Good, bad, ugly?

Thinking about buying one for plinking and hunting.

OST I want one too

I picked up a BMR carbon as soon as they were available, it proved to be an accurate and well built rifle, and over the course of time it went through quite a few changes trying to squeeze the last bit out of it.  Timney HIT trigger, EC V2 tuner, and a new stock; you don't need to do any of the things I did, out of the box it's a great rifle and I've been very pleased with the purchase.

The only issue I had, and it may only be my specific BMR, was the factory magazines were a bit loose in the mag well which would lead to the occasional failure to feed.  I corrected that with a bit of aluminum tape inside the front of the mag well to snug up the fit of the magazines and prevent them from moving as the action was cycled.  It shoots premium ammo exceptionally well and even with lower priced CCI standard and TAC-22 shows great accuracy.

There is a lot of debate on this subject....steel barrel vs "carbon".  I put that word in quotes because it is not a solid carbon barrel.  It is a pencil thin steel barrel, covered by a hollow carbon fiber tube.

My steel barreled BMR is a lights out tack driver.  5 rounds of Lapua Center-X at 100 yards under 0.67".

I am looking at carbon barrel because of the weight savings.

That is Boyd's Pro Varmint stock right? How do you like it? Did you opt for the pillar bedding? Have been debating getting that or the Rimfire hunter if i end up getting a BMR. Sucks that they have so many stocks now that seem so similar yet the picture on the sight is never accurate it seems.

After everything is said an done what kind of accuracy did you get with the stock rifle and what kind are you getting with it after all these mods?

Edit: Rimfire hunter BMR
Attached File

It is the Pro Varmint stock in pepper laminate.  I didn't have Boyd's do the pillars since they would only do the front due to the amount of stock material that needs to be removed at the rear, I used full size Remington 700 Score High adjustable pillars and did a full bedding job.  I left a bedding pad ahead of the front pillar for added barrel support, it free floats from there, similar to what people do when they bed in CZ rimfires.

The accuracy from the original stock was decent for a micro-rimfire, and the Boyd's did improve the consistency of the groups over the factory stock but it was the pillars and bedding that really let the BMR show it's as accurate as my B-14R's.  I'm not going to recommend you use the Score High pillars I did unless you're ready to remove a fair amount of the stock material both front and rear to get the pillars to fit properly.  I don't know if I would have had as good of results with the accuracy with just the small front pillar from Boyd's, the action is very solid and stable in the stock now, zero movement, and 50 in-lbs ended up being the sweet spot on the action bolts.  It took a bit of work but the accuracy improvement was well worth it.

I always thought that due to the size and polymer construction the factory stock was the weak link on the BMR.  Properly stocked the BMR is capable of extremely good accuracy.

Just beware:  it's a fake carbon fiber barrel.  Steel liner in a carbon fiber tube NOT a steel liner with a carbon fiber wind.