I've owned a couple of Ruger's Mini 14 rifles...the first was a Ranch rifle from the 1990's..and it was a reliable plinker blessed with poor accuracy. Bad enough that it was pointless to scope the thing. From a cold barrel..you could get a shot or two on target then the shots just wandered around. The more you shot the worse it got. Let it cool down...and maybe..just maybe it would be good for another shot or two on target. Maybe not. It was pretty pathetic at 100yds.
So I peddled that Ruger and bought a HBAR AR15..it shoots fine.
A couple years ago...a friend talked me into a group buy on police trade Mini 14 rifles. I pondered the deal..and kicked my order in for what I thought would be a police trade Mini 14 GB stainless. Well....must not have got all the info...or assumed too much..because we received regular old stainless steel Mini 14 rifles..not GB Mini's.
I received a clean old Mini...all wood furniture..handguard and all..182 series. Probably a decade and a half older than my previous Ranch series Mini. I didn't shoot it for probably a year after I got it because I really figured it's accuracy would stink.
Well?..When I did shoot the LEO trade Mini..it's accuracy was fine. I mean it wasn't a heavy barrel varmiteer or anything like that...and burn two 30 round mags downrange and groups opened up somewhat....but overall...this older stainless Mini shoots much much better than the newer Ranch Mini I had owned. This one shoots like a guy would expect a fairly pricy gun to shoot(as in..you can hit things you aim at).
I've talked to other knowlegable shooters about it...and several have reported owning Mini 14 rifles that shot just fine.
So just what 'vital to accuracy' manufacturing details was Ruger not able to put into every Mini 14 rifle?