Posted in another thread where I had build 2 .416 Rugers. One on a M700 and the other on a M70.

M700 version sits in a Accurate Innovations stock with the aluminum bedding block. W/O any further bedding and no barrel mounted recoil lug, this rifle shoots well, but is a tad light.

The M70 version is also sans a barrel mounted recoil lug and is in a B&C Medalist - also with the aluminum bedding block. In this configuration it too shoots well.

I've given some thought to putting the M70 in a Safari Express stock. Somehow, wood stocks and DG rifles just seem to go hand-in-hand. The Safari stock has dual cross-bolts, and is inletted for a forward recoil lug. This particular stock came off a 375 H&H.

What are your thoughts on the .416 Ruger sans the barrel mounted recoil lug in the Safari stock? Provided that it is properly bedded and relieved in the tang area am I asking for trouble, i.e stock splitting?

I don't think you need to put a barrel lug on it.
Yes, relieve the tang and glass bed everything, and add pillars when bedding,
and a small piece of hidden allthread behind the primary recoil lug,
inside the glass bedding,
then you are triple crossbolted.
Another piece of bigger allthread through the long axis of the grip, is also a good idea.

The SIG ARMS Mauser Banner M98 Magnum in 450 Dakota has no recoil lug on the barrel. I have looked.

IIRC, none of the Dakota Arms rifles have recoil lugs on the barrel, even their 450 Dakota M76 African.

Yes, a secondary recoil lug on the barrel might affect accuracy. But some rifles shoot very well with them when bedding is right. They are trickier.

You dont need one on the 416 Ruger

MY 416 Ruger was built on a standard 300WM Weatherby Vangaurd with wood stock

Vangaurd wooden stocks are internally cross bolt/reinforced, all I did is bed it in the original Wooden Vangaurd stock

It's held up to about 400 Rounds so far and doesnt look like cracking thr stock.

Again no lug is nessesary.

regards
S&F

quote:

Yes, a secondary recoil lug on the barrel might affect accuracy. But some rifles shoot very well with them when bedding is right. They are trickier.

CZ adds a second recoil lug on their safari magnums. Mine have all shot well and I haven't needed to test to see if better accuracy could be gotten without the barrel lug. MOA seems fine already on a heavy calibre.

A recoil lug on the barrel WILL affect accuracy...unless you have bedded it correctly then adjusted the sights...all you are doing is moving the point of barrel/stock contact forward a bit. As with any fiddling with the barrel/stock relationship, you have to do the whole schmere to do it right.

The 416 Ruger doesn't need a recoil on the barrel any more than a 416 Rem or 416 Taylor as long as the stock is rated for the recoil level...as it doesn't produce all that much recoil.

Some laminated stocks won't handle the recoil and some will...the same with some wood stocks. I've never heard of a synthetic stock coming apart under heavy recoil and I know the A.I. and Medalist stock will take just about any recoil you want to throw at it... FACTORY STOCK...BUT...it never hurts to do a little "extra" stiffening here and there just to feel better and there are many ways to add a bit of weight to balance things out.

Keeping the stock from cracking is more of a "tuneup" process...most of the things that case a stock to crack and WHERE most stocks crack, are well covered in forums and the solutions also....relieve the tang...pillars and/or bedding blocks to stop the wood from being squished out and the stock screws to become loose and allow the barrel/receiver to move under recoil...torqing the stock screws AFTER pillar bedding so you have a metal to metal lock and all the pieces and parts DON'T come loose...and metal stiffeners in the areas that are known to be weak.

All very well covered by the excellent experts on this and many other forums.

So a search and all will be revealed.

Luck

My 450 Dakota on a ZKK action is bedded around the action but the barrel is floated. The stock ZKK has a barrel lug. Mine shoots one hole groups at 50 ysds. I can't see to shot open sights at 100.

The need for barrel lugs starts with the 458 Lott or maybe the 458 Win..

That said I use a barrel recoil lug on 416s and up..it cannot hurt..as to accuracy it has never been a problem with my guns...

Foobear,
Your are correct, bedding is essentiial with a second lug..but keep in mind proper bedding is essential in any rifle under any conditions..Its imparative.

quote:

Originally posted by Atkinson:
The need for barrel lugs starts with the 458 Lott or maybe the 458 Win..

That said I use a barrel recoil lug on 416s and up..it cannot hurt..as to accuracy it has never been a problem with my guns...

Foobear,
Your are correct, bedding is essentiial with a second lug..but keep in mind proper bedding is essential in any rifle under any conditions..Its imparative.

