Follow along on the #KeeganStrong Build

[HellsCanyon]

Ran into a slight issue with the magazine box hitting the rear of the action mag well preventing the mag from locking into the bottom metal. A little bit of setup time and a few minutes on the mill and the mag well is clearanced.

After that’s done, torque everything into the stock and check case head presentation. As you can see it’s there, but not quite where I want it to be for reliable feeding.

Going to give the rear pillar another .010” on the mill and that should get me where I want to be.

Guys often ask why custom rifles are so expensive. When you’re not producing the same exact model of rifle with the same stock, bottom metal, action, barrels...etc you oftentimes run into “problems” like these. Especially with factory actions.

Mike

 

[HellsCanyon]

Success. Got very adequate case presentation, and the bottom metal sits flush with the stock line.... love it when a plan comes together

Mike


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[Cahunter805]

Looks like it's coming together very nice!! Great job to everyone involved and get well Keegan!!

 

[Matt W.]

Good job HellsCanyon! Makes me want to want to have you build me something! Fun to see the build develop and kudos to you all for helping the kiddo out!! We need to see more of these build threads. Always good to see something come together.

 

[BULLBLASTER]

Cool post Mike!
I like to see the step by step progress. I for one will never complain even if a project like this delays my stuff a bit. I can’t wait to see what kind of critters Keegan piles up with this stick! If only I had the hunting drive and toughness of that kid!

 

[HellsCanyon]

Update on surgery day!

"Final check in from Keegan's surgeon. He is out of surgery, and everything went well. They were able to excise all of the tumor and get clean margins without any problems and very little blood loss. They removed portions of 4 ribs that the tumor was touching, along with two small pieces of lung tissue, and the scar tissue from his original biopsy site. A titanium vertical expandable implant is now attached to his third and eighth rib (above and below what was removed) to provide the structural support needed from his missing ribs, and a gore tex patch is in place to keep his lung from expanding out through the chest cavity. He has a chest tube which will help to inflate his lung, drain fluids and air bubbles, and promote healing in the area of the lung tissue that was removed. This will be in place for a few days until the fluid drainage is down to a minimum volume.

The surgeon said Keegan was steady throughout the resection, and that he expects him to be ready to come out of recovery and into his room in ICU within the hour. He will be in ICU until his pain is controlled and he is stable enough to move to the regular floor. Discharge will be dependent on how quickly recovers, but the doctors are thinking he will be here for five to seven days.

We are so grateful for the skill of our surgeons in removing this nasty tumor and repairing the damage left behind, and for the excellent care he was provided by the anesthesia team, surgical assistants and nurses. This was the best place for him and we're thankful every day that we have access to this level of care and expertise. We are appreciative of all the encouraging words from friends and family throughout the day. Thank you for standing with us to support Keegan. It truly means so much to our family."

Mike

 

[mt100gr.]

Prayers from a father who paced the waiting room while a neurosurgeon removed a portion of my 10 month old daughter's skull. "Skills" is an understatement.

Good on you, Mike.

 

[Northernpiker]

Sounds good. It's amazing what doctors can do. Thoughts are with ya!

 

[Matt W.]

Praying for that family. What a roller coaster of emotions...

 

[BrushyHillGuide]

Mike- how’s the kid doing today? What are you lacking to finish the build? Any parts/pieces left to buy?

Prayers sent for a full and speedy recovery by God’s Grace!


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[HellsCanyon]

Mike- how’s the kid doing today? What are you lacking to finish the build? Any parts/pieces left to buy?

Prayers sent for a full and speedy recovery by God’s Grace!


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He’s had a rough recovery so far. Needed a blood transfusion cause of some low cell count of some type, trouble sleeping and a few other things but he’s being a stud of a patient and doing everything they ask of him! Here’s a few pics from today.

Surgery was a bit intrusive to say the least!

Only thing I could think of would be a bipod for the rifle. I gotta head to a friends this week to get the 260AI reamer and send his stock to my hydrodipper as well.

Here’s another picture of Keegan from our 2016 Idaho muley hunt. This was taken 6 miles in from the truck.

And another packing his buck down the mountain

Mike


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[BrushyHillGuide]

He’s had a rough recovery so far. Needed a blood transfusion cause of some low cell count of some type, trouble sleeping and a few other things but he’s being a stud of a patient and doing everything they ask of him! Here’s a few pics from today.

Surgery was a bit intrusive to say the least!

Only thing I could think of would be a bipod for the rifle. I gotta head to a friends this week to get the 260AI reamer and send his stock to my hydrodipper as well.

Here’s another picture of Keegan from our 2016 Idaho muley hunt. This was taken 6 miles in from the truck.

And another packing his buck down the mountain

Mike


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10-4. We’re praying for him. Tried emailing you about the bipod but your inbox is full. PM when you have some space.


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[HellsCanyon]

Not sure how to proceed with this thread if y’all want to hear about Keegan’s recovery or just the rifle build. I think I’ll be updating both....

Quick update tonight. Keegan is out of the hospital and back at the Ronald McDonald house in Seattle. His recovery has been a bit rough but he’s making good solid progress from the surgery. Results came back on the removed tumor and they indeed removed 100% of the cancerous tumor, however the tumor was was 33% killed from his prior chemotherapy treatments. They expected much more to be affected....
So now they will be adding radiation treatments to his next rounds of chemotherapy. He’s going to be one sick kid for awhile yet...

