358 Hoosier Satisfaction! and a THANK YOU to AJ Brown Arms
Jul 21, 2014 19:11:44 GMT -5
omegahunter likes this
Post by HuntMeister on Jul 21, 2014 19:11:44 GMT -5
This has been over a year in the making but this weekend I think I finally saw it through to completion. Some of you may recall that last year I built a 358 Hoosier wildcat on a Marlin XS7 donor rifle that I purchased new. I had Alan Brown of A.J. Brown Arms in Bloomfield do the build for me. I added a Boyds laminated stock to it to give it some character as I have grown tired of the endless offerings of black synthetic.
After I got the completed rifle back last summer I proceeded to do some load development hoping to find the sweet spot. After many tries I just couldn't achieve reloading nirvana with this rifle. I sent a photo of the latest target to Alan for his review and he immediately called me and said I had a bad case of vertical stringing. He asked me to return it to him at my earliest convenience so that he could try to determine the issue behind my poor groups. This was early fall. I decided to go ahead and use it during the firearms season and killed a nice buck that weighed 209 lbs field dressed. The 180 grain Barnes TTSX did a superb job on this big bodied buck.
I returned the rifle to Alan after the first of this year and a few months later he called and told me that he couldn't find anything wrong with the rifle and that bad barrels happen. Said he was going to replace the barrel no charge. I just got the rifle back a couple of weeks ago and yesterday was the first trip to the range with the re-barreled Hoosier. I will be the first to admit that I am not a great shooter. Load number 5 appears to be the answer to happy groups and it also happens to be at max listed charge for this bullet / powder combo so I should have top fps as well. The high flyer hit in group #5 which was my last shot of that group is due, I'm certain, to me pulling the shot.
THANKS again to Alan Brown at AJ Brown Arms for taking care of the customer and helping me through my first wildcat build!
After I got the completed rifle back last summer I proceeded to do some load development hoping to find the sweet spot. After many tries I just couldn't achieve reloading nirvana with this rifle. I sent a photo of the latest target to Alan for his review and he immediately called me and said I had a bad case of vertical stringing. He asked me to return it to him at my earliest convenience so that he could try to determine the issue behind my poor groups. This was early fall. I decided to go ahead and use it during the firearms season and killed a nice buck that weighed 209 lbs field dressed. The 180 grain Barnes TTSX did a superb job on this big bodied buck.
I returned the rifle to Alan after the first of this year and a few months later he called and told me that he couldn't find anything wrong with the rifle and that bad barrels happen. Said he was going to replace the barrel no charge. I just got the rifle back a couple of weeks ago and yesterday was the first trip to the range with the re-barreled Hoosier. I will be the first to admit that I am not a great shooter. Load number 5 appears to be the answer to happy groups and it also happens to be at max listed charge for this bullet / powder combo so I should have top fps as well. The high flyer hit in group #5 which was my last shot of that group is due, I'm certain, to me pulling the shot.
THANKS again to Alan Brown at AJ Brown Arms for taking care of the customer and helping me through my first wildcat build!
