Ruger M77?

[stagpanther]

I bought a used anniversary edition in 35 whelen--classic extremely well-built rifle in my opinion. I've shot some sub-MOA with it off the bench. I keep my eye out for them, not only very well built and nice looking but reasonable weight for real-world hunting.

 

[oldscot3]

f you judge a hunting rifle from the bench?

You are fooling yourself.

Shooting a rifle from the bench should tell you what your rifle, scope and ammo combination is capable of in the best of circumstances. That's not fooling yourself, it's learning what the full potential is. Pretty much the rest is all on you.

 

[Don Fischer]

I've owned one Ruger CF rifle. Early M 77 tang safety in 7x57. Friend in a gun shop got me one when they first came out, about 1972. Probably the most beautiful rifle I ever saw and the hardest rifle I ever owned to get to shoot. Loved that rifle but accuracy was a huge disappointment. The only bullet's that would shoot were Hornady 154gr RN bullet's and they gave me right around 1" at best. Of course it killed everything I shot at very dead! da*n that was a beautiful rifle!

 

[Lohman446]

But judging a hunting rifle from a bench next to a bench rifle is not really fair.

I don't care how good of groups your heavy, long barreled, 12lb rifle with 16 adjustments on the stock is capable of throwing at the range off of bags and 10 minutes of setting up. Its never going to replicate those hunting where a bench is not available.

Your right my, for instance, M77 is never going to throw as good of groups off the bench as that theoretical bench rifle is. BUT that theoretical bench rifle is not going to be halfway up the mountain taking a shot off an improvised rest after tracking and moving after a herd of elk all day.

Hunting accuracy IS different than bench accuracy and is dependent, to some degree, on the shooter.

 

[stagpanther]

I agree with Franken--except he's more generous than me, I generally aim for a precision of .5 MOA if I'm shooting past 200 yds.

 

[agtman]

That would have been Brian Pearce in Rifle Magazine. I remember the article.

Okay, Ratshooter, now you've got me curious. Do you recall which issue of Rifle his article appeared in? I've got a bunch of back issues stashed somewhere ...