OK...so I have a Sauer 202 in .270 and the forend has always bugged me because when you tighten the stock screw it pulls to one side and the more your torque it the more it pulls to the right until it eventually touches the barrel on the left side of the barrel channel--ruining the free float. I'm not the only person with this problem from what I've read on various forums and I didn't want to resort to sanding the barrel channel because it was already uneven and would look worse if I relieved that much wood to get it free floated again.

So I thought about it for a long time as I tend to do with these little things that bug me about my guns. And then it hit me....maybe the stock screw inside the forearm is either applying uneven pressure on one side of the forearm or perhaps there is some structural difference in the stiffness of the wood that causes it to bend under pressure. In either case the solution would be to apply more pressure on one side to counteract the pressure on the other side. Again...the dadgummed thing is straight as an arrow until you apply torque to the stock screw which rides in an escutheon that fits snugly in a mortise channel beneath the barrel. The shoulders of the escutcheon carry the tension applied by the screw against the front of the mortise in the wood. Could also the be mortise isn't perfectly square to the screw or the escutcheon isn't perfectly formed on either side (its a part formed from bent flat stock....)

But how to adjust the tension from side to side? Shim it! So I cut some small plastic shims from a milk jug and inserted them underneath the left side of the escutheon on the side that would touch the barrel. Ir took two shims and just like that I put some torgue to the stock nut and its straight as it can be. The shims cost nothing and won't rust or compress...

So if you have a Sauer 200/202 with a crooked forend give this a try....easy as cake!