Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Gunsmithing Best Mod 77 "tanger" bedding method?

I have a real nice older wood stocked tang safety Mod 77 in 338WM. Someone did a great job of slenderizing the stock & recheckering it. I once had a MKII that split its stock in the inletted action part so want to (a) strengthen this one and (b) ensure I get the best accuracy from it. I have read that the older Mod 77s tend to shoot better full length bedded or a pad near the fore end tip & just the recoil lug area. This was bedded in the recoil lug area and a pad near the tip. Its not a pretty job Bubba did, just a big dollop in both areas. I haven't even shot it yet, but I want to make sure its stout. I am taking it to a new to me gunsmith tomorrow and want some options to talk over. Any help/opinions are welcomed!

I have a 270. It was originally unbedded with a pressure point about 3/4s the way up the fore end. Accuracy went to hell after years of use. Was going to bed it. But found a real nice late production laminate factory stock. I had it bedded into that stock by Redneck that posts on here.

I went with pillars and free floated. Figuring on always being able to add a pressure point. Gun now shoots amazing. I would suggest doing the same with yours. Being the stock has been slimmed the pillars will add some strength and enable you to properly torque the action down and keep things from moving. Probable the most important thing especially with a heavy recoil caliber is to relieve the tang slightly. You want a slight gap between the tang and the stock so no recoil forces are transferred to the stock in this area. Lots of 77s crack in this area. You want the recoil going to the recoil lug nowhere else.

Best results I've had bedding tangers is with charcoal. I had a 77 RL in .257 Roberts that I fought for 2 years trying to get decent accuracy from. That was before I joined a range so I'd head up in the woods, find a clear cut, pace off about 100 yards, set up a target on a stump, and shoot off the tool box in the truck bed. One day I got pissed off from lack of success and just started crankin' through ammo about as fast as I could shoot, somewhere up around 100 rounds. I could smell hot wood charring but I didn't care, I was pissed off and frustrated. I put the gun back in the gun rack in my truck window where it promptly melted through the rubber padding down to steel. I figured I'd ruined it but I just didn't give a [bleep] at that point.

Next time out, I shot two 9/16ths inch 5 shot groups with 75 grain Sierras and 44 grains of 4064 and 2 5/8ths inch groups with 43 grains of H414 and 120 grain partitions.

Huh.

Beats me. What I know is, whether it should have or not, it worked.

Tom

There ya go Tom! ha That is a great one! Nothing like cranking off rounds and smelling the wood get hot! ha I even grew to love the smell of M16s and M60s getting hot! And, an 8 inch Howitzer has its own great smell, let me tell ya!

The two hangers I currently have are bedded receiver and a couple inches of barrel, free-floated the rest. Stub (30-06 with 17 in basrrel) runs about 1.5 MOA most anything. The 338 is MOA, to 1/2 MOA, depending on ammo.

Mine are bedded at each screw location and the barrel is floated all the way. Works well and has since I bedded my first one in 1972. GD

You may have stress relieved the barrel and/or burned some machining burrs out of the throat.

Definitely not a barrel break-in procedure to recommend to others . . . . . . . .

Charcoal! I've been just about as miffed, in my case, I attacked the bore with tight patches and valve compound....I was NOT gentle, but it was like a new, good barrel after and I got four seasons of good shooting out of it....

The tang M77s are kind of tricky and need a lot of careful work to get a "click" bedding around everything, even the middle screw, which really, really needs a pillar or sleeve. Mine ended up with three pillars (two sleeves in the back) and bedding around the front of the action and an inch of barrel. The action screws all go to a hard stop with no springing. But it was work to get there.

ALL actions , regardless of flavor, should go to a hard stop with no more than a quarter turn of "spring". If they don't, the receiver area is not inletted or bedded flat. One reason I dob't think much of Weatherby....

At least on front and back screws. Middle screws can probably get way with just beginning to come snug snug and stopping. Better thoI think as above.