Weekend Taipan Project

I decided to build a 700mm FX barrel kit for my Veteran today. I have made full 500mm and 600mm setups for it already using heavy duty steel sleeving, but I needed to get a feel for a full-size 700mm and figure out whether or not it needs an outer shroud. Used a new FX Superior Heavy liner that I polished up on my lathe, then scuffed the crap out of the exterior so I could apply an anaerobic gap filling bonding agent for the carbon fiber sleeving. 



That gave me a little idea to split the long unidirectional tubing in two pieces, and then I machined down a larger diameter piece from a high-modulus tube that I had custom made for .25 barrels. Doing this really ensured that there was a nice uniform coating of the bonding agent from end to end, and the coupling in the center was sanded down so that it was like a press fit to the inside of my custom barrel sleeve. (Side note - I have found that thinner unidirectional tubing works just as well as thicker / higher modulus tubing for clear improvements to accuracy when using the right bonding agent.)

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Dying to test this thing out. It has another 10 hours to cure, but if this 22cal FX Superior Heavy liner is as accurate as the other one I have, it should be able to snipe lime size targets at 300y with 40gr slugs! (Havibg stellar results with Griffin BTs and some FBs that D-RIG sent me to test in a BHN-9 hardness). 

I've had this turned up to 120FPE using a 700mm CZ with 55gr sided to .217 (single loading, they will not fit in the mag), but unfortunately the 700mm CZ has an extremely tight bore and only seems to prefer lighter slugs 😭

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Just crazy power from a rifle that has such a small hammer mass. Something tells me the barrel is not all that is no longer stock .... lol

That is definitely one of the ingredients lol..

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The function of a 300 yard reach I’d take in any form but that looks sharp besides. You able to take some weight out of the stock? I may have missed a post but if I recall you had mentioned wanting to.

I appreciate that! Honestly, I just sanded a wooden stock down and slapped some paint on it to see how well AlumaHyde would stick to it 😂 .. but yeah, the weight is always on my mind! This is a great hunting rifle with its monster power and accuracy. It would be near perfect for hunting in the mountains if the stock fore-ends weren't designed for benchrest. I had planned to trim down and lighten a couple of the factory beech stocks, but I have some other ideas that I'm hoping to (find the time to) bring to fruition .. think along the lines of Sabre tactical on a weight diet for Taipan.

Very nice work on that FX liner and carbon fiber sleeve! I’m sure it’ll shoot just as accurately as your other barrels! Hope to see the results
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Definitely planning to see tomorrow! I did a radical re-tune on it today, and I totally failed to drop in my other 700mm FX barrel to test it over the chronograph. My reg is only sitting at 150bar (I usually set it to 2500PSI for 40+ grain ammo), but I'm running one of my older valve prototypes with a slight modification and a new valve pin with "generous" travel at my disposal. My new valve will smoke this one, but I can get some ridiculously precise tuning using this valve system with a variety of custom springs and weights (along with some other valve voodoo that I won't discuss).

As much critique that FX liners get, I will say this - they can definitely be setup to perform just as well, if not better than solid / bull barrels. I have been through numerous ST and STX barrels, it was a numbers game finding a gem, but FX did something right with these Superior liners - none have been lemons for me thus far.





 
"think along the lines of Sabre tactical on a weight diet for Taipan." This I want to see!!!!!!!!

This gun needs some stock options besides Beech and laminate. I have the Beech and it looks better after a LOT of TreWax and polishing.

Yeah and synthetic would be another desirable option. 

It turns out that my reg was set way too low yesterday for heavy ammo. Only had the 40 grainers up around 900FPS, and I know for a fact that they shine at higher velocity. I had a bunch of 34gr Griffins with me, and only a couple of mags of the 24.8gr NSAs.

The 34's shot 2 MOA at 291 meters, attributed to cross-winds. They might also be a little small for the bore (these were like .2168" in diameter). The 24.8gr did damn well at my 91 meter zero target, I'll upload the video soon:

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