Thread: 22lr Benchrest: Rebarrel a 22, preferred gunsmith

I have a Tikka T1x that I use primarily for target shooting, while it shoots pretty well all things considered I'm pretty convinced I want to rebarrel it to a a much longer heavier barrel.

Are there any preferred gun smiths to do rimfire rebarrelling/ accuracy work?
Or has anyone had any luck with a (22lr not centrefire) rebarrel from Trueflight or Hardy?

If money wasn't an object I'd just buy a Vudoo barrelled action, but considering they are $6000 with no trigger or stock, dropping $8000 on a new build seems a little mad if I haven't atleast considered the alternatives.

I can't find much info about rebarrel Tikka T1s other than prefit drop in barrels which are common in the US, and these all get fairy mixed reviews.
Considering how common it is to rebarrel CZ 452/455/457s and get incredibly good results, I can only think Tikka T1s are either:
-too new to the market to have a following in rimfire benchrest
-accurate enough out of the box people don't bother
-have some major flaw that stops them being rebarrelled (certainly not as easy as a CZ455/457)

Cheers

Have shot with a number of guys that use the Trueflite barrels, they swear by them. Grant seems to have the 22LR sussed and his barrels are accurate.

or try a walther barrel?

Wingman........

Buy a new T1X

Originally Posted by Beetroot

I have a Tikka T1x that I use primarily for target shooting, while it shoots pretty well all things considered I'm pretty convinced I want to rebarrel it to a a much longer heavier barrel.

Are there any preferred gun smiths to do rimfire rebarrelling/ accuracy work?
Or has anyone had any luck with a (22lr not centrefire) rebarrel from Trueflight or Hardy?

If money wasn't an object I'd just buy a Vudoo barrelled action, but considering they are $6000 with no trigger or stock, dropping $8000 on a new build seems a little mad if I haven't atleast considered the alternatives.

I can't find much info about rebarrel Tikka T1s other than prefit drop in barrels which are common in the US, and these all get fairy mixed reviews.
Considering how common it is to rebarrel CZ 452/455/457s and get incredibly good results, I can only think Tikka T1s are either:
-too new to the market to have a following in rimfire benchrest
-accurate enough out of the box people don't bother
-have some major flaw that stops them being rebarrelled (certainly not as easy as a CZ455/457)

Cheers

Im following these comments with interest. Been trying to find a .22 cal target rifle for a 13 year old. The old 1408 hes using is just to heavy.
Something like a T1X looks perfect but are target sights available and are they easily fitted. Particularly the foresight
Appreciate any advice or thoughts
and ps, sorry for hijacking the thread

I've already exchanged a few comments with "Beetroot" re the options available to him.

I've re-barrelled a number of 22LR actions (including a couple of Anschutz, Cooper, Weihrauch, Lithgow and even a Savage Mark II). All are excellent shooters but the key is finding a smith who understands rim fire builds - Some outstanding center fire smiths out there but not everyone can build a 22LR.

Re TF barrels, I have Grant's ultra match 22LR blanks on my Anschutz 1761 & Cooper 57M - I also own barrels by some of the best known US manufacturers - TF are the equal of any of them IMO.

Plenty of CZ457 builds floating around that can hang with the 700 foot prints so I see no reason why a build done on a Tikka wouldn't be OK.

Any rim fire, regardless of make, is a roll of the dice. I've been buying 22's all my life and some of the most expensive have turned out to be absolute dogs.

why not a jw action

Im sure your post above was in jest - but Norinco did make target rifles and some of them are very good.

I wouldnt write off a Norinco as the base for a target rifle with a new barrel.

Originally Posted by sportco62

Im sure your post above was in jest - but Norinco did make target rifles and some of them are very good.

I wouldnt write off a Norinco as the base for a target rifle with a new barrel.

With the likes of the EM332 (Also Norinco) this goes double. Also not sure if longer equals better with 22LR.... @mudgripz may have something to add re that topic...

Originally Posted by sportco62

Im sure your post above was in jest - but Norinco did make target rifles and some of them are very good.

I wouldnt write off a Norinco as the base for a target rifle with a new barrel.

it was....how many jws are up there at Olympic or dominating bench rest worldwide out of curiosity?

Originally Posted by blip

it was....how many jws are up there at Olympic or dominating bench rest worldwide out of curiosity?

If the article I have around here somewhere is accurate...more than you think...

