At the Practical Marksman match last year I won a .308 Krieger MTU contour barrel and action truing from Terry Cross. When I talked to him, he allowed me to trade the barrel for any caliber and contour I wanted, and he very graciously allowed me to do a full build around it. So, Terry donated the barrel, installation, and action truing, and I paid for the remainder of the build. Everyone knows Terry has been covered up in work for quite a while, so this was a generous gesture on his part.
I told Terry I really wanted a .260, but was fairly open to suggestions on the rest of the build. This is my first custom rifle, all my shooting to this point has been with a stock 700P. Terry suggested a heavy Palma barrel, cut to 24". I told him I liked the feedback I'd heard from the Sentinel stocks, but generally didn't prefer thumbhole stocks. A couple of days later, I had a Sentinel stock in the mail to try out. Let me tell you, this is the best feeling thumbhole I've ever felt. A number of people felt it while I had it, and every one liked it. Needless to say, the Sentinel was chosen.
To make a long story short, the rifle showed up on 2/26/09. Everything about this rifle is a work of art, I haven't found a flaw anywhere yet. The thread protector for the barrel threads is nearly invisible, there are even snaprings on the bottom metal to make sure you can't lose the action screws. Maybe that's standard on other bottom metal, but it's a nice touch.
Anyway, two matches, travel for work, and rain kept me from trying it out until yesterday. This rifle definitely shoots as good as it looks. It was cool yesterday with a hot sun, so the mirage was terrible, and the fixed 16X Super Sniper I have on it for now didn't help any. I still had 3 consecutive loads, at 1/2 grain intervals, shoot .6 MOA or less 5 round groups at 200 jumping 130 Bergers with boron nitride out of sized down Lake City Match brass. The middle load, 43.5gr, was clocking 2935 FPS, so I'll stick somewhere around that. I finally saw a just a little ejector shine at 2975 FPS. Again, the rifle will shoot much better than this, as evidenced by the bughole targets Terry included with the rifle, I was just not steering well. I'm honestly surprised there was anything much under MOA.
Anyway, enough talk, here's what you're here for:
I told Terry I really wanted a .260, but was fairly open to suggestions on the rest of the build. This is my first custom rifle, all my shooting to this point has been with a stock 700P. Terry suggested a heavy Palma barrel, cut to 24". I told him I liked the feedback I'd heard from the Sentinel stocks, but generally didn't prefer thumbhole stocks. A couple of days later, I had a Sentinel stock in the mail to try out. Let me tell you, this is the best feeling thumbhole I've ever felt. A number of people felt it while I had it, and every one liked it. Needless to say, the Sentinel was chosen.
To make a long story short, the rifle showed up on 2/26/09. Everything about this rifle is a work of art, I haven't found a flaw anywhere yet. The thread protector for the barrel threads is nearly invisible, there are even snaprings on the bottom metal to make sure you can't lose the action screws. Maybe that's standard on other bottom metal, but it's a nice touch.
Anyway, two matches, travel for work, and rain kept me from trying it out until yesterday. This rifle definitely shoots as good as it looks. It was cool yesterday with a hot sun, so the mirage was terrible, and the fixed 16X Super Sniper I have on it for now didn't help any. I still had 3 consecutive loads, at 1/2 grain intervals, shoot .6 MOA or less 5 round groups at 200 jumping 130 Bergers with boron nitride out of sized down Lake City Match brass. The middle load, 43.5gr, was clocking 2935 FPS, so I'll stick somewhere around that. I finally saw a just a little ejector shine at 2975 FPS. Again, the rifle will shoot much better than this, as evidenced by the bughole targets Terry included with the rifle, I was just not steering well. I'm honestly surprised there was anything much under MOA.
Anyway, enough talk, here's what you're here for:
