I have a few thoughts. First off, thanks for stepping in and providing a source for parts kits and the cost effective poly magazines. I'm sure I'm not alone in intending to continue to run my Vudoo indefinitely. Without question it is the rifle I shoot the most and enjoy the most. .22lr just can't be beat.
As for moving away from a 700 platform in the future, there may not be a ton of folks around that remeber why the 700 got so popular. As you mentioned, it's was not because it was a good action design. In many ways it is the opposite of this. The 700 was designed to be cheaper to manufacture than previous designs and many of it's issues are because of that. The very low cost to manufacure original Walker trigger for instance attaches with pins because those pins are actually part of the trigger function. One is the pivot for the topsear and the other a travel stop for same. Pins are a terrible way to attach a trigger, they allowed a very cheap design though. Much of the rest of the design is similar such as the trigger safety and 60degree trigger / cocking piece interface. These are not a good design. Neither was the clip extractor, bolt stop, and small bedding area. Back in the early days of this site and community the 700 didn't gain popularity for the action design, it did so because factory 700's, especially 5R's, shot damn good compared to other contenders. This was due to using better barrels more than anything else though I do think using shouldered barrels was a good move compared to other designs as well. Of course, now we are all talking custom semi clone actions and small shop cut barrels. Many of the 700 design problems are, of course corrected in custom actions. Your still stuck with the small bedding area and terrible trigger interface though. Ironic that aftermarket trigger makers have done so much work on that trigger that I challenge any trigger to stand up to a 2-stage bix. Seriously, there is no comparison. Anschutz and Walther can take their 3-position rifle triggers and shove them, the bix is better. That brings us to the fundemental issue. The 700 platform has intrinsic issues and those are certainly magnified when it comes to .22lr magazines and feeding with everybody using slightly different stock / bottom metal dimensions and the magazine attaching to that instead of the action. The 700 also has an unbelevably huge ecosystem of amazingly good and mostly interchangable parts. How much will you really gain departing from it? Even if you can have a 90 degree trigger interface and the trigger doesen't hammer in but has some nice screws or something will it be as good as a Bix or a TT? What will the real world improvement be from a slightly faster lock time or a better bedding area? Honestly, I doubt the changes could warrent steping outside the ecosystem. I guess perhaps you could go with the Tikka footprint as most of the ecosystem now also has Tikka verisons though I'm not sure how much that gains you.
Anyhow, some things that might be interesting:
1) A trigger hanger or threaded trigger pins because hammering in trigger pins is so fucking stupid.
2) I know how you feel about the many failed attempts to duplicate the Fortner action. Sorry, that motion and feel is still what I want most and can you make it dry fire safe and fit in a 700 chassis, thanks. Don't do it like their weird Fortner sporter model either, I want the thumb pad on the back. That geometry is what makes it so slick to use. I don't want some nasty Savage straight pull abomination either. I want a straight pull that feels like a Fortner when you run it. I want it to feel like it's running on ball bearings lubed with the tears of liberals. It's really kind of surprising I don't have a Fortner yet actually.
3) It might be possible to do a .22lr barrel interface that clamps the barrel in place instead of having it thread in. .22lr just dosen't generate enough thrust for a pre-tensioned shouldered interface to be nessecarry. I expect clamp attachment would allow drop in barrels while not needing either a fragile cone breach or the barrels to be individualy timed to the action as the user could just rotate the barrel to line up the ejector and extractor grooves. I expect the clamp screws could be on the top in front of the scope rail.
4) Affordable, reliable, magazines.
5) I would really prefer a solid bolt mounted safety that I trust over a trigger based one. A lot of 700 triggers actually have versions that come without the safety as many feel trigger based safeties, arnen't.
Anyhow, I look forward to keeping up with whatever you end up planning.
