Out of the box, the one's that I see are the best shooters are:

Tikka T3 (prefer CTR for the heavier barrel)
Rem 700 5R barrel
Sako A7
Sako TRG
Accuracy Int.
Savage heavy barrels (and I don't like the Savage rifles, but they do shoot well)

One's that I personally would never own:

Christensen anything
Kimber bolt gun (I have turned away several custom load projects with these rifles)
some of the Ruger rifles

What's crazy is some of the older Rem 700 from the 70's and 80's will flat out shoot most of the modern rifles today. I have turned in some super tight groups with some old 30-06 and 270 rifles that were much older. For the money, I'd find a list of serial numbers from the 70's or 80's of the Rem 700 rifles and check out some of the pawn shops or online. Some of the older rifles for a low or decent price now would be a really good deal.

I loved the way my Ruger American's shot....very accurate. BUT, I had both a 243 and an '06. I tried a total of 4 magazines (Ruger sent me two extra) and none of them would feed correctly as every one of them failed to feed the final cartridge, sometimes 2. The springs in them are terrible and had to be constantly fiddled with. They went down the road.

I wouldn't own a Kimber, Christenson, current Rem 700, or Legendary Arms if they were free.

I did answer the question, in fact. I even separated the first two sentences to make it easier for the reading comprehension challenged, like yourself, to understand it.

Then, I also expanded on the topic.

^^(Seperated again, to make it easier for you to follow along)

I have three from Chad's top two, plus a 700 in .243 from 1979. These all have great optics on them, and are fantastic shooters. I hunt with guys that have a variety that includes Ruger and Savage. We sight in, they struggle to shoot 2" groups with stray shots. I don't. My stuff is always on and shoots really tight. I don't follow a crowd, but listen, evaluate, buy and test. I heard good stuff on this forum about Tikka and the 5R. They proved out.

Best bang for the buck is not the same as best out of the box; you answered first what is best rifle for the dollars spent. Different question than what is the best rifle out of the box. Simple easy answer to a question you answered below in the next sentence.

You feel tikkas are better than some rifles that cost more, but are they better than any rifle out of a box? Or are you artificially putting a price limit on your answer? In my hands the tikka did not fee as good as my cooper. I was all ready to buy a tikka based on comments on here about them, looked hard at Weatherby, sako, tikka...cooper was hands down better in the hand and I never felt buyers remorse. I know that’s my opinion.

Then you add the comments about smithing a gun to make it semi-custom and making it a great gun....totally irrelevant to the question posed and confounding the question by stating those comments. I know you love tikka, and that’s ok, but the OP is looking for best out of the box. You answered it with caveats that there is a “budget” and that it can be customized. I read just fine, just felt you changed the question the OP asked. No hard feelings, not trying to bring this post down with he said he said stuff.

Having said that, I have seen plenty of range reports of folks with tikkas that were Larger than MOA, and there are plenty of reports online of the same. I am sure they are shooter issues, but I have read enough to know sub moa results are as dependent on the shooter as the gun.

Ya buy a gun and ya have to defend it. In the trading business we called it “talking your position”. Chainsaws, Guns, trucks, it works that way every time.

But, back to out of the box rifles. I am absolutely convinced that if I needed a great shooting rifle, and didn’t want to tinker with it to make it something that shot great, and didn’t want to spend a fortune, I would buy a Tikka. Cooper makes a great rifle, no doubt, and I’d like to have one, but just don’t want to spend the money. Haven’t bought a NF scope either.

Sorry I provided too much information.

And I thought it would be obvious by me using Tikka actions to build on, that the action and trigger are of such high quality that they are worthy of wearing a barrel I have $700 invested, and riding in a $600 stock, with $200 bottom metal. Guess I thought wrong.

You can find a Tiika T3X for around $550 if your patient, and a Bushy LRHS for $750 if your patient, Sportsmatch rings that clamp diredtly to the dovetail for $60, and you'l have a bomb-proof setup that will hang with most any custom gun out there. They are stupid easy to get waaaay under MOA, even with factory stuff.

Guys, this isn’t a bash tikka thread...far from it. I never said tikka was trash and never said you couldn’t turn a Tika into a fine shooting machine. That’s not the point of this thread. The OP wanted your opinion of the best “out of the box” hinting rifle. That’s a pretty cut and dry question to which adding things like triggers, stocks, barrels and more $ are not part of the equation.

