Bedding in front of action

[wyo]

I have a rifle that I had rebarreled and the smith who did the job also bedded the action. He also bedded the first 3 inches of the barrel. He told me that he always beds out past the action underneath the barrel as a matter of principle, believing the barrel needs this support.

I"ve never heard of this and am thinking that I should remove the bedding compound back to the action to get the advantages of bedding the action and free floating the barrel.

Any experiences with this on this forum??

Wyo

 

[clowdis]

That is very common, especially in actions that have a magazine and may be a little weak in the flex department. I have and still do it both ways.

 

[chino1969]

I have a rifle that I had rebarreled and the smith who did the job also bedded the action. He also bedded the first 3 inches of the barrel. He told me that he always beds out past the action underneath the barrel as a matter of principle, believing the barrel needs this support.

I"ve never heard of this and am thinking that I should remove the bedding compound back to the action to get the advantages of bedding the action and free floating the barrel.

Any experiences with this on this forum??

Wyo

Interesting question that I recently explored. I just bedded a blueprinted Rem. 40X single shot action in a HS Precision competition stock. I wanted to have it both ways and here's how I handled it. I bedded the action with no bedding in front of the recoil lug. After the bedding had cured and hardened for over the week, I made a bedding shim for the first few inches of barrel in front of the recoil lug. I applied release agent to the barrel channel and formed a little clay dam to prevent bedding compound from running into the recoil lug recess in the stock. I now have a removeable shim that performs the same function as permanently bedding this area. The barrels are all Kreiger #18 in a light varmint contour. I may want to go to a #17 heavy varmint contour in the future with the same action. This way I can make another shim to accomodate the heavy varmint barrel. I also want to prove to myself whether bedding the first couple inches of barrel make any difference. Some very good well known gunsmiths do it with bedding and some do without. My little experiment will prove, to myself, whether it's worth it or not.

In your case, I would leave the bedding intact unless you are planning in making that a switch barrel rig. All my rigs are switch barrel set ups which is why I went that route. I have rigs bedded with the first several inches of barrel bedded and they shoot great.

Lou Baccino

 

[Preacher]

All my barrels are fully 100% floated, even the heavy 30 inch straight 1.350's, and they do shoot very well.. I would just as soon nothing touched the barrel but air... I guess the best thing for you is to shoot it like it is and then shoot it with out the so called support and see what happens... I have done it that way and now they float the full length...

 

[wyo]

I guess the obvious thing for me to do is first to shoot it. Shoots good, leave it alone [unless I just want experiment and compare bedded performance with unbedded]. Thanks for the replies.

Wyo

 

[GerryM]

I agree with my twin preacher.
Free floating always worked best for me.

 

[Eddie Harren]

I find it interesting that the USMC M40A1 rifles, which were world renowned for their accuracy, were bedded 1.5" in front of the lug and WITHOUT pillars.

 

[GerryM]

There's a reason for that Doc.
Jim hart has done many and it's not just his style.
They are shot is way different conditions,
The barrels have a very different taper also.
I know i have one built to those specs by
one of the builders.

 

[Rust]

I bed my heavy barrel field rifles under the barrel provided they have a straight section of barrel to bed under for the first two inches or so but only with a laminated or good synthetic stock (as in NOT injection molded). My theory is that it is a little more solid and will stand up to a little more abuse in the field. There have been occasions of unintentional physical abuse in the field.

My match rifles are all free floated, don't want to risk altering the barrel harmonics over the course of a 20 round string as the barrel gets good and hot. No empirical data as I don't have the time to do a comparison but it's my theory and doesn't seem to hurt anything...