MKII: How far back to free float barrel?

[thomae]

I have a MKII heavy barrel with the factory wood stock (from Boyd's).
It's a pre-E receiver, if that makes a difference.

I have not modified it except for trigger work. (Lightening and cleaning up the trigger pull and installing an internal trigger stop to deal with overtravel)

The barrel is currently free floated from the muzzle back to where the diameter increases nearer to the receiver.

Should I free float it all the way back to the receiver?
If so, what should I do about the barrel-mounted round recoil lug?

One poster suggested removing it on his .17 and using the tang as the recoil lug. (See Below)

Any thoughts and suggestions would be appreciated.

Thank you very much.

I have a 93r17 that I have modified. Before I changed anything the rifle, with prefered ammo, shot a little over 1 inch at 100 yards. After the mods the groups shrank to around .5 inch at 100 not counting the inevitable flyers that occur from time to time when shooting rimfire ammo. I fully floated the barrel up to the action, installed pillars of my own making to the stock, did away with the round factory recoil lug under the barrel and made the rear of the action (tang) a recoil lug. To do that I had to turn the firing pin bolt down slightly. (Not sure if that is what it is really called.) The last mod was to monkey around with the accutrigger to get it just under 1 pound. I am not sure which mod increased accuracy the most but if pressed I would have to say lightening the trigger was likley the biggest improvement to accuracy. As far as bedding the action to the stock all I did was to make sure the sides of the action were making equal contact with the stock. To do that I fully relieved the stock, very slightly, around the sides of the action and possibly in afew other places underneath the action and then rebedded it. That part was done after installing the pillars. If memory serves me correctly there isn't much underneath the action to bed it to. Anyway, hope this helps.

[dksac2]

I like to just bed the barrel right past the flat in the barrel, no more. It acts as a small lug. Maybe an inch max.

John K