Norinco is Northern China Company (or similar) and is a large group of manufacturing plants. The target rifles (centrefire and rimfire ) were made by Norinco for the olympic teams....The EM332 was reportedly out of the same plant, but JW15s are made in most of the plants and under different brandings and qualitites....(Polytech, Bushman Norinco and a couple others that I cannot remember.) The thing to remember is Chinese factories are well capable of making extremely high quality products, but no one in the west is prepared to pay top dollar for made in china...so they sell us the stuff we pay for (often cheap nasty stuff cos thats what we expect) Think of Japans reputation for manufacturing cars and motorbikes in the 50s and 60s The term Jap crap ring any bells? And remember the Japanese were centuries ahead of western nations at metalurgy in the 1800s so why was their stuff suddenly rubbish?? Cos thats whaat the west told them hey would pay for it....

In the early 2000s I was dealing a litle bit with imorted products and I saw some exceptional quality coming out of Russia and I saw some absolute rubbish coming from the USA and some of that had supposedly reputable branding on it too......

Originally Posted by timattalon

If the article I have around here somewhere is accurate...more than you think...

Norinco is Northern China Company (or similar) and is a large group of manufacturing plants. The target rifles (centrefire and rimfire ) were made by Norinco for the olympic teams....The EM332 was reportedly out of the same plant, but JW15s are made in most of the plants and under different brandings and qualitites....(Polytech, Bushman Norinco and a couple others that I cannot remember.) The thing to remember is Chinese factories are well capable of making extremely high quality products, but no one in the west is prepared to pay top dollar for made in china...so they sell us the stuff we pay for (often cheap nasty stuff cos thats what we expect) Think of Japans reputation for manufacturing cars and motorbikes in the 50s and 60s The term Jap crap ring any bells? And remember the Japanese were centuries ahead of western nations at metalurgy in the 1800s so why was their stuff suddenly rubbish?? Cos thats whaat the west told them hey would pay for it....

In the early 2000s I was dealing a litle bit with imorted products and I saw some exceptional quality coming out of Russia and I saw some absolute rubbish coming from the USA and some of that had supposedly reputable branding on it too......

I have a russian and a mauser rf target rifles. The russian is your typical agricultural tank but man can it shoot once you get used to the trigger

Originally Posted by timattalon

If the article I have around here somewhere is accurate...more than you think...

Norinco is Northern China Company (or similar) and is a large group of manufacturing plants. The target rifles (centrefire and rimfire ) were made by Norinco for the olympic teams....The EM332 was reportedly out of the same plant, but JW15s are made in most of the plants and under different brandings and qualitites....(Polytech, Bushman Norinco and a couple others that I cannot remember.) The thing to remember is Chinese factories are well capable of making extremely high quality products, but no one in the west is prepared to pay top dollar for made in china...so they sell us the stuff we pay for (often cheap nasty stuff cos thats what we expect) Think of Japans reputation for manufacturing cars and motorbikes in the 50s and 60s The term Jap crap ring any bells? And remember the Japanese were centuries ahead of western nations at metalurgy in the 1800s so why was their stuff suddenly rubbish?? Cos thats whaat the west told them hey would pay for it....

In the early 2000s I was dealing a litle bit with imorted products and I saw some exceptional quality coming out of Russia and I saw some absolute rubbish coming from the USA and some of that had supposedly reputable branding on it too......

the legend re the toys coming out of Japan is worth re telling....
the specs said 2 in every hundred could be faulty...so when final shipment arrived there was a box with all the faulty ones included..they had been made DIFFERENT so they were faulty.

Have you decided on the chamber/reamer you want to be used for the chamber?

Will you be going with a different twist on the new barrel?'

Do you wanna go to a much heavier profile barrel? The design of the action kinda dictates max barrel diameter. Could do a strait like I did on my CZ452.

The T1 is not the the easiest of rimfires to replace the barrel on. A number of prefit barrel manufactures stopped doing barrels for the T1 because of an issue some rifle builders had after removing the factory barrel.

I haven't done a T1 yet but Ive done the research and have decided on how Id go about rebarreling a T1.

True flite barrels? You can support local, the team at TF deluvers a good product. Go Ultra match.

Ive got several of the more popular 22 LR match reamers - Reach out if interested.

Note: It takes longer to finish the build on a rimfire compared to a centrefire - maybe its just me wasting a lot of time testing.