"How do you bed your SuperStock 10/22"

Okay, now we need to talk about preparation. Bedding a rifle is like painting a room, the better you do the prep the better the job it going to go. And there is a TON of prep. Bedding a rifle is a 5 -10 minute deal. PREPARING a rifle for bedding can take an hour or two and there are very few short cuts to doing it right. So how do I prepare a rifle for bedding? Lets take a look.

First the Stock. I tape off every where I think the compound could oose out on to. The stuff is nasty and will get on ANYTHING it can! So I tape the stock to look like this:



This picture also answers the second most asked question I get, "Where do you put the bedding pad under the barrel and how big is it?"

Here you can see it. It is 1.5 inches up from the action and 1.5 to 2 inches long. This one is 1.75". Are these engraved it stone? No. Will moving it 1/4" change anything? Maybe, I don't know. I just know that when this very rifle was still the "development rifle" I stumbled onto this bedding scheme while trying to shoot Ricochet's 13mm Funshoot. I was stacking cardboard shims up and down the barrel channel with the Skeeter barrel. All of a sudden there was two targets that made the club and with ammo that it never shot well!! When I got the GM Heavy Sporter I just used the same scheme and shot the best average target I had shot to the time. And that was just breaking in the barrel.

Okay you see all those places that are dark brown? Those are the areas that are bedded. Many people just bed the back of the action. I bed the whole thing. Is my way better? For ME it is! Even months later it is still very hard to get the barreled action in and out of the stock. It is TIGHT.

Any of the areas you see bedded are also roughed up to give the bedding a place to go and to leave a thickness to make it strong. I leave a spot here and there untouched so the action will have a little support until the bedding hardens. Which brings up another point.

There is NO pillar !! None of my rifles have them unless they come from the factory. Are pillars a bad thing? Nope. But the pillars main and really only function is to keep the stock from compressing. I have never been much for cranking down on the take down screw. Snug is good and I turn it the same amount each time, I mark the screw.....I know, I know, I'm a dinosaur. Edit: I now use a torque wrench and both of my Twins shoot best at around 20" lbs which is not very tight. I have been tightening them more than that until I got the torque wrench.I also have nothing against a pillar done well. It is possible that one or both of these rifles will get one because I doubt the testing is over. At the same time will many argue with the accuracy these two rifles are making? Do they NEED pillars? My first rifles that I bedded in 1978 are still going strong without them Edit: My latest rifle "Ricochet's Tribute" does have a pillar. Because it is still in testing as of 4-1-2011 I have not bedded it because Ricochet never did bed his rifles. So far it is not as accurate as the bedded rifles but it is close. It averaged .894" at 100 yds. The "Twins" averaged .817" and .749" so I think bedding the new rifle will close the gap easily.

I'm thinking that is about it for stock prep. I know my ideas are not what may be considered the latest or the current fad. I will NEVER tell you my way is better and it is far from the only way. The truth is there really is a number of ways to do this and end up with a very accurate rifle.

Stay tuned:bthumb:

METAL PREP:

Okay, the stock is more or less ready to bed......now the tough part. Not hard really just the part I like the least. It is also the most important part if you do not want to glue the action into the stock.....maybe forever. If you do mess up you can usually get it apart but that is another post and maybe another thread. There two ways to lock you action into the stock. One is that the release agent either is not used correctly or the wrong stuff is used and it glues the action in the stock. The other is a "Mechanical lock" This would be when the epoxy extrudes it screw hole, crevices, cracks, joints or the like and make a ledge or post that hold the stock in. Either is very bad. Either TOTALLY AVOIDABLE So don't be afraid to do this job. Still every time I do one I'm always a little nervous until I feel the rifle pop apart after the glass sets.

To be honest the 10/22 is kind of a pain in the butt to bed as compared to a MOD 700 Remington with it's simple round receiver. The 10/22 has many nooks and crannies that HAVE to be filled with clay or taped off or otherwise blocked and smoothed:



Please note: this tape would be trimmed so NONE was on the bottom, just the sides.

You can see just in this view a number of places that have to be filled with clay and or tape. Tape? Yes tape! Let me explain:



In this view I have already filled all the creases and holes with clay. AFTER that I put 3 or 4 layers of tape on the sides. That tape is then covered with release agent. I do this to create room on both sides the the bedding does not touch this area of the rifle except on the bottom. Why?

