Waterboy3313
Member
So I have a Remington 597 in 22 LR. It was my first rifle I ever purchased when I was 18 years old back in 2000 or 2001. I bought it new from a big 5 store. It came in stainless with a standard diameter barrel and the ugly grey synthetic stock.
I'm sure as being a kid before the internet was a big thing I made several mistakes in it's lifetime. Like jamming cheap aluminum cleaning rods and brass cleaning brushes down it from the muzzle end of the barrel very often. It probably has 50ish thousand rounds through it or more. Then I went through a phase for years where it didn't see the light of day.
When my son was around 8 (about 5 years ago) it came out of the safe and he learned how to shoot using this rifle. He was actually impressive to watch. Very accurate as long as he did his part. The kid went through a phase and is still in it where he doesn't want to go shooting or even hang out with his parents right now.
I decided to drag it out and play with it a little bit recently. I put a weaver 3x9 scope on it I had in recycle bin. I was breaking clays on the berm out to 185 yards. That was the limit of my bdc reticle on max power. Having tons of fun I decided to upgrade the scope again. I found a Athlon 6x24-50 scope in my recycling bin that was known to be a great scope for the previous application it was mounted to.
I put the Athlon scope on and went to the range. I set up paper targets on a stand at 50 yards. Trying 4 types of ammo I was averaging 5-6" groups. I was frustrated with my groups and adjusted my scope in the center of my fat groups and proceeded to clays and random things out between 100-150ish yards.
Ranging every shot before actually pulling the trigger and making notes I was actually pretty accurate. The large groups on paper made it frustrating but yet amazing I was hitting single targets at longer distance. I went home and cleaned the barrel very thoroughly. Several patches came out very blue and then black before showing signs of being clean. I probably ran 25-30 total patches through it before I was happy.
After seeing how dirty it was I assumed it was the reason for my garbage groups on paper. Yesterday I took it to the range again. I set up my target stand at 50 yards. I ran 10 rounds through it before even trying to shoot a group and then passed it to my son that I forced to go with me.
After he shot about 80 rounds through it he was mad and frustrated he couldn't get a single bullseye. During that time I made a couple of scope adjustments and shot several 10 round magazines myself with poor results. All shooting was done from a very sturdy table with a stool that was not attached to the table. Front rest was a haris bi pod and the rear of the stock was rested on a bag. The setup is very solid. I used another rifle on the same setup same day at a 100 yards and was getting 5 shot groups under 1 MOA before moving the target stand closer and changing over to the 22lr.
Being at the point of major frustration here. I'm at a loss of trying to figure this out. I know it has a lot of rounds through it but I wouldn't think a 22lr barrel would not be shot out yet. As a kid I'm sure the barrel got hot or more like warm when I was yanking the trigger as fast as I could several magazines in a row. I probably abused it more cleaning the barrel improperly more than anything.
I'm curious what other people find as an average size group with their 597s. Am I wrong thinking it should be better? If I could get down to a 1" group at 50 yards I would probably be ok with that for what it is. I think that my results should be much better than they are.
I found a new Jarvis barrel for sale but I don't really want to dump a bunch of money into this thing. If it's going to cost me upwards of $500 to fix it I would rather spend the money towards buying a new bolt action CZ or Tikka. Any suggestions or ideas would be greatly appreciated.
I'm sure as being a kid before the internet was a big thing I made several mistakes in it's lifetime. Like jamming cheap aluminum cleaning rods and brass cleaning brushes down it from the muzzle end of the barrel very often. It probably has 50ish thousand rounds through it or more. Then I went through a phase for years where it didn't see the light of day.
When my son was around 8 (about 5 years ago) it came out of the safe and he learned how to shoot using this rifle. He was actually impressive to watch. Very accurate as long as he did his part. The kid went through a phase and is still in it where he doesn't want to go shooting or even hang out with his parents right now.
I decided to drag it out and play with it a little bit recently. I put a weaver 3x9 scope on it I had in recycle bin. I was breaking clays on the berm out to 185 yards. That was the limit of my bdc reticle on max power. Having tons of fun I decided to upgrade the scope again. I found a Athlon 6x24-50 scope in my recycling bin that was known to be a great scope for the previous application it was mounted to.
I put the Athlon scope on and went to the range. I set up paper targets on a stand at 50 yards. Trying 4 types of ammo I was averaging 5-6" groups. I was frustrated with my groups and adjusted my scope in the center of my fat groups and proceeded to clays and random things out between 100-150ish yards.
Ranging every shot before actually pulling the trigger and making notes I was actually pretty accurate. The large groups on paper made it frustrating but yet amazing I was hitting single targets at longer distance. I went home and cleaned the barrel very thoroughly. Several patches came out very blue and then black before showing signs of being clean. I probably ran 25-30 total patches through it before I was happy.
After seeing how dirty it was I assumed it was the reason for my garbage groups on paper. Yesterday I took it to the range again. I set up my target stand at 50 yards. I ran 10 rounds through it before even trying to shoot a group and then passed it to my son that I forced to go with me.
After he shot about 80 rounds through it he was mad and frustrated he couldn't get a single bullseye. During that time I made a couple of scope adjustments and shot several 10 round magazines myself with poor results. All shooting was done from a very sturdy table with a stool that was not attached to the table. Front rest was a haris bi pod and the rear of the stock was rested on a bag. The setup is very solid. I used another rifle on the same setup same day at a 100 yards and was getting 5 shot groups under 1 MOA before moving the target stand closer and changing over to the 22lr.
Being at the point of major frustration here. I'm at a loss of trying to figure this out. I know it has a lot of rounds through it but I wouldn't think a 22lr barrel would not be shot out yet. As a kid I'm sure the barrel got hot or more like warm when I was yanking the trigger as fast as I could several magazines in a row. I probably abused it more cleaning the barrel improperly more than anything.
I'm curious what other people find as an average size group with their 597s. Am I wrong thinking it should be better? If I could get down to a 1" group at 50 yards I would probably be ok with that for what it is. I think that my results should be much better than they are.
I found a new Jarvis barrel for sale but I don't really want to dump a bunch of money into this thing. If it's going to cost me upwards of $500 to fix it I would rather spend the money towards buying a new bolt action CZ or Tikka. Any suggestions or ideas would be greatly appreciated.