We reinvestigate the problem of Gribov ambiguities within the Landau (or Lorentz) gauge for the ghost and gluon propagators in pure $SU(2)$ lattice gauge theory. We make use of the full symmetry group of the action taking into account large, i.e. nonperiodic, $\mathbb{Z}(2)$ gauge transformations leaving lattice plaquettes invariant. Enlarging in this way the gauge orbits for any given gauge field configuration the Landau gauge can be fixed at higher local extrema of the gauge functional in comparison with standard (overrelaxation) techniques. This has a clearly visible effect not only for the ghost propagator at small momenta but also for the gluon propagator, in contrast to the common belief.

• Received 24 November 2005

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.74.034503