I've never touched one. My co-worker said he changed the stock and was having terrible accuracy and shifting zero. His barrel was binding terribly in the forearm. He wanted me to bed it and install a new scope. He had a Tasco scope, base and rings and we upgraded him to a Leupold VX-R 3-9x40 30mm firedot. I told him he might as well upgrade the base too.

This rifle is chambered in .270.He wanted it in better shape before elk season this year. He's from Montana and goes back home every year to family property to hunt.

I made custom length steel pillars and bedded the action. His stock was too thick around the action and he barely had any screw engagement. I had to recess the bottom metal quite a bit to get the proper thickness to match the pillar length.























Installed the new Leupold base, scope and rings...







Now I just need to seal the stock where I had to open up the wood and take it to the range. It should shoot great now. The barrel is fully free-floated.

Tony.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: benny6,

Wow! Not that I know what I'm talking about (except to know pillar bedding and a fully floated barrel are Good Things), but that looks like terrific work.

I am curious: You did a ton of highly technical and extremely skilled labor on that rifle. To the untrained eye (sort of like blueprinting an engine), it looks almost the same. Does that bug you or is the proof on the paper enough to satisfy your ego?
I bet it's going to shoot lights out. Great pics of the job.

Bruce

Looks great. Please let us know how it shoots.

For me, proof on paper and if the customer is happy is where it’s at. It may still shoot.... okay. I don’t know the history of this rifle and how it shot before, other than what the owner told me.

I expect it to shoot well for me as I have a very defined routine and setup which is very different from the average hunter and their idea of a “sighting in” session.

I’ll give it a good barrel cleaning and borescope it before I test it to make sure everything is good to go.

Also, I came into the gun world with nothing. I’m self-taught and I remember having to search for information to figure out how to do stuff on my own. My posting style is knowledge-sharing and for the benefit of others who are curious about how things are done.

The hardest part to get right about epoxy bedding is getting it tight with no voids or air pockets. After bedding M14’s, bedding bolt guns is magnitudes easier and this job had no voids.

I can only think of one other M14 bedding job I did that did not have a void or air pocket that didn’t collapse while probing with my finger. Nearly all M14 bedding jobs I’ve done required a skim-bed to correct air pockets.

The other challenge is not getting any of the bedding to stick to the receiver. Even though I use release agent, I’ve had a perfect bedding job ruined because a chunk of the epoxy may follow the receiver out of the stock.

Again, bolt guns are much easier with a simple round surface and only the recoil lug being the odd surface.

I’ve learned a lot from this site and posts like this is my way of giving back.

Tony.

If you don’t mind, how do you determine the proper length for pillars?

quote:

Originally posted by Voshterkoff:
If you don’t mind, how do you determine the proper length for pillars?

That’s what the second picture is for. I trim the pillars until I can screw the action screws through the bottom metal and into the action and have good thread engagement.

If the front pillar is too short, the screw can go too far and not allow the bolt to close. I trim, install, and shine a light into the chamber area and check to make sure the front screw doesn’t poke past the barrel threads. I leave it about a half a turn short.

If you look at the third and fourth pic from the bottom, you can see how far the rear screw threads into the tang.

Tony.

quote:

Originally posted by RNshooter:
I am curious: You did a ton of highly technical and extremely skilled labor on that rifle. To the untrained eye (sort of like blueprinting an engine), it looks almost the same. Does that bug you or is the proof on the paper enough to satisfy your ego?
I bet it's going to shoot lights out. Great pics of the job.

Bruce

There's no way to see if a rifle's been bedded (somtimes you can see free-floating). Unless you pull the stock off, you can see the bedding.

One question, you pillar-bedded and epoxy-bedded? I thought it is usually one or the other (standard disclaimer: what do I know?).

One of the main points of bedding is to ensure that the back of your recoil lug has full bearing contact. The action screws are not supposed to absorb any recoil forces at all. The front, sides and bottom of the recoil lug are supposed to free float as well.

I can use my Montana rifle as a good example here. I know for a fact that the recoil lug is free floating. I have it in a Hogue stock with the aluminum bedding block. With the action all the way back against the recoil lug, the action screws won’t fit. I have to slide the action forward to get them to fit. The accuracy of that rifle is horrible. I have to bed the lug at some point and try again later.

I shelved it last year and switched to my pillar bedded savage in a McMillan.

The pillars provide rock solid mounting, but the bedding provides even recoil distribution and extends the consistency of the stock to action fitment.

Tony.

looks great, what would that weigh?

what would the elk hunter /owner require for this rifle in the way of accuracy?

minute of milk jug?, minute of notebook? minute of pop can?

quote:

Originally posted by bendable:
looks great, what would that weigh?

what would the elk hunter /owner require for this rifle in the way of accuracy?

minute of milk jug?, minute of notebook? minute of pop can?

As pictured, 8 pounds, 9 ounces empty.

Realistically? Minute of paper plate at maybe 200 yards. That’s about the size of the vitals.

I’m confident it will do just fine for his purposes.

Tony.

Outstanding post, beautiful rifle, and thank you for sharing your insights. Tom

Nice project. The vintage stock is simple and beautiful!

Nice bit of work. Looks like an older BDL. Can't wait to see the range results.

Thanks for sharing the process pictures.

Nice work,is that modlen clay [play doe]in mag well ?
I use the brownells kit for bedding,and bee wax in the cavities I want to protect.
midway one shot as a release agent Three dry cotes.straw sleves in bolt chanels and my threaded bolts to hold the action.

Thanks! That is Roma Plastilina oil based modeling clay. It never dries out and I've been using the same clay for bedding jobs for probably 5 years now. I still have half a brick that hasn't been cut into yet.

I just pick out the dried bedding chunks and wad it back into a ball and back into the zip-lock it goes until the next bedding job.

For release agent, I use Ram-225. It's expensive at about $25 for an aerosol can. It produces super-tight bedding jobs.

I forgot to tell RNshooter that the pride is in producing a bedding job that is nearly invisible. That is one of the goals for me.

Tony.

quote:

Originally posted by RNshooter:
I am curious: You did a ton of highly technical and extremely skilled labor on that rifle. To the untrained eye (sort of like blueprinting an engine), it looks almost the same. Does that bug you or is the proof on the paper enough to satisfy your ego?
I bet it's going to shoot lights out. Great pics of the job.

Bruce

a good pillar bed job (on just about any rifle) will not be noticeable to the untrained eye, and it should look the same,


that is the part that should stand out, and Benny did a great job

I took it to the range today and ran some Federal 150 grain soft point through it. Very cheap stuff.

I got it dialed in at 100 and ran two 3-shot groups. Both were right at 1". The first two shots of each group were right next to each other with the third dropping about 3/4" low as the barrel warmed up.




I allowed the barrel to cool between groups. I'd call this good accuracy for an old hunting rifle. I've got to do some more cleaning on the barrel. There's a fair amount of copper fouling on the last 14" of the barrel. The rifling looks good but the throat shows signs of erosion.

The scope is not the best for accuracy work and the crosshairs are very thick. But for hunting, it should work just fine. This trigger is pretty stiff too. I had to back off a few times from fatigue and start over.

Thanks for reading.

Tony.

Love it!
As a note, I have a 700ADL in 30.06 and bought my son the same in .270.

With hand-loads the .270 can touch holes at 100 yards. Still working on the right load for the .06

Now the thought of shooting elk with a .270, to me the 30.06 at 180 grains is the smallest is go and preferably above 200 grain.

Really enjoyed reading your post. Thanks for sharing