What if Ruger?

[Kudu m77]

Glass bedded their Hawkeye 77s at the front part of the action and floated the barrels at the factory?

I think they would instantly make their average Hawkeye shoot sub moa from the factory. I do know this is a lot of extra work, but they can ask more for the rifles and I am sure guys would pay more knowing that you will get a good shooter.

What do you guys think?

Pieter

 

[wunbe]

Does not matter.

Ruger is no going to do it.

DIY. it is easy and you can control the result.

Wunbe

 

[RJ556]

Pieter, I absolutely agree with you. I've always done my own but a lot of folks do not have the skills or do not want to "Mess with" a brand new rifle. A lot of "would be" Ruger customers are buying Tikka's and Winchester M70's because those rifles are shooters out of the box.

 

[Kudu m77]

Does not matter.

Ruger is no going to do it.

DIY. it is easy and you can control the result.

Wunbe

I have no problem doing it myself as I get joy out of it when I see the results after bedding and free floating. I think most of the guys on the forum enjoy firearms and tuning them to how they would like them to shoot. The thing is I am thinking of the average hunter who buys a gun and expect it to shoot good from the first day. I think most 77s that do not shoot great only needs to be bedded and floated. Obviously there are some rifles out there with more serious problems, but that is the minority by far.

I know chances of Ruger doing this is probably zero. I just think it could be the difference between people saying Hawkeyes are very accurate rifles OR when you are lucky you will get a good one.

Pieter

 

[dakota1911]

Right now I just do not see Ruger doing stuff like that. Maybe I am wrong.

 

[Lloyd Smale]

ruger knows that 80 percent of the customers are perfectly happy with a 2-3moa gun and its cheaper to fix the complaint guns then to fix the problems with there design. There exceptable accuracy standard is 2 inch at 50 yards and i can almost do that throwing rocks at a target. What i allways thought they should do is sell an upscaled model. Nicer wood, select barrels, bed them and put a 2lb trigger and a one inch accuracy guarantee on them and sell them for a bit more. Call it a 77 custom or some such thing. Id gladly pay a couple hundred bucks more to get a rifle that looked nicer and saved me the agravation ive had with rugers in the past with there accuracy. Something like weatherby does with there moa guns.

 

[leon670]

Contrary to what you read in gun mags and internet forums, not all rifles shoot better with free floated barrels. Rugers are designed to shoot well with a bit of pressure on the barrel from the forend. I have owned five Ruger M-77 centerfires and all of them have shot 1 1/2" or smaller groups at 100 yards. That's good enough for a deer rifle. I have a 77-22 and I free-floated the barrel. It shot worse. I bought a new stock and now it shoots fine. Lesson learned. Almost any new Factory bolt action rifle will shoot well enough for big game hunting. I have no need to shoot a ground squirrel at 300 yards with a .270

 

[Lloyd Smale]

leon the reason is that just floating a barrel can allow a poorly bedded stock to let the action run all over the place. Especially true with a ruger due to the tiny recoil lug they have. Ive seen guns that were floated shoot worse but have never seen a gun floated and bedded properly shoot worse and most shoot substantialy better. Forearm pressure on a barrel is like a bedding bandaid. Whens the last time you saw a bench rest gun or a gun that came out of a custom shop or even a factory varmit rifle come with forearm pressure on the barrel. Yup 1.5 inch at 100 yards is good enough for deer as long as your not shooting past 250 or maybe 300 yards. Some of us need a rifle to reach out a bit farther and to me if a gun wont shoot an inch for 5 shots at a 100 yards it usually finds a differnt home. I do have a couple smaller rifles that will only shoot 1.5 or a bit less but there used for deer hunting where the range is guaranteed to be short. To me though something like a 300 mag, 7 mag 264 mag ect that will only shoot 1.5 inch groups is a turd.

 

[gunners]

While not a huge sample I've owned 6 Ruger rifles and still own 2. Have not had to touch the bedding or free float any to get good results. Trigger job on the mark ll 270 I had was all I have spent out of pocket. My 7 mm mag I have at the moment, its groups shrunk dramatically by increasing the fore end pressure slightly by tightening the front action screw a fraction. It groups consistent at about 1 inch at 100 meters with this latest box of Winchester super supremes. My latest addition a 338 WM is staight from the box very consistent with the first 2 boxes 200 gr Hornady superformance. Its best was .95 of an inch at 200 meters :shock: which was better than what I got at 100 meters running it in .I would like to put a few more boxes through before I'd call it. They can be very picky with ammunition though, different brands or weights of bullets will have major impacts. Bedding free floating may be able to help in that regard but I haven't needed to. Those groups are three shot groups in deference to the sporter weight barrel.
Now if Ruger decided to bed and float the barrel put in an adjustable trigger and have a nicer stock won't that just jack the price up to be competing against Sako and such other well established fine rifle makers. I thought they where flat out doing what they've got now. I'm sorry but if they where near the price of a Sako I'm buying the Sako

 

[Lloyd Smale]

gunner for your reasons youll probably never see ruger bedding and floating stocks. It cost money and would either put them in another price catagory or cut into profits. What i would like to see with ruger is a custom shop like remingtons where a guy could spend a little more and get a gun with a select stock bedded and floated and a barrel thats a bit better then a production ruger. Id bet if they did and kept the price to around a grand theyd sell like hotcakes. Heck a cdl rem cost around that now and they sure sell well. Look at what weatherby does with its moa guns. Why couldnt ruger sell a 77 that was guaranteed a moa shooter or your money back for a bit more. Id sure rather have one rifle like that then two that shot 2moa. I would think theyd sell like hotcakes. Ruger fans are pretty rabbid fans. They think nothing of shelling out 1500 bucks on an ar with ruger on it that others sell for about 2/3s that price. Stamp ruger custom shop on it and id bet thered be lines outside the gunshops to buy them.