Rifle update:
Finally got the 260AI reamer this weekend. And I was able to cerakote Keegan’s Barrel and Action/Bolt last week with a bunch of others as well. It’s getting closer I’ll be adding a few more pictures when I get ready to chamber it up.

Mike


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[Jackelope]

Good stuff Mike. Thanks for taking us along for the ride. Praying for Keegan!!

 

[HellsCanyon]

Well getting some time back on this build among other customers.

After measuring the dimensions required for this action, regarding proper bolt nose clearance, recoil lug seat, tennon length/OD...etc the first step is to get the barrel dialed in. I've played a lot over the years with different methods of "dialing in" a barrel on the lathe, and have developed my own method, same goes for chambering methods. I won't dive too deep into that here.

First step is to turn tennon OD down to appropriate OD with approximate tennon length.


Next we cut the thread relief and recoil seat. I leave a bit more clearance here than most builders. If the recoil lug is a tight fit onto the tennon, it creates a potential to cause misalignment with the action and bolt lugs/centerline. This is applicable only because the recoil lug is "pinned" onto the action. If it was allowed to spin free then it wouldn't be a problem.



Next we thread the tennon, time the action to where I've marked top dead center of the barrel, and cut tennon to length. I also at this point pre-bore the chamber for various reasons but as I mentioned above I don't want to get too deep into my methods. Gotta protect what few trade secrets I have



Chamber is then reamed to headspace + .002". This allows excellent brass life, and allows you to not have to run modified case holders and still get the appropriate shoulder "bump back" when you resize your brass.
Finish chamber:

 

[HellsCanyon]

Next step was to get his muzzle brake spun up. Nathan Wright at Muzzle Brakes n More donated one of his 3 port brakes to the project, I REALLY like these brakes and have started using them on all my builds. 3 ports for the smaller calibers, any of the magnums get his 4 ports. They're really a quality brake. I've had some people say they've got excess runnout but after threading them I've measured less than .0002" runout on the last baffles bore.

Dialing in the muzzle with 2 indicators and a range rod. This range rod is precision ground and tapers. The lead end has an interchangeable pilot that's sized in .0002" increments. With the appropriate pilot you can really get the bore dialed in nicely. Certainly adequate for any sort of muzzle work when you can get the length of the rod running true to less than .0002" TIR it's entire length. This is very important if you're going to run suppressors or anything with a lot of baffles and you may be worried about a baffle strike. Lot of guys just indicate in tight to the muzzle and I've seen that cause some issues. As much as barrel builders would like you to believe, very very few barrels are perfectly straight, and at that I've yet to see a perfectly straight barrel consistently outshoot a barrel that's got some runout in the bore (if you know how to chamber them appropriately). But that's a different thread.



Same thing as threading the tennon. Cut appropriate OD and thread relief... I leave a full rotation's "short" on the muzzle threads first off as we're going to cut that shoulder back to properly time the brake.



Threaded



This brake was just a few degress past top dead center so I had to bring it nearly a full rotation around to get it properly timed.


11* crown cut


You'll often see builders just run an oversized drill bit through the brake to open it up to the appropriate ID for bullet clearance. Unless you single point it with a good boring bar you're doing it wrong. Drill bits are far too flexible to correct any sort of runout the brake baffles may have. They follow whatever existing path is already there.




Mike

 

[HellsCanyon]

Simple check with the range rod after the job is complete to ensure the bullet path is clear of any baffles on the brake.



Did a little final assembly before getting stock dipped. I might have to bust my hydrodip tank back out since the company I usually use isn't responding back to me for a free dip... can't blame em too much I guess


These donated scope rings are MUCH too high for this setup. Going to hit up a vendor of mine and see if they'll donate to the cause. Other than that everything is looking very good on this build!


Thanks for following along. Once the stock is dipped and brake is cerakoted I'll be passing the rifle to my buddy Karl who's close to Keegans family and he's going to be doing load development. I'll continue to update this throughout that process as well!

Mike

 

[HellsCanyon]

One thing I typically do but forgot the late night I chambered Keegans rifle is record a small video of chamber runout. So I did it on the last chamber I cut which happens to be a members here. .257 Weatherby going on a Tikka action.

The picture above of the range rod in the muzzle with two dial indicators is also a very common method to dialing in the chamber end of the barrel. However if you do this check at the end, dialing in with that method, you will almost always have AT LEAST .001" total runout of the lands/grooves at the end of the freebore. I've seen it much worse than that, as much as 3-4 thousandths out depending on the straightness of the barrel. This is part of why I've developed my chamber method to produce the truest and tightest chambers possible.

[video=youtube_share;Vcw8YIdMbI8]https://youtu.be/Vcw8YIdMbI8[/video]

 

[Cahunter805]

Great build!! Excellent work! Nathan's brakes are by far my favorite and really help tame muzzle jump.
Are you measuring off the lands with a long stem when dialing in the chamber? Also when you pre drill are you using custom ground core drill bits or just a regular drill bit?

 

[Brendan]

Chamber is then reamed to headspace + .002". This allows excellent brass life, and allows you to not have to run modified case holders and still get the appropriate shoulder "bump back" when you resize your brass.

Can you elaborate on this? Meaning that instead of using something like the Redding competition shellholders to gradually bump the shoulder back to get that clearance, you'd expect to get the same clearance with a standard shellholder?