Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Restocking, when to know you need to upgrade?

I haven't had much experience swapping stocks around on rifles. Typically I have bought them with a composite or just used the factory wood or tupperware.

I have a 700 ADL Varmint in .308 that has shown some promise. Shooting several groups of my handloads at 0.6 MOA and most everything else under 1 MOA. I have free floated the barrel but that's all I have done to it. I have contemplated getting a Boyds laminate and bedding it myself but I'd hate to make it shoot worse.

What's the consensus, worth it to restock or leave as is and try more load development? I would like to have the barrel cut and crowned to 21", 26" seems like overkill for a .308.

Why not bed the stock it is in now, chances are that it will shoot as well as the Boyds. Also the Boyds will be heavier.
I am assuming that it is currently in the factory tupperware stock, if so google up so bedding info on bedding them. I have had very good luck with bedding them. I am a fan of the factory tupperware stock design, I really like the way they ride the bags.

If you are using the factory trigger consider upgrading to a Timney for a $100 or so, you will find a good predictable trigger will tighten groups up. Perhaps even more so than a bedding job considering the groups you are getting now. Although if you are shooting 0.6 MOA you may not see much improvement in any stock or with a bedding job.

I would not cut the barrel until after changing the trigger or rebedding, if you do them both at the same time and it doesn't group as well then you will not know where the problem lies.

I am not a fan of short barrels myself, I would not go under 24" but if you are determined to go shorter stay keep it at least 22". You can always shorten one but it is impossible to make them longer.

drover

First thing I do with any rifle I'm keeping is put it in a Manners or McMillan. Life's too short to dick around with Rem factory plastic stocks. YMMV...

What are you going to use the rifle for? I'd be happy as a pig in schitt with a rifle that shoots "several groups of my handloads at 0.6 MOA".

This ^^^^^

You can dump a ton of money into that rifle, if you so desire, but it is unlikely that you will see a return on that investment. Determine what is important to you and go from there.

I have some rifles in Mickey stocks. They are great, but not from an accuracy/$$$ perspective. Just depends on what maters to you. If you think that upgrading to a Mickey is going to magically shrink your groups, you will be disappointed. If you like the feel of a Mickey, you will be pleased. What say you?

I have a McMillan on a 70 FWT and it's not like it magically shoots bug holes so I get whay you guys are saying about return on investment.

I have no intentions on getting into benchrest shooting nor would I try with a factory rifle such as this. This rifle will basically be a range gun, trying to shoot small groups so I have no desire to drop $500 into another stock. I have considered trying to bed the factory Tupperware to see if it would tighten up the groups a little. Maybe I should leave well enough alone and try some different loads before fiddling with the gun itself.

Bed the factory stock, it won't hurt the accuracy, if you do it properly. I'd be pretty happy with a rifle that, "shoots most of my handloads to .6moa", as you suggest this rifle does. Your rifle is a heavy barrel pig that was meant for varmint hunting. You shoot varmints from supported positions most times anyway, I don't see where cutting the barrel down would benefit you when the intended purpose of the rifle is to shoot it off the bench or from a bipod. It's not a walking varminter, it's a heavy rifle. I'd also be a little leery about dropping a $500.00 rifle into a $600.00 stock. What are you going to gain???