Ross Mk.III Sniper Clone

[steveu]

All,
Here is a link to the pictures of a Sniper Clone that I helped my good friend Deepfreeze with.
https://www.milsurps.com/vbpicgallery.php?do=view&g=1306

It is a clone of the one that is on Forgotten Weapons with the Winchester A5 scope.  It is sporting a Malcolm 3X scope with Steve Earle bases that HRH Combat Arms in Fort Worth mounted properly.  It is about 98% finished.  I need to clean up the hole for the front base in the handguard, repair a crack in the handguard with some epoxy and clean the barreled action and wax it.  I free floated the barrel channel also.  The action screws are torqued to 35ip.  I did a ladder test with N140 and was getting a good group with 39 grains.  I did not pursue that powder because I got to thinking about the length of the barrel and thought that N160 would be a better choice.  After another ladder test, 44 grains of N160 came out on top.  I only shot 4 rounds to conserve the .313" 185 FMJBT's that I have.  The bullets and cases were weighed to 1 grain group.  Cases are Remington's that are neck sized and expanded with a .310" ball.  Primers were WW 8 1/2-120 LR.
The barrel has some light pitting that can be seen with a bore scope, but is bright to the eye.  The throat looks very good for a 100+ year old rifle.

It should be a fine shooter in the next Vintage Sniper Match next month!

Cheers,
Steve

[admin]

Very interesting.  Looks like a fun rifle to show off and shoot.  Nice that you are getting good accuracy with it.  Thanks for posting.

[steveu]

All,
Update on the clone.  I finally got all the required bits to load some cast bullets for the rifle.  Today I went to the range to test some loads. The bullet was from a Saeco #305 mould cast with isotope lead, sized to.312 and lubed with sagebrush lube.  I used Alliant 2400, 5 shots of each charge from 16-18 grains in 1/2 grain increments.  17.5 seemed to be the best load, 5 shots at 100 yards that could be covered with a quarter.  Next is testing at 200.  I did not get any velocity data as my chronograph was not working properly.

[admin]

Steve -

Thanks for the update. That is some fine accuracy.  What weight is the bullet?

[steveu]

With isotope lead they are 179.5 grains and measure .3125".  I size them to .312".  I am ver happy with the mould so far.  I have updated the photos in the link that have the target picture.