Building Dedicated Cast Boolit Krag

[Squibload]

Have a very nice Krag action and want to build a dedicated cast boolit rifle in 30/40 Krag. Need advice on maker and optimal type of rifling for barrel and where to find a marksman type stock and sight suggestions - old eyes need scope but mounts are difficult on the Krag. I have considered the Kraghaus sight rail. I have a customized Burris barrel mount on a ler equipped sporter but the ler Burris/ Leopold set up has a small field and is slow to acquire. All suggestions welcome. I want to do this right!

[Bent Ramrod]

I don't know what is "optimal," but here's an 1899 action that I rebarreled with a Douglas .30 1-in-12" twist blank and fitted into an aftermarket 95% shaped and inletted Carbine stock. I put a Jostam pad on the stock to raise my face to the level of the sights.

I guess Col. Cooper would say that it is not a real Scout rifle as it is too heavy. But I didn't have the heart to trim the barrel lighter and the action is too heavy anyway. It's close enough to a Scout for my modest needs. I shoot only cast boolits in it.

When I turned the barrel down to a smaller diameter I left full-diameter rings on it. I machined the rings on a horizontal mill using an indexing setup to duplicate the angles of Weaver mounts, making them into scope mounts that are integral with the barrel. That's a Thompson-Center pistol scope on it; I think it's 2-1/2 power. Put an extra action screw through the stock into the bottom of the barrel near the action to dispense with the need to hold the works in with the sling band. The screw has a nut on it to be drilled for a third sling ring when I get around to it. I also have to polish and blue the barrel. It could probably use an aftermarket trigger that can be made lighter; I need to get some info on what is good.

This was mostly done with odds and ends scrounged at gun shows and estate sales. Don't know how much of this stuff is available commercially anymore.

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I found an earlier Krag cocking piece and put a Lyman cocking piece sight on as a backup. It is one of my favorite cast boolit toys; good for 3 MOA or so at 500 yards.

[Bullshop]

I like the bolt peep!
I have a Krag action and a Dougless barrel blank with a .412" groove and a 1/14" twist. I see a Krag in 405 Win in the future if I can ever get settled somewhere.

[Bent Ramrod]

A .405 Krag would be plenty cool, all right. Might need a little grinding in the magazine to feed the larger diameter shells.

There were a lot of caveats in the gunsmithing books about how those cocking piece peep sights would wobble around so bad that they were useless. But for iron sight ranges I don't see any decreased accuracy, and there is no particular wobble in the sight when the bolt is cocked. The lock time is supposedly lengthened as well, but I haven't seen an accuracy difference between the sighted cocking piece and the original 1899 cocking piece when I use the scope.

The peep sight might wobble when the trigger is pulled, but by then it is moving forward so fast I don't notice it, just the front sight and the line of white under the target. It's a backup; I sighted it in just in case but mostly use the scope.

I would recommend a 12" twist for a cast boolit gun. It seems to work fine at CB velocities even with long boolits like the 311299.

[Bullshop]

I have seen them in 405 that would feed factory ammo. I questioned the smith and he said it was a process to get it right.
I figured if I cant get the 405 to feed there is always the 40/60 Manard.

[gnoahhh]

If I built a .405 Krag, I would short chamber it so it would be a handloading proposition only , thus preventing some unsuspecting soul in future from firing a hot-rodded .405 round in it. Krags are stronger than they would seem, but why take unnecessary risks with 109+ year old case hardened steel receivers? Of course, then said unsuspecting soul would probably just handload a hot short .405 anyway.

[KCSO]

Mine is an 03 barrel that miked out at 308 on the nose and it shoots better than I can hold. My cast bullet groups are running 1 1/2" at a hundred yards with a 3x scope. Mine was built on a 1896 action and has had the lugs lapped in for full bearing on the safety lug and the headspace is set after lapping. I have posted pictures of it before. I also have a Sedgly Krag with the original peep sight that is a real shooter.

[Multigunner]

A made to order cast boolit Krag would present a perfect opportunity to test out the break in time with cast and the effect of seasoning over a period of many hundreds of rounds fired. Keeping track of the increase or decrease in group sizes when the same loads are fired under close to identical conditions, the count count for the targets noted along with range conditions.

This could be compared to results of cast boolit groups fired using a barrel once used only with milspec or commercial jacketed bullets.

[gnoahhh]

I'm in the process of building a copy of Townsend Whelen's Krag sporter. After spending a king's ransom for a mint original barrel, I decided to go with a new Criterion barrel instead as it has consistent 'modern' dimensions that should make load development a skinch easier with the moulds/sizers I already have. All components on hand, and stock is taking shape. Cast bullets are all it will ever see, as long as I'm around to feed it.

[madsenshooter]

gnoahh, have you slugged that Criterion? On the first run, there were some buyers who weren't to happy as the dimensions didn't differ a whole lot from the GI barrel. They were expecting "modern" dimensions but didn't get it. Could be Criterion used some blanks that were substandard in that first run, which the CMP quickly sold out of though. From the Krag rifle achives of Culver's shooting page:

"I then did some measurement:
The bore diameter is .3015", and the groove diameter (unfortunately, so far as my feelings go) is .309" (both as measured directly and from the chamber cast I made later).Overall, I have mixed feelings about this barrel: one of the historic problems with original Krag barrels is that most of them have too-large groove diameters, and I'd expected Criterion to adhere more closely to the nominal .308" (why not?). I've not examined their barrels for other U.S. military rifles, but would expect them to be closer to the nominal diameter (anyone checked?). It's frustrating to me because the barrel I'd intended to replace has a nearly identical groove diameter to the Criterion, and shows a preference for 'fat' bullets, which are not that easy to come by (I'd been using M118s which are .3087" average, but have just about run-out of them). I don't have an un-barreled receiver to mount the barrel on, and am now unsure about replacing the one I'm shooting, as it performs pretty well. In summary, then, what you get is a replacement barrel which can be expected to shoot as well as a typical Krag barrel in very good to excellent interior condition - but not much better, and will require some additional (avoidable) work to install."