Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Haviland Rifle #311 Hawkeye Hunter: Action screw torque

I read with interest JH's test of action screw torque on accuracy, specifically the middle screw being torqued to the instruction manual's recommended 45 in lbs (with 95 and 60 in lbs for front and rear, respectively). Is this a relatively new Ruger recommendation? A friend has a 10-15 year old Hawkeye (one right after the switch to Hawkeye), and he's always done essentially finger tight on that middle screw. (His rifle is walnut stocked which he bedded; no pillar.)

45/60 in lbs on middle/rear are certainly higher than I would have imagined on a walnut stock without pillar bedding or an aluminum block.

I never seen the article but you friend is torquing it the right way if there is no pillar for support. ( very light torque)

Anymore that a little more than finger tight is too much for the Ruger action. You will most certainly start deflecting the stock and at some point the action. Neither scenarios are desirable.

If the middle action screw has a stress free pillar to support the stock and action, go ahead and tighten it to 45 in lbs.

I would refrain from the extra torque otherwise.

I have a Hawkeye Hunter 6.5 PRC sitting in the corner still in the box.

This article you are talking about was the deciding factor on wether or not I’d get the rifle.

The writer actually put rounds down range as a tool to form his opinion and answers your question.

I’m personally going to trust the writer.





Todd

I evidently didn't read all of my old friend John Haviland's article. The 45 inch-pounds for for middle screw seemed a little, uh, screwy to me, partly because I recently acquired one of Lipsey's special runs of .275 Rigbys, produced in 2017.

I took it apart after getting the rifle back home, and found the middle screw just barely tight, the way I usually tighten 'em. The guy I got the rifle from (ulvejaeger on the CF) evidently tightened it just a little, per usual, and reported excellent accuracy.

I put it back together the same way, and over the next couple days took it to the range with other rifles, shooting a couple of handloads worked up for a 7x57 I'd owned. Both shot fine, one with 139-grain Hornady Spire points into much less than an inch, and the other with 156 Norma Oryxes into a little over an inch. This was with a fixed 6x scope.

Dunno why it would shoot better with 45 inch-pounds on the middle screw, since all the wood-stocked Hawkeyes I've owned (several) do not have a pillar (or anything else) to support that screw. This includes the first 6.5 Creedmoor I ever owned, purchased in 2010, which shot .6-inch FIVE-shot groups with Hornady factory ammo--with the middle screw tightened just enough to stay in place.

Maybe it is “Hawkeye Hunter” specific? Hmm.

Todd

The article states, "The Hunter's receiver-to-stock bedding...is only steel against plain wood." Which sounds exactly like the bedding of every wood-stocked Hawkeye I've owned.

I cannot fathom how cranking on that middle screw could possibly make things better. Pehaps another undetected variable was involved in J.H.'s test; a few three-shot groups seems like scanty data to me.

That was my other thought.

Could it possibly be that torquing the middle action screw caused the “right”amount of pressure on the fore end tip?

I do know that on free floated Rugers that tightening the middle action screw will cause the distance between the barrel and fore stock to increase.( bending the stock and possibly the action ) The only one I have has been pillar bedded and tightening the middle action screw to whatever torque has no effect on the relationship between the fore end tip and the barrel.

It’s been a while since I’ve bought a new Ruger however, but I seem to recall that there was tip pressure at the fore end?