Two Gun Guy, Advice, Guns

(That thing being arrowed is awesome – I’ll bet instead of bullets it just fires fully formed explosions.)

Clearly looking to capitalize off the future success of 2WO G2N G2Y, some writer for Syracuse DOT COM has dubbed his buddy THE Gun Guy, and is dispensing firearms device.

Being that I played 2GG, and thus have held real guns several times over the course of three days, I feel I must get into character and answer these questions the correct way.

While this would seem like it’d be an ongoing feature, I’ll bet I only do it once.

Here is the question that was sent to the guy.

While the writer signed it “Joe Trihey”, I think his real name is probably, “I Have Way Too Much To Say About Guns Trihey”.

Besides all his words, I can’t help but think there’s something wrong when a person is looking for advice that is best summed up as, “my gun isn’t killing things good enough”.

Question:
I have recently purchased the a new BAR Longtac 270 and I am a little displeased with the accuracy of the gun. I would like to share a few details of my experience with the gun and get a professional opinion on the matter. I have been a deer hunter for the past 12-14 years and I’ve had several bolt action rifles, all of them being 270s and have been pleased with the accuracy and flat trajectory of this caliber. I am accustomed to still hunting but have recently moved to an area where dog hunting is the primary focus and the guys I hunt with shoot rifles, naturally automatic rifles. The majority of them consider Browning the only automatic rifle. I did some research and found that it has a good reputation for reliability and accuracy. After purchasing the Longtrac I mounted a 3x9x40 bushnell elite 4200 scope along with weaver bases and rings. I would have used leupold mounts but I had a bad experience with these in the past.

The rest is after the link, followed by 2GG’s answer.

I first sighted the rifle in at 25 yds. I moved the target out to 100 yds. Shot 3 different brands of 130 grain bullets (core lokt, hornady custom, rem prem accutip) and 3 shots each. The gun was shooting all over the place, 5-6″ groups at best with the hornady’s. The person with me said it was me. But I am usually capable of shooting 1″ groups with other rifles so I knew that was not the case. Just to make sure, I quit for the day, cleaned the gun that night and shot it again the next day. The results were not better. After this I began to examine the gun. I noticed that the crown was not center of the bore and it was not square either (almost looks like somebody slipped with a cordless drill). It is not easily noticable but it definately is not right. So I took it to a local guy, who I believe is a gunsmith, and had him look it over. He found that the scope bases were loose. I was very surprised b/c I used a thread locker and tightened them pretty good or at least I thought so. He tightened them and remounted the scope. I told him that I had mounted the scope well and he said that the aluminum reciever has steel plugs that the base screws go into and that these can sometimes come loose from the reciever. He said to shoot the gun some more and check the bases again, if they were loose again to send it back to Browning. I asked him about the crown, and he replied that it probably would not make a great impact on the accuracy.

I took the gun back to the range. Zeroed in at 25 yds, and then shot three 3 shot groups at 100 with the ammo mentioned above. This time it shot better, but not what I expect out of a $1100.00 gun and scope. The rem ammo shot 3-4″ groups and the Hornady about 2″. One thing I find strange about the groups is the pattern; it shows some consistency but not accuracy. I kept 6 of the targets I shot, using a new target for each 3 shot group. On 3 out of the six targets there is a pattern that is very similar. The pattern is like this: 3 bullet holes following a diagonal line 3-6″ long consistantly going higher and to the right away from the bullseye almost making a straight line if you connect the dots. I dont know which ones are the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd shot but at any rate it is notable. In fact on two of the last three targets shot 2 of the holes line up almost perfectly with one another.

I have not yet taken the scope off to check the base screws. First of all I would like to know if it is possible for the “steel plugs” inside the aluminum receiver to actually come loose, it could have been me not using enough torque the 1st time. Secondly to what effect could the crown have on accuracy. To give you an idea of the crown dislocation: it looks slightly egg shaped looking into the bore and on one side of the crown the depth of the crown is about the thickness of a dime and exactly opposite of that it is about the thickness of a small paper clip and then about an eigth of the circumfrence looks like it did not get crowned at all. So I am wondering if this will have an effect on accuracy and if it does should I have the gun replaced or have the barrel recrowned. The reason I would be hesitant to have the gun replaced is because it did shoot a 2″ group with the bad crown and if there is a good possibility that a correct crown job could bring it down to an inch then I would say that I have a good gun and just a bad crown, and why should I return it when I may get a gun that will not shoot any better than 2″ groups with a good crown job. From what I read mass production guns, especially automatics are hit and miss.
- Joe Trihey

DEAR JOE GET ANOTHER GUN SO YOU HAVE TWO ADN THEN SHOOT EVERYTHING YOU SEE THANKS FOR WRITING 2GG

UPDATE: The following quote is from The Gun Guy’s actual answer, and if you think it’s not making its way into a future 2GG script, then you’re wrong:

A good man with a bolt action rifle is hard to beat.

So true. So very true.