Bedding Conundrum

[aetherarms]

Having recently been laid off, I've decided to temporarily suspend my centerfire shooting. Going without shooting entirely is simply not in the cards, so I've decided to give rimfire BR a go. Currently, I don't own a 40X, SPF Copperhead (drool), or similarly awesome action, but I do own a very nice Savage/Anschutz Mark 12 that I've recently put a lot of work into.

The big problem with this rifle, however, is that unlike a more traditional 700/Mauser type action where the guard screws and bottom metal secure the action into the stock, the barrel is tapped about halfway down the forearm and is secured by two screws extending out and securing a plate of sorts that retains a slot for a sliding counterweight.

On every other rifle I've ever built, I've always followed the tenet of 'free-float, bed, and thread muzzle for tuner'. With this rifle as is, I cut two G-10 pillars to match the contour of the barrel, set them even, and bedded the barrel and action with Devcon. While all of this did dramatically improve accuracy (went from a .732" to a .591" @50 yards averaged across five groups), there's still the nagging voice in the back of my head that's yelling "float the barrel and put on a tuner, you mook."

Any thoughts on how this could be achieved would be most appreciated. My only idea thus far has been to drill and tap the action itself and fabricate new bottom metal, but I worry about altering the receiver and, even more so, feel fabricating new bottom metal would be awfully involved.

 

[watercam]

What about making an action sleeve or two clamps/sleeves and pillar/ glass bed those? Would be a stock modification as well of course. Or a barrel block just at the front of the action? Could be done with a short piece of round stock bored to barrel diameter. Would not need to be very thick to be effective on a rimfire.
Hope employment comes your way soon, I know the feeling!
Mike T.

 

[Minesweeper3433]

Just remember that with unemployment comes time for kids shooting and working on projects. I have always enjoyed my "down time" between work as a chance to catch up on fixing the van and truck and doing my rifle work and hanging at my local gunsmiths shop.

 

[aetherarms]

Holy crap that's a good idea. If I make a bedding block just thin enough to float the barrel somewhere between .050" and .100", I'd bet I wouldn't even have to modify the bottom stockline to relieve room for the trigger being pushed up. Then it's just a matter of resetting the levels with new pillars, bedding the block in, and fabricating new action screws. Hell, I could probably glue the action to the block permanently and increase its rigidity in the process.

Thanks for the advice. Off to the shop I go.

 

[Greatwhitenorth]

Before making or investing in a tuner, get some heavy duty O rings just under the barrel diameter. Apply these from the forestock forward about 3" apart on the barrel with the last one at the muzzle. Shoot some groups. Adjust the distance to be less between the O rings always keeping one at the end of the barrel and reshoot groups. Use same ammo and lot#. If you can dampen out the right harmonics even slightly, it will show promise for going with either a mid barrel or adjustable end tuner (or both as some BR'ers are doing now). This is a cheap way to test if the harmonics are effecting accuracey too much. It effects accuracy any which way, but sometimes the results don't fully warrant the application.