I first became aware of ActionClear and the INCH action at the NRA Annual Meeting in Phoenix, Arizona in 2009 where I met Rod Shehan. I was attending the meeting to represent the United States F-T/R Team and had managed to take a break from my assigned duties for a bit to walk around the exhibit hall. I happened by the ActionClear booth and noticed the INCH action sitting on the table. Picking it up, I was immediately impressed by the heft of it and smoothness of operation. Rod and I struck up a conversation, both of us being rather gregarious, and he related all the features of the action to me….3 rear locking lugs, massive bolt, striker fired and double seating surfaces for the barrel tenon. Needless to say I was very impressed with it. We parted company with a handshake, exchanged email addresses and I was back to my PR role at the meeting.
Well, 2 years passed. We had exchanged a few emails and I had been following ActionClear / Woody Engineering on Facebook for a while where we would chat when we were online at the same time. To make a long story short, in mid February of 2011, Rod and Chris asked me if I would like to shoot one of their INCH actions to gain some U.S exposure for ActionClear. Of course I said yes and this journey I will be taking you on began.
The entire project came together with amazing speed. Being a member of the US F-T/R Team, I was slated to travel to Ireland in mid-June for the inaugural resumption of the Creedmoor Cup. Think golf’s Ryder Cup, but with rifles at 1,000 yards… a friendly rivalry between Ireland and the U.S. dating back to 1874 and alternating venues every 4 years. The match hadn’t been shot in 120 or so years and this was a chance to be a part of Creedmoor Cup history.
So now I had a dilemma….I had 6 weeks to get my loaded match ammo to Berger Bullets for shipment to Ireland. This left a relatively small period of time to build the rifle and then develop a reliable load for it if I wanted to shoot the INCH/Eliseo rifle at the Creedmoor Cup. Rod and Chris of ActionClear, Tom Myers of X-Treme Shooting Products, Gary Eliseo of Competition Shooting Stuff and John Whidden of Whidden Gunworks all answered the call to fast track this project so that it could be ready to take to Ireland. This would be interesting.
Well, what followed was nothing short of amazing. The action, which was at X-Treme Shooting Products, the U.S. distributor of INCH actions, was shipped to Whidden Gunworks in Georgia.
John Whidden, long range shooter extraordinaire, fitted and chambered the Broughton 11 twist medium Palma contour barrel with a Palma ’95 reamer and added some throat length to accommodate my Berger 185 BT Match bullets. I also had John machine a 3/4”hex on the muzzle of the barrel to allow barrel removal without a vise. This is very handy for air travel due to the combined length restriction of luggage of most airlines.
Gary Eliseo, owner of Competition Shooting Stuff and manufacturer of the outstanding Eliseo “tube stock” gathered the necessary parts and sent the stock kit directly to me.
Tom Myers of X-Treme Shooting Products shipped the CG Model 22 target trigger directly to me.
In just 2 weeks, I had all the parts for the rifle in hand. I assembled it in my shop in about an hour and a half with a few allen wrenches. Assembly was simple and straight forward and the parts fit and finish was top rate. Kudos to Gary for a very ergonomic and simple design.
I adjusted the trigger per instruction from German Salazar in his Rifleman’s Journal blog and it came out perfect. The trigger is a work of art and I have to agree with German that it is the finest trigger out there for a target rifle.
OK…so now the rifle was built and I had 4 weekends to develop a load and ultimately decide whether I would take this beauty to Ireland with me. No worries there, eh? J This, too, would be interesting
The initial trip to the range was to break in the throat of the barrel and rough zero the scope. I did so using a method I learned from Larry Racine, former US Palma Team armorer. Start with a lightly oiled bore, shoot a shot using short bearing surface bullets at low velocity and only oil the bore between shots without cleaning. 6 shots did the job. The method works well for me and makes break-in simple.
The stock fit me well from the beginning and I noticed that the perceived recoil was somewhat less than my former conventional stocked rifle. My guess is that the recoil impulse moves straight back in line with the bore. Whatever the physics, it seems to recoil less with the same load I have been shooting for the last 2 years. It is a very comfortable stock with plenty of adjustment.
Here’s where the INCH action’s design got my attention. Due to the rear locking lug design, the bolt is shorter than a conventional action. This means that the loading port is closer to the shooter and allows comfortable and easy reloading without breaking position. This may not sound like a big deal, but I have spent the last couple of years having to break position to reload and this feature is very welcome and I suspect it will be worth some points on the line.
In the subsequent 2 weekends of shooting at 600 yards, I have committed to taking the rifle to Ireland. I found a Berger 185 BT Match load that gives me ½ MOA accuracy in the worst of mirage conditions and ¼ MOA in the calm……which is very rare here in Arizona. It has been my experience that results at 600 yards very closely mirror results at 1,000 yards.
Now it is time to load up my 350 rounds of match ammo and get it shipped to Berger.
Stay tuned…more to come.
Cheers!
Warren Dean
Team USA F-T/R
No comments:
Post a Comment