OK riflemen, help me figure this out, please.

After reading some more on the 1903 accuracy, I was convinced that there's more accuracy inherent in the rifle than what I've seen. So, I tinkered a little and decided there might be a few things I could do to improve this one:

1) Better shooter - Naaaahhhh! Impossible. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/lol.gif" alt="" />

2) Bedding - I suspected the bedding was too tight around the recoil lug, so I used the Dremel and relieved the front and sides a little.

3) Copper fouling - noticed in the previous picture of the muzzle that there was some copper fouling. Cleaned it once with Hoppes #9, then five more times with Wipe Out foam and let each time soak for an hour. There was quite a bit of copper fouling.

4) Worn out barrel - I don't have a bore gauge, so I made do with what I had to try to measure it. Drilled, then turned down a lead egg sinker to .330, then pounded it into the muzzle with a rubber hammer - drove it through the barrel with wooden dowels as drifts, then checked the rifling (good) and measured the slug - the micrometer bounced between .307 and .308 (call it .3075") - so I think the bore is ok, although it drove easier at a couple points than others - maybe a sign of resonance induced wear?







5) Ammunition - Probably nothing wrong with Remington CoreLokt, but just in case I bought 2 boxes of Federal Gold Medal match rounds - 168gr Sierra BTHP.

6) Shooting platform - bought a couple of sandbags.

Went to the range and the first 100yd fouling shot from a clean barrel looked like it was going to be a nice day:



Waited 5 minutes between shots with the bolt open and the muzzle pointed straight up to let the barrel cool the best way I know how and the next 2 shots on an adjacent target were well away from the bullseye in opposite directions. Scratching my head, I went on to the next idea.

7) Barrel resonance - I've read that armorers shimmed the 1903s near the end of the barrel to about 4-9 lbs of pressure, so I tried clamping a doubled business card between the barrel and the stock (maybe too thick). The next 2 shots were completely off the paper, so I pulled the shim and started scratching my head again while thinking up the next thing to try.

7) Loose/bad scope - I tightened the scope mounts a little (haven't used a torque driver on them), loaded a full magazine and shot this target fairly quickly - all rounds in less than a minute - 2 rounds went into the lower hole:



Where's that been? That's 5 rounds in less than 1.5" c/c and a lot more like what the rifle should do. So, now all I need to do is settle down and shoot everything into the X-ring...... wasn't to be. Next I shot this target:



Then this one (an extra fouling round was fired into this target):



And finally this one, again fired fast (the 2 rounds furthest out were fired later from a standing position):



On the last target, the stringing of 5 shots in a line are what I would expect from a hot barrel, though not so pronounced. The weird thing is that they walked (in order) down the target from top left, through the bullseye to lower right.

What the heck's causing this? Bad scope is all I can think of at this point. I also noticed that in cleaning the bore after a few of the targets that subsequent first rounds were in the X-ring, like the first shot of the day. Maybe this barrel fouls badly? I'm stumped for now until I can try a known-good scope. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

Frank