Custom Left-Hand Remington 700 in 308 Winchester Precision Rifle

If only accurate rifles are interesting... this one is interesting...

This is a custom Remington 700 precision rifle I built with my friend.  It is a collection of old and new parts.

custom Rem 700 left side 308 2

New parts purchased were a Remington 700 Left-Hand short action receiver with .308 bolt face, Shilen #7 Select Match Barrel with a 1:10 twist, and Jewel HVR trigger.  New left-handed Remington 700 actions are hard to come buy.  He bought this one from Brownells when they got a few in.  He scored a used McMillan A4 stock with Badger M5 bottom metal online and added a Vortex Razor 5-20X50mm FFP mil/mil scope in Vortex matched rings. Here is a picture of all the parts before we started working on them…

lil guys 308 in parts

Unfortunately, we didn’t take pictures as we were building it, but here is a short overview of what we did.  The action was trued with a Manson Receiver Accurizing kit and we installed an external bolt stop.  We chambered the Shilen barrel with a Manson 308 Match reamer.  The action was bedded (we didn’t bed the bottom metal) in Marine-tex prior to painting the parts.

custom lh rem 700 308 vortex

The bolt was helically fluted and a hunter bolt knob installed by Kampfeld Custom.

My buddy coated the metal in Gun-Kote and the stock is Duracoat.  He was a professional high end car painted before he became a cop- that’s why his work looks so good.  He used Bulldog GAP stencils for the camouflage pattern.

Custom rem 700 308 fluted bolt and handle

The Vortex Razor is a solid option in performance optics. This is sitting on a 10 MOA Nightforce base with Vortex matched rings.

custom 700 lh 308 front

We installed a Picatinny rail on the fore end so he could attach a Sierra 7 bipod.  The barrel is 24″ long with a .090″ deep recessed target crown.

custom 700 308 bipod mount

If only accurate rifles are interesting… this one is definitely interesting…

WARNING: The loads shown are for informational purposes only.  They are only safe in the rifle shown and may not be safe in yours.  Consult appropriate load manuals prior to developing your own handloads.  Rifleshooter.com and its authors, do not assume any responsibility, directly or indirectly for the safety of the readers attempting to follow any instructions or perform any of the tasks shown, or the use or misuse of any information contained herein, on this website.

5 shots 100 yards 168 SMK custom 700 shilen bbl

This rifle loves the Seirra 168 grain MatchKing HPBT (above).  5 rounds at 100 yards, prone with a bipod and rear bag.  .244″ (.233 MOA).  He is using Lapua brass, Varget, and Federal match primers and is getting 2600 feet/second with an extreme spread of 26.37 and a standard deviation of 10.24.

IMG_6344

Above is another 5 shot group at 100 yards with the 168 SMK using the same load above from the bench.

IMG_6345

The 175 SMK shoots well too.  This is a 3 round group at 100 yards.

IMG_6343

Factory Federal 308 Gold Medal with the 168 SMK shot well too (above) in this 3 shot group.

Looking at how it shoots you can see why we are both fans of Shilen barrels.  I know they developed a bad rep years back, but I haven’t encountered a bad Shilen barrel yet.

He’s real happy with the way his rifle turned out. Too bad it is left-handed…

To learn more about how we build rifles, take a look at the projects guns page!