So if someone built a 49 calibre (.500) 2.6" Rigby case cartridge on a Ruger Alaskan, you would recommend adding a barrel lug?
(I suppose that McGowen would know how to do that and that it could be fit into a Hogue stock.)

I always felt that the need for a barrel mounted recoil lug started at .416. Its a judgement call, but a split stock is a real PITA versus a $35 part, some simple inletting and some accraglass. Properly installed and bedded, they DON't effect accuracy at all. Now if you bed one wrong, good luck getting it out of the stock. I guess the splinters would indeed effect your accuracy. -Rob

Are there not differnt actions that have seperate requirments? IIRC the M70 has a much larger action recoil lug then the M98.

Please educate me.

SSR

Don't know if it was really needed on my 404, but I got a barrel band model; I needed a sight base and thought a recoil lug would not be a bad idea, so this incorporated all into one.

quote:

Now if you bed one wrong, good luck getting it out of the stock. I guess the splinters would indeed effect your accuracy.

The Hawkeye Alaskan with the Hogue stock is synthetic so no splinters. Would it need an extra lug or does the synthetic stock absorb the recoil as is?

ABSOLUTELY...RAY.

I was refering to ANY fiddling with the bedding, including adding a barrel mounted lug or free floating, mucks up the accuracy until it is corrected by whatever means required.

Bedding accuracy is only as good as the person doing the bedding job...you know how easy it is to get the receiver "rocking and a rolling".

Synthetic stocks don't have a lot of places that will crack due to the material...and it flexes with recoil which helps.

Way the heck back in yester year I read an article about one of the gun scribes actuall running over one of the early synthetics and all it did was scratch/gouge the exterior of the stock.

I tried the same thing with a Savage synthetic stock...putting a 2x4 under the end of the forend on the 2" side and ran the front wheel of my Chebbytruck up to the mag cutout. It did bend but didn't break, but also put a permanent kink/twist in the mag box area.

I can say for certain that for that stock, under those conditions, at that time, the stock DIDN'T crack or break and was still usable even with the kind after a bit of reworking...as for Hogue...I wouldn't feel constrained to do any further mods for "recoil mitigation" and would use it "as is" as the few Hogue stocks I've looked at don't seem to have a lot available ways to mess around with additional stiffening without REALLY messing things up...but looking for a "lifetime warrantee/guarantee"...I don't know about that.

Talk to Hogue or do a search on this and other forums...specifically for "broken/cracked" Ruger Alaskan/Hogue 416 Ruger stocks might get you some actual specific information....no conjecture or "guesstimates".

I'm not stockmaker...more of a "club" maker, I know what "looks" good but just can't seem to translate that into a stock... ... but I've done 75-100 bedding jobs over the years and as long as you follow the few simple, literally "cast in epoxy", "rules", I've only had one major problem getting a receiver out of a stock...that was because I used a paste wax instead of Brownells release agent and I finally had to put the rifle in a friends large freezer for a week to get it to pop out.

I buy Accugel by the tub and release agent in the large bottle. I also use JB weld in the large tubes, epoxy resin in the pint cans, Brownells steel, and aluminum powders and dyes and even used steel and aluminum turnings from my lathe and mill...I like to experiment while I do things.

Luck

I use a second lug in most of my "personal" big bore rifles from the 9.3x62 on up, as it gives me a since of security that my gun will not come apart 200 miles from civilization..

It is very easy to drill and tap a second lug on reinforced with glass or tig welded may be beeter?. cheap insurance.

Are they needed on 9.3s, 375s or even .416s is questionalbe and argueable, but it kant hurtcha.

I always glass bed both lugs and tang at least. I always use two cross bolt glassed in, I always leave a very small space around the magazine box. I have never had a stock split out in 50 plus years of making them. That extra day of work, makes a lifetime of difference IMO.

All stock material is prone to warpage or breaking..I have repaired many composite stocks in Idaho (cowboy country) and a 1200 pound horse rolling down the side of a shale slide snaps them at the grip and the material makes no difference, they snap, or those that have the gun facing forward out of the saddle scabbard and get a tree between the two and the horse panics, that is a wreck and can only snap a stock...I have seen composites warp when set to close to the tent stove on several ocassions, and once in the trunk of a car in 112 degree weather, and had one composite melt because the guy glass bedding it wanted to rush the drying process and the light bulb was about 3 inches from the action over night, messy! Plastic or wood can go south, end of story..but smart money does everything possible to prevent it.