I've been toying with the idea of having a custom varmint rifle built for me for a long time, and I've started looking for Remington M700 action to build one on. I recently came across a used Rem M700 BDL in .30-06 thats receiver was in excellent shape, but the stock and barrel had several dings and scratches, making the asking price very appealing at $300 since I only want the action anyway and I'll probably have it refinished anyway.

The main issue is that all the possible calibers I'm considering are all short action calibers (in consideration are 6mm Rem. AI, .22-243 Win., .243 Win. AI or .22-250 Rem. AI) but this BDL is obviously a long action gun. The only cartridge in long action I'd consider is the 6mm-06, but I didn't really want that big of a powder burner if I could help it and would prefer to stay with the aformentioned wildcats.

I know that there are a couple arguments against long actions such as action rigidity (although I don't fully buy this one), weight (not that I care, since I plan on putting a 4-5lb barrel on it), overall length (also a non-issue since it'll be sporting a 26"+ bbl.), and cycle time.

So what I'm left with is the mail issue of will the long action feed similar diameter cartridges (except in the case of the 22-250 AI) that are quite a bit shorter than the .30-06 fodder this guns magazine is designed for? My thought is that the long action magazine would actually be a benefit as it'd allow bullets to be seated out as long as necessary to come close to the rifling while still retaining full magazine function.

Any thoughts are appreciated.

Thanks,

Mike