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94 SHOOTING SPORTS MAGAZINE

FIREARMS | GUN TEST

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

■ Name Merkel RX Helix Alpinist

■ Calibre 243 Winchester

■ Capacity 3+1 (DM)

■ Weight 7 ½ lbs

■ Barrel 22”

■ Twist rate 1-10”

■ Length 42.5”

■ Magazine capacity 3+1

■ Trigger Single stage, 1.8 lbs

■ Stock synthetic

■ Adjustable comb Y

■ Available calibres 222/223 ‘Mini’

243/6.5x55/270/7x64/308/

30-06/8x57/9.3x62 ‘Standard’

7mm Remington/30

Winchester ‘Magnum’s

■ Prices from £3285

■ Contact Viking Arms, 01423 780810

(for nearest retailer)

http://www.vikingarms.com

At 296 grams and 155mm long, it

complimented the gun perfectly offering

effective suppression. The trigger blade is

slim at 7mm and I would have preferred

some chequering or grooves but it gave

deceptively light pulls under the 2lb mark. It

wasn’t a glass break but no creep could

really be felt, certainly no grittiness and

overtravel after the shot was minimal. For a

necessarily complex action design, the

trigger was easily judged and pleasantly

dependable in use.

QUICK OFF THE MARK

I ran a selection of ammunition through the

gun’s 1-10” twist barrel. Everything from

70-grain ballistic tip Sierra handloads to

105-grain GECO Softpoints shot within my 1”

@ 100 yards requirement. Special mention

must go the Fiocchi 95-grain SST

ammunition which became my go-to choice;

often capable of 0.5” 5-shot groups and

utterly reliable out to 300 yards and NO hard

extraction in 200 rounds.

All showed slightly higher velocities than

expected from the 22” barrel, the GECO

nudging 3000 fps with Hornady 95-grain

Superformance up to 3150 fps, it’s clearly a

`fast` tube. The superb quality control of

heat treatments and hammer forging also

ruled out any wandering zero through a hot

barrel! The barrel cannot be cleaned with a

rod in the conventional manner without

removing it from the gun, a factor that makes

precision rifl emen quiver with doubt and I did

to start with too. But not for long! Barrel

swap has to be the fastest out there – press

the button under the forend allows it to slide

off and an 85mm lever to the lower left of

the barrel swings down to unlock it.

HEAD JOB

Removing the barrel offers two possibilities.

With the action closed, the bolt head will

come out with it still connected to the

locking abutments. It is then rotated to

remove. However with the action open it

remains attached to the carrier in the

receiver. To re-insert the barrel align the red

mark to the upper side with the action, slot it

back in and lock down the lever, click the

forend home and Bob’s your uncle.

Return to zero, the most important

aspect of any switch barrel system! I did

refi ne this method a little as to aid the job. I

placed an UNLOADED but fi re-formed case in

the chamber, rattle the action back and

forward a couple of times to lock/unlock it

and then the secret, from Merkel

themselves, is to open and close the locking

lever three times, just to allow everything to

nestle back into its relaxed `comfort zone`. I

followed these rules and found the deviation

never exceeded ¾” from previous point of

impact on the fi rst shot and defi nitely within

ammunition accuracy levels on the second.

These values alone are readily attributable to

a cleaned barrel but I tried it several times

hot and cold, clean and unclean, just for fun

and it never varied any further.

COMFORT AND CONFIDENCE

It’s a very comfortable gun to carry as no

bolt handle ever sticks into your back when

slung. Cleaning the action’s internals is no

light task though, the butt is removed with a

long Allen key and then the trigger guard

assembly drops out from below after two

cross pins are drifted out. It is defi nitely a

workshop job and not a 5 minute task

although in 500 rounds, it never NEEDED

cleaning to function. But the internals

defi nitely sounded a little gritty on occasion

and in some environments, could foul

terminally in my opinion.

It shoots well from all positions, partly

because it requires little physical movement

to reload but also stock ergonomics and

subtle features like the hard polymer heel to

the rubber buttpad. The metalwork and

furniture proved durable, only a careless

encounter with a jagged rock has lightly

marked the gun anywhere other than

characteristic brass marks on the rear face

of the ejection port. It has defi nitely become

a rifl e I will be sad to see go, and I can

forgive its minor character faults, as its

benefi ts far outweigh them.

If you remove

the barrel with

the action

closed, the bolt

head comes

out still locked

to it, but is

easily removed

Barrel removal

is VERY fast

and beautifully

smooth, you

can just feel

those exacting

tolerances

Merkel Helix Alpinist

243; a very different

straight-pull switch

barrel system!

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