 

[shaffe48]

Would bedding and free floating make a rifle less ammunition sensitive? In other words, would it still be worthwhile to bed and free float even if I got really good accuracy from one load? I say this because I've gotten good groups from some of my loads but worse performance from a preferred bullet weight. Obviously, I'm going to try a different powder then different brands of bullets but this might be an option.

By the way, don't some cheap rifles free float their barrels? This would seem to conflict with the price argument.

 

[Lloyd Smale]

yes shaffe in my opinion it does. I found over the years that not in every instance will it make the best load for the rifle shoot better it does make the gun overall more accurate. Guns that string verticaly or horizontaly will shoot nice round groups. In some cases they shoot drasticaly better but in about every case they are more consistant shooters. What you need to keep in mind though is that your making a big change and your previous load developement can be out the door. the load your gun shoots best now might be a totaly differnt bullet powder ect. In most cases though ive found that the old best load is still a pretty good starting place. Anymore when i get a new rifle i just go ahead and float and bed it. Ive just spent to much time and money on guns i didnt do it too working up loads just to find i had to start over because i bedded it.

 

[Kudu m77]

I have heard of quite a few guys owning several Ruger 77s that after they bedded the actions and floated the barrels that their rifles shot sub moa, which they could not achieve previously. It just seems as in most cases guys found that it improved accuracy. I think chances of achieving consistency is better with a free floating barrel. An M77 of mine sometimes shot very well with front tip pressure and I even think I posted how well it shot but with time I realized that it was too heat sensitive and even had different points of impact on cold vs hot vs humid days. It now shoots the same everyday. It seems like No.1 rifles in general shoots good with pressure on the barrel, especially with the rubber pad but the No.1 is a complete different design and the separate forearm is another element that might have an impact on how they shoot. I know plenty of guys have great shooters from the factory, I just think in general people might have had a different perception on how they shoot. You can read on every single firearm form out there that Ruger 77s would be labeled as inaccurate more than any other firearm manufacturer. Some even claim that 77 actions are crap and incapable of shooting straight. I think it would have been different if 77s were bedded at the factory. If people ask me what gun should I purchase if I want something accurate I would tell them to buy Savage or Sako, although I know there are plenty of 77s out there that would run with Savage and Sako in the accuracy dept. I think 77s are probably some of the most rugged out there and never do you hear of things like bolts breaking off like Rem 700s (I am not saying 700s are poor quality it has just happened with quite a few guys) but if I listen to the majority of hunters today I just hear about accuracy everywhere and things like bolts breaking loose from the bolt body do not even concern them because at least it is shooting straight according to most.

I would buy more 77s as I really like the design and I know it can take a pounding without any worries that something might break and they are capable of good accuracy. But as I said earlier a lot of Ruger fans are willing to 'tune' their rifles to shoot great and find it very rewarding, but personally I think the majority prefer out of the box accuracy.

Pieter

 

[oldguy]

Don't know why they need to. All my Ruger's , Hawkeye's and #1's have shot one inch or better straight out of the box , if I do my job right. I guess I just live right.

 

[LAH]

Stamp ruger custom shop on it and id bet thered be lines outside the gunshops to buy them.

Totally agree.

 

[wunbe]

It does not cost that much for rifles to be free floated from the factory. Savage, Tikka. and some other low end rifles are so issued and have well-deserved reps for accuracy. Ruger is just stuck with some 'Old Bil'l approaches to manufacturing rifles.

That slanted foreend screw and the AH forearms are other wrinkles that NOONE else in the industry has adopted. Lack of imitation being the lowest form of praise....

wunbe

 

[jn 41]

I agree with OLDGUY. And if Ruger 77's are so bad compared to other brands, why buy them or even have interest in them at all?

 

[RJ556]

Over the years, I have usually had to "tweak" my 77's to get them shooting to my satisfaction. The reason I have always owned and will always own a few 77's is because of their great classic looks, easy, mostly tool-less dis-assembly/reassembly and hardy ruggedness. Three other brands that I have bought were extremely accurate "out of the box". Those were, Winchester M70, Browning A-Bolt and Tikka T3. And in the Classic looks department, I believe the Winchester M70 Featherweight will give the Ruger M77 a run for the money. But, I like them all and that's why I own them. RJ

 

[modrifle3]

Get a torque screw driver and tune the rifle. Then don't take the stock off. Remington is no different if you buy a wooden stocked rifle. Ruger makes as accurate a rifle as anyone, but all makes need some tweaking when shooting extreme distance.

In the old days you bedded the barrel anyway.