Getting Into Long Range Hunting - Ongoing thread

[Mossie]

The Rifle

So of course the first step was to get a suitable rifle in a suitable caliber. To do this, I needed to set a goal of how far I wanted to shoot. I decided that 500 yards was a good figure. This seemed to be a good starting point, as it was generally outside the range of most hunting rifles, but wasnt at the extreme end of things. I felt this was an achievable figure on my modest budget.

Caliber
The age old argument with all forms of shooting and hunting - What caliber? Well it didnt take me long to make the decision that 7mm Remington Magnum would be my cartridge of choice. The main reasons why I chose this were:

• Manageable recoil without the need for a muzzle brake
• Inherent Accuracy
• 162gr A-Max seems to be a good projectile of choice
• Enough energy to move out to longer ranges as my skill level increased

Rifle

This was an area that had me thinking for a significant amount of time. I basically had 4 options:

• Buy someones custom built rifle
• Buy a high end factory rifle
• Buy a standard factory rifle and customise from there
• Buy a standard factory rifle - and shoot it

All of them had their pros and cons. Initially my plans were to bring in a Rem 700 Stainless Magnum action and a Shillen Barrel from the US. This looked to cost about $1300 landed. However this was taken off the menu due to the Stainless Magnum actions being discontinued from the factory.
I was then keeping an eye out on trademe for a secondhand Rem 700 that I could pickup and then build a custom from. While doing this, Kiwigreg from the forum posted his Rem Sendero up for sale. It already had load development done, had a Warne steel rail attached, and had done bugger all work. Greg had fired a few groups with it, and it looked to be an excellent shooter. It also came with 15 loaded rounds, and 35 once fired Norma brass. All this for $2400. In the end, I decided this was the best option for me.