Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats The Very Best Action

I have a good friend who builds lots of very nice rifles on 700 clones. He has many many boxes of magazines and springs and followers with which to “tune” the feeding and functioning. Because he has done nearly 100 he can get it right. My question is can your guy reproduce perfect functioning 100% of the time?

Lots of 700 based rifles are assembled by guys who are very competent machinists. But cycling and feeding are not primary considerations. Shooting from a bench is only one piece of a much large whole.

I would rather have a single rifle that is perfect than a safe full those lesser beasts. I only carry one when I go hunting.

The LX-1 looks to be a fine action, but I'm having trouble understanding the reasoning behind building the "perfect" rifle chambered for an experimental cartridge which a person may very likely grow bored with or find fault with in a short period of time. At that point you're left with an action that may not be tuned perfectly if and when the rifle is turned into a 270.

Nice

An article explaining more of the reason for each feature of the LX-1, with photos of each feature, will appear soon in RIFLE magazine.

It will also explain why D'Arcy doesn't give a schidt about making "mountain rifle" actions.

It might also be worth mentioning that Echols was the very first apprentice of Jerry Fisher, right out of gunsmithing school at age 22.

Why would he when a sub-moa (at least my 270 is) Montana light rifle can be had for a grand?

There is no comparison. Sorry.

Prairie Goat
My action is designed for 270-30/06. The 6.5 wildcat has the same body taper as those so you are only a new barrel away from switching cartridges. Incidentally I ordered a pair of barrel blanks turned to the same exterior dimensions one of which is .277 1-9.

John
I know DArcy isn’t driven by the idea of really lw rifles. I can get a synthetic stock to under 1lb 5-6oz. or a wood stock to 2#.

Action 42oz (with alloy options), synthetic stock 22oz, barrel 34oz, scope 10oz. So far 6# 12oz then add some fat: NET no more than 7# 4oz..

Ed
I certainly respect your opinion. I just don’t care for the Kimber action or the stock.

I just want something that is as perfect as can be. I hunt birds with an ancient M870 but it isn’t a Purdy. I am not all that interested in shotguns. To me shotguns are tools.

A rifle, well that is something else.

EdM,

If your only criteria for a rifle is sub-MOA, far less expensive rifles than your Kimber will do even better.

I have been friends with D'Arcy for many years and he has always claimed his goal is to always build the best and most reliable rifle. Period. He has often said he doesn't want to build a Rolls Royce of rifles as, he would prefer to build the Toyota Land Cruiser .

Dave

I hope to spend a lifetime, never finding the need to play overpriced/overated Kimber roulette.

In the time it took Ruger to aquire a bankrupt company, ship everything to a new location, tool up a new shop and hire competant workers, Kimber can't even get a fkn rifle out the door.

Sorry, but I'd never trust the Kimber 84 to protect me in the event of an over pressure issue. I don't care what steel it is.
Lightweight, at the sacrifice of safety.

Now that Echols Action, that will protect you in some sort of catastrophic event. Look at the interface of the left raceway and bolt knob at lock up! That dmn action is masterful.

The integral base system on that Echols action is smart. I despise round actions with 6-48 screws.

Having been one of the few that has lost a threaded bolt knob off a CZ 550, id want an extra provision to hold the threaded bolt knob in place. Probably in-progress I'd imagine.

RinB, I don't know your background, where you hunt etc, but I agree fully with you about the importance of a single, fail-safe rifle. A single Echols rifle, is far more important than a safe full of slopy-jalopys.

When a sloppy jalopy fails you in a tense situation, you never forget it, it eats at you. A call to Echols is a sound solution.

RinB here's some examples I've had, where I can understand your decision:

A large brown bear squares up with one of my sled dogs. I shuck the lever of a Rossi 45 Colt. The piece of sht wouldn't cycle the long hardcast bullet.

Aim at a bull moose with a browning blr, pull the trigger, rifles goes "click"

Another hunt, aim savage 99 rifle at a large bull moose, one good shot. Shuck the rifle for shot number two, the bullet jams into the mag. The weak rotary spring couldn't handle the heavy for caliber bullets, especially when not squeaky clean. A quick fumbling, pulled the jam and slammed home another round. Finally found a clear shot.

Hiked out to a beaver pond, CZ 550 bolt knob gone. The vibration of the boat motor loosened it once before, and also sighting in the rifle. Why should I have to locktite something on a $1300 rifle.