When I learned to do bedding it was in the middle to late 70's and Bob Brackney was a top Benchrest gunsmith and shooter. He wrote a number of articles for Rifle Magazine which, at the time, was the official magazine for one of the 2 benchrest organizations. Bob always stressed that in the front take down area it was important not to have any side or front pressure on the action. In the rear main part of the action I WANT the sides tight. Not here. The tape gives me just enough clearance that I will never have to worry about it.

Now to the barrel pad area. Once you have figured out where you want the pad you need to make a "dam" on each end to give the wanted pad. The dams can be made out of clay or tape. I prefer tape with release agent on it. It gives a cleaner break than clay does. Is that important? No. It just looks nicer. Do looks matter? NO! So do it either way you like. Some people go to great lengths to make their bedding pretty. I'll do some of that but the fact is ugly bedding works every bit as well as pretty bedding. Small voids, round edges and other cosmetic issues mean absolutely NOTHING in accuracy. They CAN add 100% to the time and work to do the bedding job to completely eliminate. Not worth my time. You may see it differently and that is fine. It is YOUR rifle. This is MY rifle For instance, is this pretty?



Nope, but it works great. Take a close look at this picture. See the very flat area towards the right? That is the vee block. If you notice the area in front of it is virtually void of bedding. That is because I put a thick tape spacer on the front of the block and clay in the stock so that there is NO bedding touching the front of the block. Same reason as I don't want any side pressure. Also note that I fill the oval lengthwise recess in the take down lug. Other people let this fill with bedding. I don't like that idea. My action bedding is SO tight that if I fill this area I stand the chance of creating a bit of a mechanical lock front to back.

Almost done with metal prep, hang in there. When I bed the action I remove the trigger assy. Why? It has nothing to do with bedding, it gets in the way and creates many more opportunities for mechanical locks. Take it off. BE SURE TO PUT A PIECE OF TAPE OVER EACH HOLE IN THE ACTION WHERE THE TRIGGER ASSY PINS GO THROUGH!!! I use aluminum tape for this because it is very thin and strong. Just to be sure I even put another piece over the inside hole.

Are we done yet? Are you kidding? NOW we smear our Kiwi Neutral Shoe Polish on ALL the metal that even comes close to the bedding!! It is much easier to wipe polish off than to chip glued on glass bedding. Don't glob it on but use plenty. I just use my fingers and wipe it on, rub it in, force it in anyplace that it will go. If you are too prissy to use your finger wear some latex gloves. I would not use a brush. The Miles Gilbert kit comes with an applicator but I end up with it on my hands anyway so I just use my index finger to put it on and smooth it very thin.

Darned good thing we remembered to do this, don't you think? :bthumb:

See ya next time....oh....next time. We will actually mix the compound, discuss what compound to use and what not to (do not use Bondo Rico!!) and we will put the action in the stock....and pray we did everything right See ya then.

GOOP!

Time for GOOP talk. First let me tell you I hate working with epoxies of any type so I'm picky about what I use. I want something that is not runny and it stays pretty much where you put it. I already have said that I believe in kits for beginners and that I use them myself. My friend Mike the gunsmith uses Acragel, I used to use AcraGlas with "kitty hair" (chopped fiber glass) and these two rifles were bedded with Midway Miles Gilbert kits. I like these kits. When you mix these you have the runny typical epoxy, but it has a bottle of "micro balloons" or tiny glass balloons. It is a very fine glass powder in looks. When you mix this with the epoxy you get a very nice, thick, pasty goop to work with. Pretty nice really. I has two colorants and that is my only real complaint with these kits. There is more than enough components to do 5 rifles but only enough colorant to do two of one color. They are black and brown. Without colorant it comes out a nice milky white.

Be sure you have the stock ready before you mix and that means one more thing to do. Remove the take down screw from the stock. Have a good sized soda straw ready. One of the fat milkshake type straws. Place it into the take down hole from the inside. Mark it for length and cut it off just a bit longer than the hole in the stock is deep so that when you clamp the action into the stock it will slightly compress the straw. Now fill the straw with modeling clay. Wrap the straw with tape until it will just fit into the hole and smear the whole thing with shoe polish and jam it in the hole!!

Take on last look at you metal work and make sure everything is ready. Your satisfied? Good check it again.

Okay the stock is ready, metal is ready and later I will write the final (for now.....more on that below) segment about putting them together, and just as important, getting them apart.

As I have already said the Blue rifle will continue to be worked on a tested. Almost ALL of this will be bedding, pillars, vee blocks and such so I will probably use this thread to continue where "Put Up or Shut up" got left off. Well either tonight or in the morning I will finish this.

Okay. Stock is good, metal is good. Here we go.

