280 Ackley Improved Rifle Build
Rifle
- Bergara Premier Action: Long action. I could only find it in a magnum bolt face, so after I received it, I just called Bergara and they set out the correct bolt face for the 280AI (0.473″) and I swapped it out)
- Oregon Mountain Rifles Prefit Barrel chambered in 280AI
- Triggertech Primary Trigger
- MDT HNT26 Chassis (at least until Backfire’s Backlight Chassis comes out in October)
- Element Titan 3-18×50 scope (I currently have a Maven on there but I’m switching it out). I absolutely love the Element Titan. It’s my go-to for a rifle that I want absolutely precise adjustments from the turret.
- MDT Grnd Pod Great Bipod. Use this on a lot of my rifles. Only issue is it tends to work loose on the arca.
Ammo
Obviously, you need to do your own load development on your own rifle. The load below is what I’ve found, but it may be unsafe in your rifle. Always start with a low powder charge and work up, and make sure the overall length of the cartridge matches what you need in your rifle. This is just a reference of what’s working for me.
- Brass: Peterson 280AI
- Powder: H4350
- Bullet: Hornady 7mm 150gr CX
- Powder Load: 54.1gr (We saw SLIGHT pressure at 54.7gr on our rifle)
- Primer: Federal 210 large rifle
- COAL: 3.34″ (3.373″ is hitting the lands)
Results
- Average 5-shot group size: 0.34″ (Average of four 5-shot groups)
- Note: On the Youtube video featuring this rifle, we shot groups of 0.5 and 0.6″. Those were the worst groups we’d seen from this rifle but we weren’t sure what caused it. Turns out I loaded the ammo wrong. I read on my sheet that the max coal (to have the bullet hit the lands) was 3.73″ and I loaded the ammo at 3.73″, so the bullets were kissing the lands, which is usually terrible for accuracy. I read the wrong number on the sheet, which is 3.34″ to give us 30 thou of jump.
- Velocity: 2987fps
