Kimber 8400 Advanced Tactical 308 Win. Kit

[longrangehunter]

This was a Cyber Monday super buy of the year! It was so cheap I wondered what was wrong with it? Come to find out nothing but a super cyber monday deal, so my brother will be the lucky guy to get it.

The gun had only 67 rounds down the barrel, and only two very small marks of the windage turret cap that are hard to even see! Crown and Kimber Pro II paint is mint, came in a Custom Kimber Tactical Pelican case, a Leupold LR/T M1 3.5-10x40 Illuminated scope mounted on a 20 MOA base. The kit was only missing the torque wrench, Versa-Pod Bipod, a sling and the Otis 7.62 gun cleaning kit.

I picked up 250 pieces of Winchester Brass and two boxes each in Sierra 168 MK and the Berger Classic 168 Hunter, so in the next few weeks I'll see how this thing runs.

Like most Kimber Rifles it should be a shooter, these are all put together in there custom shop and come with a 1/2 MOA accuracy guarantee, so it should shot.

 

[Guy Miner]

Nice! Should prove to be an accurate and worthwhile rifle.

Looks great! In a tactical sort of way... :grin:

BTW, that very scope has been Very Popular with law enforcement snipers/precision riflemen for some time now. Good scope!

Guy

 

[DrMike]

Very nice! Glad you were able to take advantage of the deal!

 

[SJB358]

Very nice! I like it!

 

[longrangehunter]

Thanks Guy, Mike and Scotty,

My brother Michael is fortunate enough I had been looking for a rifle, but he wasn't looking for a 308, he wanted a 7mm Rem. Mag. I had been looking around for the past three months and came across this so I called him. He wasn't really interested until I sold him on the whole package deal, at $1,999.00 it was too good to pass up. I was going to buy it just to flip it even if he wasn't interested but after telling him what it was he decided he'd take my advise and have me buy it for him.

The sum of the parts are worth a lot more, just the rifle in the hard case retails at $2497.00. The contents of the kit add another $2575.00 retail. Therefore, the entire Kimber Advanced Tactical Rifle Kit has an MSRP of $5072.00. Just yesterday I saw two rifles in that price range with no scope, one had the case, so I felt it was worth the purchase price just to test it out and if nothing else I could always sell it off?

It weights #13.5 lbs. w/the scope attached so it's no lite weight. But the stock is fully adjustable for LOP from 14.25"-12.25" as well as cheek height, which does add some serious weight and being a McMillan A-5 stock is no slim cookie to begin with.

It should be fun to develop a load for and I look forward to testing it out...... I'll post some pics when I get the chance to put some round through it.

 

[SJB358]

I bet it'll be a sweet shooter. Looks like a lot of fun.

 

[hunting1]

I have the same rifle, you got a smoking deal! Love to hear how it shoots. so far mine is liking 4064 and NComp 175's.

 

[Guy Miner]

A rifle like that, fairly heavy, built for accuracy, cartridge known for accuracy, and very easy to shoot, can be a great tool for building excellent rifle marksmanship skills. Very rewarding to shoot such a rifle, leading to many good hours on the range, and a lot of money spent on loading components... :mrgreen:

 

[longrangehunter]

I have the same rifle, you got a smoking deal! Love to hear how it shoots. so far mine is liking 4064 and NComp 175's.

I tested out a few loads with IMR-4064 and the 168 SMK on Saturday, the first three went into one hole measuring .1265", then the other two went high/right, and low/left see photo #1. This could have been to the barrel heating up and/or as well as me.

Today I went with 42.0 of RL-15 and the 168 SMK since my last 7-08 loved that powder with two different bullets, and this gun seemed to as well, the first three went into another one hole measuring .1295", see photo #2. Then photo # 3 shows a five shot group from this load, 4 shots measured .2595" and the 5th pushed it out to .620"

It seems this gun really likes to shot with a super clean barrel with no fouling shots, both times the first three shot groups went into 1/8" holes. I didn't get to run these loads over my chronograph and today was a little difficult shooting at 275 yards since the sun was making the frost turn to a cold fog and the target was in the shade making it super hard for me to see it well enough through the fog plus shooting off the frozen ground with a bipod doesn't help matters much either. I wasn't all that impressed, they were 1.8" and 1.6" groups so I'll need to test it some more.