338 RCM Ruger: Massive piece of casting slag on the feed ramp! The point of a lead tipped spitzer would stick to that sharp slag, stop the round dead in it tracks.

416 Ruger: bent sheet metal mag box. Round didn't align perfectly under the action rail. Had to straighten the mag box, or the flat point dgx's on the right action rail, the round wouldnt make the feed ramp. They would jam right into the flat, under the feed ramp.

Fkn sheet metal mag boxes on a rigby-level recoiler?!

WTF buys a Rossi for anything but a toy?

That Echols action is a beauty for sure and I don't think anyone is questioning it or his quality. I've certainly spent (wasted?) more than my share of coin on nice rifles. But to my eyes, his new action is more for a dangerous game rifle. The idea of a no. 1 contour barrel (necessary to come under your weight limit given the heavy, blocky action you want to use) doesn't make the most sense to me. As far as Kimber, damn, what's not to like? They followed Mel Forbes example of minimalism, engineering a very small diameter receiver of very strong steel, with stocks sized to fit in very accurate rifles with Mauser extraction. I've never heard of a Kimber being unable to contain pressure or a Nula either and I think the receiver diameters are the same.

I wish Barrett was still making the Fieldcraft. If I was to do an ultimate 270, it would be on a Barrett Fieldcraft long action with Manners new lightweight classic stock. It was designed by John Vest and the lines are gorgeous. It weighs 17 oz. The Barrett short action is also 17 oz., sans trigger, so the long is probably 19 oz. With pillars, a little glue and the trigger and mag box, that would put you at about 2 lbs 8-9 oz. for acton and stock. A fluted barrel similar to the Sauer 202 ultralight (muzzle dia. .630") would weigh about 2 lbs 3 oz. giving you a final weight of under 5 lbs. You could easily adjust upwards if you wanted to, but what you'd end up with is a proportional, symmetrical slender and very light sheep rifle. Save the Echols for your 8-9 lb African/DGR rifle with a gorgeous wood stock. I like this youngster's work:

https://www.mnrcustom.com/


My two cents worth.

If anyone is interested in empirical data to substantiate or inform thier opinion on this subject, you can do a search for the testing process the Canadian Rangers used to select their current duty rifle.


The cliff notes version is that they put most currently available bolt actions through rigorous functionality and accuracy testing in harsh conditions. Tens of thousands of rounds, worst atmospheric conditions they could find.

Exactly.

I’ve known Darcy for about 20yrs now, have owned several of his Legends among many other rifles built by well respected builders. IMO, nobody does the whole package as well as he does. He’s not into tactical or super light builds but for general purpose or safari types he is the best.

I don’t see the huge deal about the lighter contour barrel on the action myself. We’ve been putting 0’s and 1’s on Classics and P64’s forever and with a good Hunters Edge or similar stock they’ve been awesome rifles. The LX1 is mostly a physically sized the same action.

I think it’s going to work out perfect once it’s bolted together. It’s not a new build really, just a new action that’s 10x better than we used to pay smiths to true, hone, square, etc on the old P64’s and Classics.

I went the Defiance route this year, with CRF and 3 POS safety but only because I could get one of them much faster than an LX1. Even with the increased price of the action I saved coin not having a smith put his end mills and bits towards the old actions and make them straight.

As a point of reference, I have a small-ring commercial Husky on my desk with aluminum bottom metal. On my postal scale it weigh 2 lbs, 8 oz (40 oz.). That's a small-ring mind you with a receiver diameter of 1.2945" and aluminum bottom metal.

First off, good luck with your builds. I look forward to seeing the results.

You have only yourself to please, but I recommend building for balance. Maybe your rifle will balance fine with a number one barrel. I am a bit suspicious of that though obviously I haven't held this build. I'd rather have a few extra ounces than a muzzle light rifle. Off hand shots are needed occasionally.

You've often argued here against redundancy in your collection and for chamberings for which ammo can be bought anywhere in the world. The 6.5 wildcat you're considering may well be a great round but it's not readily available anywhere and also isn't incredibly different from a 270 even if it is better in many regards.

What kind of scope are you planning to use that's 10 ounces? A custom rifle with a supposedly vault-like custom action and a custom barrel chambered for a fast 6.5 wildcat seems built for long range shooting. That's best done by dialing. If you know of a 10 ounce scope that tracks reliably for dialing, I'd like to hear about it. It seems that your either shorting the rifle in the scope department or you plan to limit your shots to not too terribly far, and you're way over thinking this whole enchilada if you only plan to shoot to 300.