Is the juice worth the squeeze?

[BarrelNuts]

So I have a 111 Trophy Hunter XP in .25-06 that I want to tinker with... was looking at taking off the factory barrel and the tupperware stock; adding a magnum sporter barrel and an "I don't know what" stock (want to keep it on the lighter side for the longer walks when hunting). The stock options for this thing are exceedingly limited from my research which poses the question...

I have a older 110 flat back in .30-06 I bought as a donor rifle for a new project. Is it worth it to go through the headache of figuring out the whole stock/magazine/etc. issue with the 111xp or should I sell it and just convert the 110 into a .25-06 and use the cash from the 111xp to buy another donor rifle down the road?

I've grown rather fond of the .25-06 for the lighter deer in the area here; loaded well it doesn't waste a lot of freezer fare, lighter recoiling, and has never let me down; so I'm not looking to go with another cartridge for this particular project.

Thanks in advance for all the pros/cons and the lively discussion I'm sure is going to erupt

[tufrthnails]

Why don't you just hunt the TH the way it is? It is going to be hard to find something as light as the stock on it and unless you got a bad barrel it is going to be Minute of Deer all day long. Don't get me wrong I tinkered with my TH and absolutely love it for what it is. But as long as you shoot off the mag side of the stock for rested shots and not the tip of the forend you can kill deer all day. I would toss the factory scope mounts. I was able to find ammo that shoot 1.5" @100 yards factory in my TH.

[tufrthnails]

PS right now I feel like when I tell my son something my Dad told me when i was growing up! (hate it when he was right)

[yobuck]

PS right now I feel like when I tell my son something my Dad told me when i was growing up! (hate it when he was right)

It might not have been that he was always right.
But he knew fixing things that werent broke wasent necessary.
I actually knew a guy who always wore a rubber band around his shirt cuffs.
One day i asked him why he did that and his answer explaind lots of things about him.
(In case i lose a cuff button.)

[archerben]

You kind of point out a benefit of buying just an action to build on. Instead of fixing something that may or may not be broken, you just start building from the ground up because you have no other choice. I've been in somewhat the same dilemma. I've got a couple of stock savage rifles that I've thought about changing up, but they haven't really given me a reason to. Btw, the .25-06 is a great deer cartridge.

[archerben]

Concerning your stock options, have you looked at Boyds stocks? Their stocks are a decent option if you're willing to pillar and bed them, and they build stocks for just about everything. I bought a tacticool stock from them for my 6.5x284 build. I installed pillars and Devon bedded it and installed a Criterion barrel. That gun consistently shoots 1/3 to 1/2 moa.

[big honkin jeep]

More than 1 way to skin a cat.
If you have grown fond of the 25-06 the I would suggest getting some RL22 and some 110GR accubonds and working them to the trophy hunters liking. I struggled with mediocre loads and had some data that was probably what some would consider very good for a couple of 25-06s. And then I tried the RL22. It was like a secret 25-06 miracle for me.
It has been my experience that tuning the load to a rifles liking most often results in a fantastic shooting out of the box rig. Sometimes it takes a while but tuning loads is most often way more effective and economical than tinkering rifles unless something is obviously broken.
Good luck

[snowgetter1]

RL22 is awesome and I have had had great success with IMR 7828SSC. I use 115gr Partitions.

[BarrelNuts]

Darn all of you and your "sound logic". My main concern with the XP is the stock is REALLY flimsy; I've even filled the butt with expanding foam and it still feels too "tupperware" for my liking. And if you're going to toss a new stock onto a rifle, why not do the barrel too right? Makes complete sense to me!

But... point taken to try tweaking the ammo before anything else; good excuse to go do more shooting AND I get to save that donor rifle for the next build