Please don’t make this more than it is...what’s the best out of the box shooter you have handled? Leave the question at that. We all know someone can make a damn good rifle, and anyone can make a good shooter if you drop enough cash and effort into it (almost) but that’s not what the OP wanted.

I have a really good shooting .243 savage axis, but I dropped a Timney trigger in it and that isn’t what the OP wanted answered. I have a dang good shooting S&W 5.56 but I have free floated the barrel, dropped in a Gisselle trigger and changed out to a collapsible stock, but that isn’t what the OP wanted. The one gun I took out the box and it shot really well with factory ammo was a Cooper. That’s my experience.

What’s yours?

What Cooper model are you referring to?

I have a cooper model 52. Slick as a snot and shoots lights out with Hornady SST ammo. Gonna give Hornady precision hunter ammo a try this off season and see how it does.

Um, Tikka.

That's kind of what I mean on the one's I would not own. There are rifles that are more finicky to dial in or get to shoot well. I seem to have the biggest challenge getting the rifles I don't like to shoot well, dialed in, or just having strange issues with consistency. I've tested enough Kimber bolt guns to know that there's a good chance I will have problems getting them to shoot well or consistently to shoot decent. When Kimber came out with their high end 300 WM bolt gun tactical style rifle, I was all excited and almost bought one. I had a customer drop one off for me to work up a load. I'm a huge 300 WM fan and know that round very well. I had full confidence on finding not just a good load, but a great load. After multiple range trips and several bullets later, we settled on a 190 SMK at a modest velocity because it would not shoot anything else. Now, the 190 SMK is a great bullet. It's accurate and easy to dial in. For it's weight, it does not have a very good BC now. But it's such a non-finicky bullet it's easy to dial in and get to shoot well. So when we "settled" for that bullet, it tells you something. I've had some 8400 rifles that had all kinds of stock and barrel issues- not free floated, stock had poor fit, etc. These will yield inconsistent groups and fliers, which is what I saw.

I've gone round and round with Christensen enough to fully stay away from them. Yes, they have turned out some VERY good rifles that shot fabulous. But they have turned out more that I have had issues with that were poor shooters and were what I call a "problem" rifle.

Ruger's are a tank and would still shoot 2-3 moa if an IED went off with the rifle on top of it. Solid, tough, and good rifles for feeding. I've had some that shot well (375 Ruger), and some that were just ok.

Model 52 Excalibur... Model 52 Phoenix???

Sample of one is what I'm gathering from your posts?

If I wanted to buy the best factory produced, production line rifle?
1 Sako. My taste in rifles is reflected in the model 85. The rifles Sako makes are top shelf. If you want to take it out of the box, scope it, and shoot it. I have not found any factory rifle that I would choose over a Sako.
2 Remington 700 5R. These barrels mated to a 700 action in a decent stock are a hell of a combination.

If I'm talking best factory rifle, as is out of box , I'm stopping with these two. There are more that shoot well but for various reasons I rate them a step down from these two.

Granted, I don't own one. But let's be honest guys, if you're not spending thousands for an out-of-the-box rifle, you're not getting the best that's out there.

To be a little more specific, here's my choice. Still, I'm sure you can spend even more for an out-of-the-box gun.

Weatherby Mark V

Funny how people relate dollar signs to being "better".... I'm not emotional like that...

I love my AI rifle, but you won't hear me touting it as the "best out of the box HUNTING rifle".

True.

If the OP had asked for opinions on the "best value" in a factory rifle I would have offered a much different opinion.

I have a M52 Classic in 6.5-284, love that rifle. I own or have owned Sako, Remington 788s, 600 and 700, Browning ABolt and Encore, Ruger #1s and 77s, Tikkas, Kimber, TC ICON, Winchester M70, CZ that I remember and still have some of them and prefer the Cooper to them all. But the Cooper price point is not cheap and is more of a "custom" factory rifle. Of those I the top 3 IMHO are Cooper, Sako and TC ICON.

Deep in my heart I knew it would end this way

So what is the answer?

Tikka?

For a factory hunting rifle, at a cost most working guys would consider reasonable, yes tikka is the answer currently. Its not the only answer, lots of good rifles out there these days at varying price points. But I’ll bet it wins a poll on most forums I frequent..


$2400 Coopers notwithstanding...