Thoughts on Ruger M77 Action Potential?

[North River]

Can the factory thin profile M77 tang barrels be threaded?

Also, has anyone tried doing a full length bedding and had good results with improved accuracy? I glass bedded just the action and first couple inches of the barrel on mine. It helped with accuracy, but I’ve heard bedding the entire barrel channel helps these guns a lot.

With a good quality, heavy barrel and a really good bedding job, I’ve found 77s to shoot decent with free floating. But with lighter barrels it has been my experience they improve with slight tip pressure on the barrel. I take electrical tape and add a little to the barrel at the front of the forend to vary contact pressure.

 

[Kenny Hart]

Can the factory thin profile M77 tang barrels be threaded?

Also, has anyone tried doing a full length bedding and had good results with improved accuracy? I glass bedded just the action and first couple inches of the barrel on mine. It helped with accuracy, but I’ve heard bedding the entire barrel channel helps these guns a lot.

You'll want to measure the diameter at the length you want threaded, but Karl at Kampfeld Customs can add a permanent shoulder to a thin barrel by threading 1/2x28 and attaching a very clean adapter for 5/8 with the appropriate material for a shoulder. He did my Tikka Lite...looks top notch and the threads are perfect and straight.

He said he could also do my Ruger 308 RS if I so choose. It has the ultralight barrel profile and I gave him the diameter, so I imagine yours would be good to go. Per his current pricing, barrels with an OD smaller than .63" are an upcharge from his standard pricing. ADCO can also perform this service.

I don't know if full-length bedding is any better/worse than free floated. I understand the old NULA rifles were fully bedded because the stock materials used were stiffer than the barrel and wouldn't flex under pressure. You could always try the electrical tape trick mentioned above and see if it improves, though accuracy may be subject to forend pressure. I just choose to free-float mine and take that out of the equation.

 

[walk2112]

Can the factory thin profile M77 tang barrels be threaded?

Also, has anyone tried doing a full length bedding and had good results with improved accuracy? I glass bedded just the action and first couple inches of the barrel on mine. It helped with accuracy, but I’ve heard bedding the entire barrel channel helps these guns a lot.

In the ones I've messed with to any extent, it seems a little bit dependent on the barrel itself and the cartridge. So still not totally settled in my mind if there is a single best answer. When Ruger used to do the FTW Predator model in varmint cartridges and 6.5/308, those had a little fore-end pressure on a heavy sporter type contour and shot very well.\

I always have to bed the front half of the action and the rear tang, but I've had a 300 win mag that much preferred free floating and shot well with most 180-200 gr bullets, my 375 ruger though shoots much better with full length bedding, had a 260 rem that shot ok free floated but was picky and then much better across the board with a little fore-end pressure, and my 308 GSR shoots 150-168 gr bullets very well with a generous free float. So kind of a crap shoot based on my experience.

Punchline is: After years of goofing around with them, now I free float the foreend, then when bedding the action carefully use electrical tape at two spots on the barrel to act as a centralizer and am careful to not induce torsion or stress in the action when bedding. Shoot and test with the free floated barrel and if it's not going well I fold up a business card or similar in the fore end to see how barrel bedding would change/improve things. If I want to keep the barrel (usually the case) if the test shows fully bedding the barrel makes sense, I do that and rock on.

If I really want things free floated on that rifle, and the barrel isn't happy that way.... my latest venture (that hasn't been tested yet) has been having a hardened stainless 'washer' machined that allows a factory take off tikka barrel to be headspaced to the ruger bolt/receiver (same tenon threads).
I saw someone else on here did this a different way and I couldn't resist trying it out so fingers crossed.

Here's a 30+ year old M77 Tang Safety (my first rifle) with an 8 twist 243 barrel. Calling it the 'Tiger'.
Thanks to Stephen @ Denali Arms for the work! In theory I'm setup now to spin Tikka prefits on this action.