Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Winchester Collectors Featherweight XTR 257 Roberts questions

Hello the fire,
This was going to be a "what is it post" but I've read a bunch of good discussions on the forum and I believe I've been able to identify what I have.

I am in the process of trading into what I believe to be a 1982 made transitional XTR featherweight in 257 Roberts. The serial number is in the G162XXXX range. At first I was confused because the serial was in the USRAC range, but I couldn't find any USRAC markings on the rifle... until I read the border to the Winchester logo on the buttplate. USRAC is worked into the border on the logo. I didn't notice until I went back for a second look. Sneaky.

The clincher is I took the rifle out of the stock and it's stamped in ink SEP 27 1982 in the barrel channel.

Here are my questions:
I believe the barrel is supposed to be free floated based on running a piece of paper under most of the barrel. However, the left side of the stock touches the barrel for a couple inches behind the tip of the stock. The right side and underside of the barrel is in clearance for the entire length of the stock. If it was intended to be a pad at the tip of the forend, it should be uniform, so I'm assuming the barrel channel is not quite straight or the wood has moved.

My father's friend owns the rifle now and gave it to me to look over and even test fire to make sure I wanted it. Shots did start to wander laterally as the barrel heated up, although it grouped respectably if I kept the barrel cool and really took my time between shots. Once the rifle is officially mine, I believe the correct thing to do is relieve some of the barrel channel to eliminate the contact on the left side.

In the opinions of the experts here, is it best to have the barrel free floating, or would it be better to have a small pad under the barrel at the tip of the stock? I don't intent this to be a bench rest gun, just a whitetail rifle but like to tinker a bit and believe there's room for improvement in the stock.

If you are still reading, as another question, the stock has the hot glue looking bedding for the action and does not have pillars. What are appropriate torques for the three action screws? I have my handy Wheeler FAT wrench and figure this would be the perfect place to use it.

Thanks for any advice.
Jason

Experiment. Put a thin shim under the bedding flat to raise the barreled action away from the wood. Test it. Then remove that shim and fold some paper and make a bedding patch out near the end of the stock to act as a pressure point. Test that. The gun will tell you what it wants.

Your first post. For one, welcome to the fire. Glad to see your first post is with us here in the Winchester collectors forum. To answer some of your questions:

1. Your rifle was made in 1982 (non transitional from the sounds of it). Straight up USRAC
2. Glass bed your rifle.
3. Get rid of that crappy hot glue bedding.
4. Freefloat the whole barrel. From the front of the recoil lug all the way out. Trust me on this.
5. When you glass bed it, bed the recoil lug and the tang nice and tight. Keep clearance on your action screw holes.
6. See some of the threads on bedding model 70's here in the Winchester collector's forum. Some guy here posts a lot of them and they sure have helped me out....
7. Keep in mind, your rifle has a fwt barrel contour. The XTR I glass bed, shot like this with 10 shots. No cooling between shots. They are sub 1.5 moa rifles......... with 10 shots...Trust me again:



They are great rifles. Enjoy yours. Here's what my WRA, first year fwt (1980), looked like:



I've since sold it to 79s here and his daughter shot a nice moose with it. Great rifles...

JRD: Welcome.

I have had two rifles like yours. The first was an early XTR FW 257 Roberts she they were introduced back around 1980 or so (?). I sent it to Jaeger in Jenkintown PA,and had it bedded floated barrel.

Because the throat on mine was long and the box magazine was short, I had a 30/06 box and follower installed so I could seat bullets further out. Not suggesting you do this just pointing it out.

My rifle shot very well with the 100 gr Sierra and Nosler partition loaded to 3150 or so. It shot a bit less well with the 120 NPT loaded to 2900 fps.

I killed a lot of antelope and some mule deer with the rifle in Wyoming, out to about 400 yards. It was a good rifle.

I would do as bsa said and have it floated and bedded.

