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Posted: 9/22/2006 7:16:35 AM EDT
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I am looking into High Power competition and I am trying to decide on my first rifle. I am considering a Rock River NM A2 or a RRA lower with a White Oak serivce rifle upper. Any advice? Jordan |
I don't think so. A top quality AR15 service rifle can be had for about $900 (RRA NM lower + WOA upper with pinend rear sight). Taking a varmint bolt gun and adding a set of sights of equal quality to what is on a White Oak upper will set you back at least $1200 to $1300. A quality rear sight for a match rifle will coast at least $300, and that does not include the aperture ($50 for a basic one). Budget another $100 (at least) for the front sight and aperture. Then you need to find a Winchester Model 70 or Tikka T3 Varmint because they are the only ones that come with a factory mag that holds the necessary 5 rounds. IF you already had one of the two mentioned bolt guns, your option would make $ sense. And I am a bolt gun fan. To the OP, I would go with a RRA NM lower and a White Oak Armament NM upper with the pinned rear sight option and not look back. |
I have a White Oak upper and it will shoot better than I can hold. Get it. |
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Yeah if you are thinking Tikka etc I agree. Highpower is getting to be expensive to play the game period. I generally keep a pre 64 Target rifle in a sporter stock with a no 5A barrel and Redfields for new shooters. I have extra spotting scopes, mat, coat etc. I have seen used bolt guns for 800.00 that are basically ready to go. Get them used to what can be accomplished with a bolt gun that does not give near the problems of AR. I laid off a few years and went to Perry and I saw long lines in front of every military van. I asked some questions as it looked like a trigger weighing line but no one had weights out. Come to find out the major problem they were having was the rifles were dirty. Rarely do you see a bolt gun going to a van for work. Hell for that matter rarely do you see a bolt gun any more haha. |
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Humpy, I hear you on cheap used bolt guns. If you look in gunbroker.com regularly, you can find some steals. I did see a Model 70 with a McMillan drop belly go for $800 w/o sights. That was a steal. I picked this one up on gunbroker for $1600 as you see it. It had 800 rounds through its 260 Rem Krieger. Even though I am still doing service rifle, I could not resist this pre 64. I have shot it in several matches yet, and it is an absolute hammer.   I also picked up this M700-based Palma rifle for $1000 (w/o the sight)   |
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How do you fire your rapid fire strings with a bolt gun? Seems like you would have to have a clip slotted receiver and be using stripper clips. ETA: after going back over everything, are we talking High Power, or High Power Service Rifle? Or is there no difference? |
If you have a bolt gun made from a traditional hunting rifle action and a traditional style stock, then yes, need a stripper clip notch. They can be machined into the rear bridge or they can be bolted on using the rear scope mount holes. My Model 70 (the one with the red stock) is set up with a bolt on slot. Newer style guns like the TUBB 2000, Tikka T3, and the tube guns all use detachable magazines. Having shot both semi autos with DMs and traditional bolt guns, I don't find the bolt gunner with clips to be very handicapped at all. You just need to dry fire rapid strings more with a bolt gun. |
We are talking NRA High Power Rifle. Two types of rifles are allowed in NRA HP: Service Rifles and Match Rifles. The bolt guns you've seen are examples of Match Rifles. You can also configure an AR15 as a Match Rifle: 
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+1. You can not go wrong with White Oak. I have an Eagle Arms lower with a White Oak Armament upper, and a tuned RRA trigger (also from White Oak). |
| +1 Call John Holliger at White Oak Precision and have him set you up with a national match, service rifle configuration upper with his pinned rear sight. Get your order in early as he typically has a 8-week backlog. Once that's on-order, give Pete a call at Legal Transfers and get one of his RRA lowers with 2-stage national match trigger. This configuration will easily take you to High Master classification but the rest will be up to you and your ammo. Good luck!!! |
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While RRAs are great 99% of the time, White Oak gives you the assurance that everything is perfect with your upper 100% of the time. I had to replace the rear sight leaf of my NM RRA almost as soon as I got it because it was slipping. It was clear that someone at RRA had taken a 72 TPI tap and ran it through the threads in the leaf to go from 1/2 MOA to 1/4 MOA windage. Shit worksmanship. I replaced the leaf and screw with parts from Anna Kinney (First Strike) and now the sight tracks perfectly. I should not have needed to do that on a nearly $1K rifle.  |
 Not that you'd want to start out with a full-blown space gun but..... Bushmaster Lower, Compass Lake 26" Upper, SR 25 Trigger, PNW Sights. RRA Short entry buttstock with adjustible buttplate, Free Floated with a handrail. Quite a handfull to shoot off-hand. Shoots 80's for 600 yards no problem |
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