One more thing to do to the barrel. Measure a spot just back from fore arm tip on the barrel. Measure the with of the barrel channel in the stock. Get out your good old black electrical tape. Your are going to need it twice. First wrap a wind of tape around and around on the measured spot on the barrel. Wrap it until it is just one or two layers thicker than the barrel channel is wide. This will center you barrel action in the stock. That is the easiest and the best way to insure good alignment.

Be sure you have some 1" wide electricians tap on hand. Goop as much bedding material as you think you'll need into the various areas of the stock. Then put another good bit in. You WANT it to over run. Settle the rifle into the stock and push it down. Remember you do not have the trigger assy in the rifle. Now wrap the the electrician tape around the action and the stock. I used to use the surgical rubber that comes in the kit. I now use the tape as it is much stronger and less flexing than the rubber. As quickly as possible use the Q tips and acetone and wipe up all the squeeged goop from the tape and metal. Get as much as possible. At this point I set the rifle up in my Porta vice under the fore arm and rear bag just like it will be shot. I do not have a rifle vice but I have been using the Porta Vise as long as I have been doing this. Take one last look to make sure everything is right....an wait....and wait....and wait. This is very hard but do not pull it apart too soon. You will regret it.

I used to leave them over night but the new stuff is good after 6 hours. When it is time I remove the rifle from the vise and I hold the stock in one hand and and the barrel in the other and give it a pull.......if it does not come apart and it may not, turn the rifle over, hold the stock in your left had (assuming you are right handed) and smack the barrel on the underside with a rubber mallet. Do this over a bed or couch in case it lets go all at once. Normally it will just move some and now you can pull it apart.

Now you can breathe because you have been holding your breath for 6 hours!!

Be sure that every thing has filled the way you want it to. Void, air bubble and rolled edges mean nothing to accuracy but if they bother you now it the time to fix anything while the metal work is all together.

Good? Okay strip all the tape off of the barreled action and start cleaning up the mess the clay has made. Break Free CLP or something similar will be a big help here. Wipe all the Kiwi off and really going to the nooks and crannies to get the clay out. Check your fit one more time. Smile a lot :bthumb:

Now put you trigger assy on the action and try to put it in the stock remembering to center the safety. Won't go in will it? Don't panic. This is normal.

Pull the barreled action aside and look inside the stock......you will see that the bedding has run down the insides where the trigger housing needs to go? use a heavy file or fine rasp, even rough sand paper on a block and file down the side of the stock until either you are back to original wood or the action fits. YOU ARE ONLY TOUCHING THE AREA BELOW THE "SHELF" THE ACTION SITS ON. Do not try to remove anything above the shelf as that is what is making your action tight!

Remove the soda straw and all the tape/clay from the take down hole and assemble your newly bedded 10/22 SuperStocker.

Bedding a 10/22 SOUNDS like a lot of work. It SOUNDS worse than it really is. Writing this was WAY worse than actually bedding the rifle was!!!

Now for the fun part. Go test you rifle. It is going to be more consistently accurate than it ever was before. You will have the pride of having learned one more thing to make your light weight rifle shoot like an Ultimate....better than the ones that are just bolted together.

Almost done. Remember I said this was a new beginning for the development rifle, the Blue Twin. In the near future it is going to get some mods and if you want you can follow them with me in this thread.

1st change is this area, where the Vee block goes is going to be removed:



Why? Because for other testing the barrel is going to come off a few times for MolyFusion and a Skeeter vee Block like the Stainless rifle has. I what to see first if removing this area make the rifle shoot any worse be cause I would prefer to NEVER bed this area if possible. I'm NOT convinced that the vee block goes back on the same way each time. If that is true it could cause binding so I will relieve this area with dremel an test. I think will be just fine, if not it a simple thing to rebed it.

After that maybe this will be my first rifle with a pillar. Will that improve already fine accuracy? I don't think so but it will be a good test.

Who knows? I may get some question or suggestion from you guys and we will test that.

But, for this moment, My twins sit complete. I'm a happy guy. See you next time.

way cool Vincent I will be watching this thread closely..still have one DSP waiting for some bedding :bthumb:
earth

I'll defenately be watching this one. I have 2 home custom stocks that I'm going to fill one day, and they will need bedding. Also will be looking at it to see how I can use it with the Bandito.

Thanks Vincent been waiting for you to post on this subject.:bthumb:

This is about showing others how I do it.

Click to expand...

