Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Ruger All Weather Hawkeye vs Tikka T3 Lite Stainless

444Matt, Are you saying the Tikka won't stand up to hard use? On what do you base your opinion? (Not challenging you, I just would like to know)

One thing I should add, is I generally only find accurate rifles interesting.

Rings come with tikkas as well

Gus, what kind of accuracy were you getting with the factory stock?

Not good - shots tended to string vertically once the bbl heated up.
Wasnt floated or bedded from the factory.

Gus

One is built to take a beating and be reasonably accurate, the other to save weight and maximize accuracey. Pich which atribute matters most to you in a synthetic stainless rifle.

Gus had the same problem I did with my Hawkey All Weather rifle. I remember when he bought that hogue stock and I walked him through bedding it as I've done to all of my rifles. Rugers can be very accurate rifles but they are more for the tinkerer to be honest. The actions can be made to be very smooth (almost like a good model 70), the triggers can be lightened with a little stone work and a lighter trigger spring. I just shot mine yesterday with a friend who shoots a very accurate savage 270 and the Hawkeye just shoots circles around it. I shot some sub moa (.75") 5 shot groups with it and handed the rifle to my friend and said here why don't you see how it does for you and he shot a nice 1" 5 shot group. He was shooting his 270 like crap for some reason, now he wants a 308 . I was actually impressed with his shooting with the hawkeye since generally his groups are around 2-3" 3 shot groups (which that's what his groups were with his 270). I shot 5 offhand at 100 yards with the 308 Hawkeye that landed into 2". They can be great shooters if given the proper attention. If you arn't a tinkerer then you may be better off buying the tikka. I also did like Gus K and put my hawkeye all weather in a different stock (factory hawkeye wood stock), bedded it and freefloated it just like I did to the synthetic stock and it shoots lights out. Here's how she looks now and an old target I shot with it when it had the synthetic stock on it (I like the looks of the wood better so that's how it's going to stay), it still shoots just like this with the wood stock too.:




Here it is bedded/freefloated and sealed up with tru oil.....


So my suggestion is if you are a tinkerer then get the Ruger, if not get the Tikka....

One is built to take a beating and be reasonably accurate, the other to save weight and maximize accuracey. Pich which atribute matters most to you in a synthetic stainless rifle.