"In literature, the Chimera is a mythical, hybrid beast encompassing the greatest characteristics of two or more creatures. Though hardly mythical, Tactical Rifles new Chimera Hunter takes on the greatest characteristics of target, tactical and hunting rifles in a single bolt action format. The rifle maintains the overall look and feel of its tactical roots, but its reduced weight and relatively clean lines make it equally at home in the field.

The heart of the Chimera Hunter is Tactical Rifles’ new precision built, proprietary action. After many years of accurizing factory actions, owner David Rooney and his engineers decided that inorder to improve consistency and maximize accuracy they needed to build their own components. The result is a tubular push-feed design that shares many qualities of the Remington 700, but is built to more exact tolerances and features some notable improvements.

The Chimera employs the same round and dual-opposing locking lugs as the Model-700, as well as the two-position safety, but it has a beefed-up, hinged steel extractor that provides enhanced purchase on the cartridge rim. The bolt has attractive, functional spiral flutes and an oversized tactical-style knob which allows the shooter to quickly load a round without loosing proper cheek weld. Absent is the staggered magazine design that has given the Winchester Short Magnum (WSM) cartridge a somewhat poor reputaion for feeding reliability. The Chimera employs a single-column, three round detachable magazine that holds the cartridge in direct alignment with the chamber. This system works very well; in fact, during hundreds of rounds of testing, we experienced zero malfunctions."

read full article