 

[longrangehunter]

Guy, my next load to try will be yours, 45.0 grains of VarGet behind the 168 SMK.

 

[Guy Miner]

Dang, that rifle of yours is indeed a shooter! NICE!

Go ahead and try a grain or so either side of that, working up properly of course. I've also found excellent accuracy at 44 and 46 grains. Just settled on 45 grains a long time ago as my standard load.

RL-15 has also proven very good for me, and the Nosler match bullets are just as accurate as the Sierras. I've been loading Sierras lately because I have a stash of old ones I'm trying to reduce. Like boxes of 100 bullets marked at $10 - $13... Dang, I like those prices!

Guy

 

[longrangehunter]

Thanks Guy,

I don't know how fast/slow these were going but when I shot them @ 275 yards the 4.0 MOA dial up was low, so I put in another .75 for 4.75 at that distance and was still low. From looking at my Shooter app and matching the dial up this load must be really slow, 2400 fps? Because I think it would have needed 5 MOA for a 275 zero.

How far off the lands are you seating the SMK in your rifle Guy? These loads were .020" off the lands.

 

[Guy Miner]

Danged if I know Cole! Haven't measured it in ages. This Krieger barrel has a lot of rounds down the barrel now. I just seat the .308's to magazine length, 2.8" and call it good. The chamber was cut with a "95 Palma" reamer, and edged out just a tad, to make room for factory Federal Gold Medal 168 grain ammo.

Must work, it's made 2.5" - 3" groups at 600 yards when I was on my game and the wind cooperated.

Typically, sighted in at 100 yards, I'll need to come up 4.0 - 4.5 MOA for 300 yards. 168's at about 2700 fps.

Regards, Guy

 

[longrangehunter]

Thanks for the info Guy. I'll need to get out the chronograph when the sun comes back out and shoot these loads to see what speed they're going? I'm going to test the scope for tracking and see if it tracks correctly as I dial since I have a zero wind day.

These loads were loaded to 2.8550"-2.8555" COAL or 2.2675" CBTO length. I tried further away and .005" closer to the lands but both shot worse then this seating depth so I stayed with what I started with.

 

[SJB358]

What an awesome shooting machine! Be hard to not like a rifle like that!

 

[hunting1]

Looks good to me! Your groups are about what I had my first outing. I only have 100-ea rounds down range so I am sure I will tighten things up a bit more. Very nice toys, here is mine.

 

[pre6422hornet]

Oh man. That is one heckuva deal.

My FNSPR .308 loves 168gr bullets and IMR 4064.

 

[longrangehunter]

I started working on finding a load with the Berger 168 Classic Hunter Yesterday. Used the same charge weight as the 168 SMK and with a slightly different setting depth. Come to find out I was close with the first five rounds and moved the bullet further out .005" towards the lands and.... boom! Bug holes.

This load is once fired and partially sized Winchester match prepped brass.

168 Berger Classic Hunter 43.0 RL-15; F210M; Winchester Brass@ 2.2550" CBTO. 100 yards from a BR-Pivot bench. Group measured .3430" five shots all in a row slow rate of fire.

I made five more rounds and went out to 455 yards prone in the deep snow, shot was 11 degrees uphill and zero wind call. Used 9.5 MOA up and all five hit there mark on the steel. Not bad for three attempts at finding a good hunting load, now I'll just have to test the 168 SMK at the same distance and hopefully this project will be done.

 

[longrangehunter]

This was the work up over the chronograph and the five shots over the various powder charges using the 168 SMK. Final load was 42.9 RL-15 F210M Win. Brass@ 2.2675 CBTO Velocity is in the 2600 FPS range with very low ES and SD. Should work real well.

Note: Any time I have ever shot a clean barrel over a chronograph I have noticed the velocity is almost always higher, and then the bullets settle down to a average speed.

 

[DrMike]

Very nice and assuredly gratifying. Yeah, that'll do.