Got my new Axis back together today after opening up the stock barrel channel some for a little needed clearance. The barrel was free floated, but just barely. I also painted the stock before it's first outing.

The rifle had not been fired previous to today, but the barrel was cleaned very thoroughly with Wipeout and the action was cleaned and oiled as well. I note that the trigger is not as light as I have seen on a few other Axis', and I guess it about 7 pounds. There is no creep or overtravel, just heavy.

The scope mount used is a DNZ one piece Game Reaper. The scope used was a Zeiss 3-9x50 MC Conquest. The rifle (30-06) was rough sighted in at 25 yards (3X setting) using Remington 150 Core Lokts. The final sight in was at 100 yards (9X setting). All shots were from a bench using a bean bag rest.

I started out sighting in at 100 yards with the Core Lokts. I could only get about 1 1/2" groups at best with them and actually had one (round #7 @ 100 yds) go way out of the group and it temporaily froze my bolt up. These are factory loads and all from the same box. After clearing the brass from #7, I visually inspected it and the remaining rounds and then I tried a few more and they shot fine, but the groups were still mediocore.

I then left, went home and picked up some more ammo of different weights and brands. When I went back to the range, I started out with some Fiocchi Exacta 168 grain Match King (factory). The first round was slightly off of my original sight in, but close. I shot the second round and noted that it looked like it was below and touching round #1. I then shot #3 and called myself pulling the shot slightly to the right. I walked down to the 100 yard line and this is what I had just shot.

[img width=573 height=768]http://i303.photobucket.com/albums/nn148/BruceHHH/Axis.jpg[/img]

The squares are one inch. I came very close to getting three touching holes. I think I really like this load, but now I need to find a match that has a better hunting bullet. BTW, I stopped shooting and went home. I want to research the Fiocchi round and see what else (factory) is out there that is a hunting round and will come close to matching it.