I have two Weatherby Vanguard S2 rifles. One, a .270, is standard and the other, a .300 Win Mag, is an RC. With my handloads, both of these started out as extremely accurate, with 3 shot groups at 100 yards varying between 1/4" and 5/8". I shot many groups like this with each. Then, I got greedy and replaced the factory triggers with Timney triggers. After that I got mediocre to poor accuracy with both of them. It never occurred to me that the triggers were causing this, but rather something about removing the rifles from their stocks and then replacing them.
The primary thing I thought about was the action screws. There are 3 variables here, whether and when the rifle is bumped on the floor before tightening the screws, the order of tightening, and the torque setting. In both cases I used the factory recommendation of 35 inch pounds. However, on the .270, I experimented at the range and got the best accuracy (but still not quite what it was before) with a torque setting of 10 inch pounds front and 20 rear.
So, how can I get these rifles shooting as well as they did before -- or can I?
It occurs to me that Weatherby may have some "process" that gets the best accuracy out of a rifle, and once disturbed there's no way to get that level of accuracy back.
Or, it could be even worse, perhaps even the factory can't get things back to best accuracy once the stock has been removed.
Have you gun writers experienced anything like this with Vanguards?
Please, no drive-bys from non gun-writers suggesting barrel cleaning or problems with scopes.
