to the left, and mounting a straight dowel rod into the scope rings appeared to confirm this. Even a cursory glance at the front scope bell shows that it's angled a few degrees left.
So, I ordered a new in-chamber boresight just to make damn sure, and did my best to remount and relevel everything. Checked and rechecked that the Leupold DDs weren't to blame and that I hadn't mounted something cockeyed. Once again, I was able to get it boresighted, but had only about 5 clicks of adjustment shy of being all the way to the right.
Sure enough, got it to the range and it's grouping beautifully, but several inches to the right. Adjusting elevation was simple enough, but there's not enough scope adjustment for me to counter the scope's mounting angle. I don't really want to take a classic to a gunsmith and see about retapping the holes, so I guess I'm going to be looking at adjustable rear bases.
Last edited by TeddyFive06; 05/20/19.