Thanks for the advice guys. I will try bedding it and see how it goes. Also found loss of information on how to torque the screws down.

I have another question: Can you tell what kind of mounts and rings these are? I'm not well versed in various mounts and don't see a brand name exposed.
The bases seem kind of odd to me in that they over hang forward but then the rings are set back. At least on the front base.
The scope is a Leupold VX-II 3-9x50mm.

Those are Leupold extension rings (as Earl surmised), also appear to be Leupold two piece reversible bases. Welcome to the fire!

WELCOME,JRD.

Some how deleted my first post.

Don't know why those bases would over hang like that. Here are the ones from my M70. They're early 80's era Burris bases.

I have the same Leupold bases on a Pre64 M70 Roberts and they hang over a little as well.

Nice rifle and an excellent caliber as well.

I'm not thrilled with the way the base is close to the objective bell of the scope even though there is a space there.

Could I reverse the front base to get more clearance at the bell? Doing so would probably make the base overhang the ejection port instead so maybe I should just leave it alone if it works.

Please do something with it. The way it is now it's hurting my eyeballs..

There's plenty of space between the objective bell and rings. The problem is that when your picture is blown up it appears that the objective bell is touching both the mount base and the barrel. Personally, I'd rip the scope off and mount something smaller that's more in line with "Featherweight".

Trip the 50mm scope, the base and rings. Get a set of Leupold DD's, low to medium rings ( no extensions),and a fixed 6x36 or 3-9x40 wit reticle of choice.

The 50 mm is superfluous and leads to mounting complications.BSA is right...hurts my head the way it is....

That's how I'd roll on a Roberts.

Bob, something like what's on your custom (Leonard Brownell) 7mm rem mag would work very well too. Appears to have a Leupold 2.5-8x36mm, or is it a 3-9x40? That set-up would look fantastic on this XTR FWT...

bsa the Brownell has a 2.5-8X Leupold. That too except I like longer tubes on the DD's.

Yes I agree, but the windage adjustable mounts that are on your Brownell rifle would work just fine on something like this XTR. Like I said, the whole set-up with the 2.5-8x36 would be about perfect...

It's been a long time since my initial posts, but here's a follow up on my rifle.

I just finished mounting a VX-3i 2.5-8x36 in dual dovetail rings. I bore sighted it but haven't been to the range to try it yet. Here's how it looks:



The new scope definitely looks much better on this rifle than the 50mm I took off it. That big scope will go on a varmint rifle or something.

I also took a closer look at the barrel channel. It apparently was machined crooked to the receiver way back when, so the barrel rubbed along the left edge at tip of the stock.

I made a rounded scraping tool (using a a sharpened edge on a steel washer the was about the right size) and removed enough wood to make the gap on either side of the barrel similar. Then I carefully sanded it down smooth to match, and finally finished the sanded area with many many coats of tung oil (which I let dry thoroughly between applications). You can't even notice the wood work I did and now the barrel is uniformly free floated.

I did this whole process before investing in an optic and wanted to prove the rifle could shoot first. I didn't save groups, but it shot well enough to satisfy me.

Oh, and I also set the trigger weight to 3 pounds- and locked the nuts into place! The trigger before had been uncomfortably light for my taste in a hunting rifle at just under 2 pounds. When I looked at it, I found the lock nuts weren't even tight! I'm glad I decided to adjust the trigger.

So now I'll get it sighted in and enjoy shooting it over the spring and summer and be ready to go come deer season.

very nice setup. Got one just about like it. Mine didn't shoot that well at first. Spent time talking to the (BOBINNH) and he got mine shooting lights out. What a guy. Gonna miss his input.

I am reading Bob's old posts in this thread and am thinking the same thing.... Rifle looks great by the way. Not a lot of fore to aft adjustment with that scope, but still looks much better in those DD's vs. the other mounts and big scope. Cool rifle man... Let us know how that set-up works out for you...