REVIEWS
An ICON of Innovation
A new centerfire bolt action is a symbol of things to come from Thompson/Center.
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Gregg Ritz is what you might call a hard charger. At 36 years of age, the former vice president of sales and marketing for Thompson/Center now owns the whole darned company. When he's not hunting, he's most likely thinking about hunting, but it doesn't seem there's a moment when he's not plotting a course to turn Thompson/Center into an even more formidable force in the gun-making world.
In the past few years, Thompson/Center has become the undisputed heavyweight champion in the world of muzzleloaders. Along the way it has updated its Contender handgun and has worked aggressively to upgrade its multi-gun Encore system as well, culminating in last year's introduction of the Pro Hunter.
But well-made single-shots and muzzleloaders do not an industry leader make, and what the company that bills itself as America's Master Gunmaker really needed was a centerfire bolt action. Enter the Icon.
Ritz showed up at the Guns & Ammo offices a while back with a big gun case and a big "Have I got something to show you!" grin. Barely able to contain his excitement, he opened the case and launched into the background.
The goal, he said, was to create "a new breed" of bolt action, a new platform like established actions such as the Remington 700, Winchester 70, Weatherby Mark V, etc.
"We talked to custom builders and tactical guys, and then we asked ourselves what we could do from a manufacturing standpoint that couldn't be done back when other companies were developing their platforms," he says.
"We were actually going to bring this out in 2008, but with what happened with Winchester and with a lot of other builders going 'down-market,' we thought the time was right to come out with a premium rifle."
They started with the barrel, the building block of an accurate rifle. Over a year ago, Ritz charged T/C engineering manager Karl Ricker with the task of developing a barrel blank capable of half-minute accuracy or better. He accomplished his mission via a number of significant tweaks that are found on the Icon.
"One was a change in the reaming process," Ritz says. "You can't hand-lap production barrels, like custom builders do, but by improving our reamers we were able to dramatically reduce tool marks in the barrel."
That translates to less copper fouling in the bore since tool marks strip jacket material from the bullet as it travels. T/C also changed the rifling to a design called 5R (for Russian) rifling, which was developed by Obermeyer. Essentially it takes the sharp corners off the rifling; instead of the grooves being perpendicular to the surface of the bore, they are at slight angles. This also serves to significantly reduce stripping of bullet jacket material and keeps a barrel shooting more accurately for a longer period of time.
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