603Country
New member
A while back I bought a Ruger Hawkeye in 223. Stainless barrel and action in a black synthetic stock. I couldn't get the rifle to group very well, and one of the things I did to get it to shoot nicely was to replace the stock. So...since then the stock has been leaning in the corner of my workshop. I also have a Ruger Mark II in 260, and it's the compact version with the short stock and short barrel (16 1/2 inch?). It's a good shooter, but that short stock is a bit of a bother. So a couple of days ago I thought I might try moving the barreled action over to that lonesome synthetic stock. If it didn't shoot well, I'd just move it back to the short wooden stock. So I screwed it down tight (following the Ruger directions on torque) and took it to my shooting bench. I sighted it in and then cleaned the rifle and took it back to the bench. It looks a bit strange with that short barrel in the long stock, and since the barrel is a ultralight version, it's automatically free floated. That little rifle shot like a champion. I didn't measure the 3 shot group, but eyeballed it at about half an inch. I'll now assume that the stock probably wasn't the problem with my 223 Hawkeye accuracy, but the stock will now stay on the 260, which now looks like some sort of tiny tactical rifle and is super light and easy to handle. It seems that I make my best decisions accidentally, and now I have too many favorite rifles.