Well, I'll keep the back story to this short.
I ended up with an NIB AICS 338 Lapua Magnum 2.0 stock a while back in trade. I thought it would be a great compliment to a 300 Remington Ultra Mag that I got on a trade, after all, they have the same COAL of 3.600, so why wouldn't a 300 RUM fit in a 338 Lapua magazine.... right?
So I went all out. I got the 2.0 stock, the Badger IMUNS, the AI bipod (against my better judgement), and three mags. The day it showed up, I was elated. It was going to make traveling with the long barreled 300RUM much easier. I installed the IMUNS, put in the the barreled action, and I thought I was off to the races. Until I attempted to load a magazine. Here is where I was reminded that NOT doing your research can bite you in the ass.
Turns out that despite the COAL of the 300 RUM and the 338LM being identical, their shoulders are in different places. The AI 338 Lapua magazine has two stamped reinforcing ribs that run from top to bottom, as seen here:
<span style="font-style: italic"><span style="font-size: 8pt">Picture is compliments of Triad Tactical, a site sponsor and a great place to do business.</span></span>
Since the neck of the 300 RUM is shorter and shoulder further forward, the shoulder of the 300 RUM would hit the forward reinforcing rib whereas the shoulder of the 338 Lapua clears it. I thought to myself; "Whoops."
Back to the Snipers Hide Search Engine where I began doing my research I should have done before I started down this path. Keep in mind, I have somewhere in the neighborhood of $1800 into this AICS stock, the magazines, and the accessories. I frantically typed in "300 RUM in AICS" and came up with a few weak sauce hits, but they all said the same thing. The mag would have to be altered to get it to work. Damn. I'm a fool. I should have done this step first.
So I called a friend. He is a member here, and I won't give his user-name, because I don't know how many more of these, if any, he would want to do. Mike, if you read this, feel free to chime in. Long story short, I sent Mike the three magazines and a couple of empty rounds for him to see if he could make it work for me. Well he did.
He simply removed the reinforcing rib. And he did a fantastic job. So now my 300 RUM is back in action.
Here are some pics of the final product. This is still totally compatible with the 338 Lapua Magnum, but voids AICS warranty. In a couple of the pics you can see where the rib was removed and where the shoulder of the cartridge would have it if it was still there. The feed lips did not need to be messed with at all and are unaltered. This obviously poses a problem of foreign matter entering the magazine, but I'm not awful concerned about it this point. That would be a consideration for someone looking at doing this for a 300 RUM.
I post this in hopes that no one makes the same mistake I did. Thanks to Mike for a fantastic fix to my oversight.
I ended up with an NIB AICS 338 Lapua Magnum 2.0 stock a while back in trade. I thought it would be a great compliment to a 300 Remington Ultra Mag that I got on a trade, after all, they have the same COAL of 3.600, so why wouldn't a 300 RUM fit in a 338 Lapua magazine.... right?
So I went all out. I got the 2.0 stock, the Badger IMUNS, the AI bipod (against my better judgement), and three mags. The day it showed up, I was elated. It was going to make traveling with the long barreled 300RUM much easier. I installed the IMUNS, put in the the barreled action, and I thought I was off to the races. Until I attempted to load a magazine. Here is where I was reminded that NOT doing your research can bite you in the ass.
Turns out that despite the COAL of the 300 RUM and the 338LM being identical, their shoulders are in different places. The AI 338 Lapua magazine has two stamped reinforcing ribs that run from top to bottom, as seen here:
<span style="font-style: italic"><span style="font-size: 8pt">Picture is compliments of Triad Tactical, a site sponsor and a great place to do business.</span></span>
Since the neck of the 300 RUM is shorter and shoulder further forward, the shoulder of the 300 RUM would hit the forward reinforcing rib whereas the shoulder of the 338 Lapua clears it. I thought to myself; "Whoops."
Back to the Snipers Hide Search Engine where I began doing my research I should have done before I started down this path. Keep in mind, I have somewhere in the neighborhood of $1800 into this AICS stock, the magazines, and the accessories. I frantically typed in "300 RUM in AICS" and came up with a few weak sauce hits, but they all said the same thing. The mag would have to be altered to get it to work. Damn. I'm a fool. I should have done this step first.
So I called a friend. He is a member here, and I won't give his user-name, because I don't know how many more of these, if any, he would want to do. Mike, if you read this, feel free to chime in. Long story short, I sent Mike the three magazines and a couple of empty rounds for him to see if he could make it work for me. Well he did.
He simply removed the reinforcing rib. And he did a fantastic job. So now my 300 RUM is back in action.
Here are some pics of the final product. This is still totally compatible with the 338 Lapua Magnum, but voids AICS warranty. In a couple of the pics you can see where the rib was removed and where the shoulder of the cartridge would have it if it was still there. The feed lips did not need to be messed with at all and are unaltered. This obviously poses a problem of foreign matter entering the magazine, but I'm not awful concerned about it this point. That would be a consideration for someone looking at doing this for a 300 RUM.
I post this in hopes that no one makes the same mistake I did. Thanks to Mike for a fantastic fix to my oversight.
