Re: Barnard Palma II
With a pinned lug switching a barrel is as easy as the Warner lug.
I'll explain quite candidly why I've gone the route of the Remington style recoil lug.
Once upon a time a very, very close friend of mine paid a very, very, very, very well known palma gun plumber a pile of money to build him a palma rifle on a CG Millenium action. This well known plumber made a lug block that attached to the bottom of the action. It was held to the stock with a single 6mm x 1mm pitch screw. 3 revolutions of thread contact were all that kept the lug onto the action.
The machine work was exceptional. The lug appeared to literally grow out of the action. Regardless there was .118" of thread engagement holding the part of the rifle that transmits all the recoil a 308 palma load can generate. (which is quite small, but still significant)
The rifle would absolutely hammer the piss out of the X ring. . . for about 5 rounds. Then it would string from one end of the 9 ring to the other.
Lightening. Never strikes twice in the same spot.
A bad place to be as a rookie on the 2003 US Palma team.
Needless to say back then I didn't have either the experience, nor the gall to question one of the sacred cows of longrange competitive shooting. I did everything I could to make it shoot. I laid the stock in carbon and bedded it four different times. Still no success.
This has proven to date to be the single biggest failure in my career. David (Karcher) ended up taking his Tubb rifle to worlds that year.
As a result I am quite jaded/prejudice against bedding blocks, V blocks, chassis, and elastomer shock absorbing tricks of the week when it comes to precision firearms. I pillar bed and unless the action is faceted on the bottom with sufficient surface area to tolerate/transmit recoil to the shooter's shoulder I'm sticking a double pinned Rem 700 style recoil lug between the receiver and barrel.
Quite often I find a person requesting something because its different or they saw a buddy with it and he shot well that day. I certainly don't profess to know everything. I do however have a pretty good grasp these days on what works.
The first Barnard I ever built is pictured below. John has shot some remarkable scores with this rifle. He only was able to enter a few matches last fall before the season was over for him. (winter comes quick north of Detroit) He's enjoyed a couple cleans with 60%+ X counts using irons during 600yard matches and has routinely shot High Master scores with the gun while still fire forming his brass. (it's chambered in 6mm Competition Match)
Between his rifle and Kyle Leibertrau's World Champion Nesika Model K that I built back in 2004/05, both of which use a Rem style pinned lug, it pretty much tells me there is nothing wrong with a glorified washer stuck between the barrel and receiver.
My pillar bedding is along the same lines as Alan's, but it has subtle differences.
