Rugers need epoxy bedding.... but then so do most other factory rifles, for improved accuracy/consistency, etc. It's only recently that some manufacturers have started bedding even the recoil lug area with synthetic compounds. And that's sometimes questionable. The first thing I did after acquiring a slightly used M70 of 1981 vintage was re-doing that (seemingly) hot glue recoil lug bedding they slopped in there, with quality epoxy.
Trigger jobs don't hurt either.
Over time, if not epoxy bedded, the wood behind the recoil lug can dry, shrink, become recoil compressed, oil soaked, swell in wet weather, etc. An epoxy job will give you perfect contact, which may not be the case with bare inletted wood- especially factory commercial quantity jobs...
Both my tangers, if hunted in wet weather, the wood will swell up beyond the edges of the butt pads (after market - the Ruger pads are terrible!) ), even tho the end grain is epoxy sealed. But they don't change POI. All of the interior inletting has been epoxy sealed, to at least slow moisture acquisition.
As I mentioned before with the Jap Weatherby - early on, as few as 3 or 4 shots would crack the wrist. For that, and other reasons, I'll take a Ruger over a Bee every single time. With a little work... Once prejudiced, always prejudiced - that's me, even when things change for the better. They later started to relief the screw holes.
A little "custom' goes a long ways on most mass-produced rifles. They are almost never inletted where the action sits perfectly flat in the stock- which they should. If the action screws don't go from coming snug to perfectly tight in 1/2 turn (less is better) then they are not bedded flat enough.. You can futz with them using a torque wrench to get them '"best shooting"; but that ain't the way my cork floats.
Any greater screw leveraging is just bending the stock to fit the metal works - and that's where the torque wrench comes in.... I do have one- but that's for bolts and nuts on snow machines, trucks, and the like.
I also prefer free-floating the barrels. Only one of my rifles shoots better with fore-end tip pressure - and it only took me 40 years of killing stuff with a free-floated barrel with it to get it there...
I have seen a number of rifles that have some slop between the recoil lug and the wood behind, whether due to inletting, recoil compression, or shrinkage I don't know. That isn't good, and can lead to problems in other areas, such as the tang cracking the wrist.
With any new to me rifle of my own, whether new or used , I shoot it for base-line, then I epoxy bed the SOB, if it hasn't been. Period. I've never been disappointed, even with (rarely) no discernible improvement in accuracy. I like shurity....
. That RU77 in '06, acquired used?
Lot's of story there, which I won't go into (again!) , but initially when I tried it, it would put 3 into a cloverleaf, and go to 5" for 5... I thought about that for a year, then glass bedded the action and bottom metal, free-floated the barrel and it now shoots 1.25 moa or so all day long, and I don't worry about weather changes.
Now, that said, I had a RU77V Tang 25-06 that I never did a thing to other than handload neck-sized fired brass. Back in my young and more ignorant days.....
It went from 5 MOA factory loads to 1MOA handloalds or less - I suspect an oversized chamber. It also threw the first round from a clean barrel 4" high and left at 45 degrees.
I never hunted with a clean barrel.
When I moved off the Slope, I thought (erroneously) I needed a larger caliber for moose, and sold it. Dumb! I've regretted that ever since- 30 plus years. It had a stock that was fiddleback from tip to butt......That cured me of selling rifles.....
I'm a Ruger fan, but also have a M98, a M70, M700, snd 725 and my walk-about carry rifle, my Dad's M94.
All are epoxy bedded but the 94, - the M98 (heavy barrel) and 70 fwt. are full-length bedded . M98 shoots inch groups at 300 yards, 70 does inch plus at 100 -- I'm going to try free floating the barrel to see if that helps. It should do better.
it's all fun...
