For those of you who don’t remember my first Ruger 10/22 project post, I am piecing together a 10/22 that is both very accurate and great for a fun day at the range. In the process I wanted to get intimately acquainted with the inner working of a gun and how each piece effects the function of the firearm.
In my first round of changes I replaced the factory stock with a thumbhole stock and the factory barrel with a bull barrel. I am also added a bipod.
Thumbhole Stock:
Manufactured by Shooters Ridge, this stock can be bought for around $100. You would expect this to be a drop in install, unfortunately I was not so lucky. I had to file out a significant about of material from the rear of the stock AND bore the take down screw hole to get the take down screw to thread.
Once installed the stock feels great. The cheek plate is higher than average and perfect for me. However, I am seriously questioning the stocks rigidity.
One more short note. Ruger apparently felt a flat head as the best tool for the take down screw. Would it have killed them to use a philips or allen?
Bull Barrel
I purchased the Green Mountain Bull Barrel. Generally you can find them online for around $100-$120. From my research and experience, I think you would have a hard time finding a better barrel for the money. The install was easy as you would expect. At 50 yards I was shooting groups that could easily fit within a 50 cent piece.
Between trips to the range I made some adjustments so we will see if these groups will get smaller yet. One interesting thing I noticed, with the stock barrel the bullet gained elevation between 25 and 50 yards. With the Green Moutain barrel, that elevation had increased probably another inch.
I would tell you what my groups look like at 100 yards but I made a massive mistake with my scope. I shot my first group, calculated the number of clicks and had a dyslexic moment. I turned the wrong knob the wrong way. Thus screwing my zero beyond all repair. I am headed back to the range now to get this fixed plus see how my adjustments fair.
Discussion at July’s Portland Gun Show
Looking for some very specialized parts for Part 3 of this series I attended the Portland Gun Show. The vendor who had my parts also had some interesting insights into my stock and barrel choices. She agreed the Green Mountain Barrel was an excellent choice. She said that she gets excellent feedback from other customers who have purchased these barrels from her. Interestingly, the Green Mountain was the cheapest she was selling. As for the Shooters Ridge, she had also had bad experiences. She said that she recently had received a shipment there there was a small torquing between the ends of the stock making the barrel channel not line up correctly. She suggested a Boyd’s Stock, which I tried and liked.
In Summary
Buy a Green Mountain Barrel and give the Shooters Ridge stock a miss.