Way to go, Vince! I'll be watching this one :bthumb:

Thanks, more tomorrow....this is more involved than I thought but it is fun too. Here is a little tease till then. This was the BREAK IN target for this rifle/barrel/bedding. The first group was the first 10 shots and I was not really paying attention. Then I saw what it was doing. So it was shoot 10 shots and clean. Was shot with $1.35 a box ammo. Something was starting to work.



Back tomorrow. See you then!

i may try bedding mine someday

might be a bit early, vince,

but two ques for now;

did you bed the area where the rcvr tang sits?
is or are your bbls fully floated after bedding that small pad 2"?? ahead
of the rcvr area?

thanks,

rico....

Quoted from above:

Okay you see all those places that are dark brown? Those are the areas that are bedded. Many people just bed the back of the action. I bed the whole thing. Is my way better? For ME it is! Even months later it is still very hard to get the barreld action in and out of the stock. It is TIGHT.

Click to expand...

The entire front area is bedded though I will make one change there and we will get into that tomorrow.

Yes the barrel is floated from the pad out. I bed a very large area and I bed it tight. The tighter the better. Tomorrow we will get into metal prep and final bedding. After all of that and any question I will go into the next evolution (s) of this scheme. They shoot so well any sane person would never touch them again but both rifles are in for some changes and I though we would do them together, for better or worse. I WILL only do one rifle at a time so that if I screw one up I will always have the other. The Blue Twin is really the "Put up or shut up" development rifle and it will continue on that journey while the Stainless Twin will be my control rifle, my 100 yard rifle, and my day to day shooter.

I kind of had this in mind when I built the stainless rifle. I honestly thought I had just gotten lucky with the blue one. So I built the stainless rifle to prove, or not, that it was repeatable. The Stainless rifle turned out to be, on average, about .020" better at 25 yards so the theory was proven. Now I can continue experimenting with the blue rifle knowing I have not only a theoretical place to return to but a real rifle built to that spec.

To be very honest it is going to be very difficult to tear into this rifle again. To me certain mechanical things almost seem to have their own personality. Maybe it comes from driving the same VW Baja Bug for almost 20 years!!! I know that sounds crazy but there is truth to it.

Racing teams go to great lengths to make one car exactly like the next, right down to building them on a huge surface plate. But the driver will always like one or two cars better and can instantly tell them apart.

These two rifles are pretty darn close to the same yet it is stainless twin that shoots slightly better (right now), feels better and when I shoot it is the one that comes out first and gets put away last. If you don't understand there is no way I can explain it. Anyway that is why Blue Twin will continue development and Stainless will only be changed if something is proven better.

Everyone is gonna be SURE I'm crazy now!

Great post Vincent:t I have only bedded the barrel on two rifles so far, I'll be watching your post with interest:t

Thanks Vincent. I start bedding the mannlicher tonight, the info is much appreciated.

Jay

Good luck with it:bthumb:

Take your time. The worst thing you can do is hurry!

Go back to post #5

The rifle is done for now as is the write up. Sorry it took so long. It was more work than I thought it would be to write this. It was easier to bed the rifle.

Remember this is MY way. This is just ONE way. There are many others. MKnarr's sticky should be read by anyone thinking of bedding a 10/22. Other people have other ideas. Some are better than others. This works for me.

Thanks for following along:bthumb:

Thanks for doing the write up Vincent. This will help me allot. I'm always looking for new ways to do the same thing so to speak.

I have a made TNZ stock that I may be doing in the near future. Course have to decide on a barrel first, LOL.

Tis my pleasure. If anyone has questions feel free

Forgive my ignorance on this, but there are 2 rifles in my inventory - well three, but 2 that apply to this question - that I want to bed.

Does this only work on wood stocks, or can you SUCCESSFULLY bed a synthetic stock?

you can bed a synthetic:bthumb:

I've heard that the bedding a synthetic stock won't take well, and doesn't last very long. Is that bad info from a poor bedding job then?

I'm grinning in anticipation!!! I have $100 check in my little hands that is supposed to go to hunting supplies - I think a bedding job kit for my hunting rifles qualifies, right?

Some polymers, plastics, whatever you want to call them, don't take epoxy well. Silicone residue from molding and other factors don't allow the bedding compounds ( most of which seem to be some kind of epoxy) to stick. I've had good success in other hobbies by cleaning the plastics with denatured alcohol or acetone and always roughing up the surfaces with sandpaper before gluing. What little bedding I've done so far has been on wood which is no problem for the epoxy. Someone with experience on some of the synthetic stocks is bound to come along and give some specific tips. Good luck with the project!

Jay

Oh, I think that a couple of bedding kits is a perfect use for the hunting supplies money.

Guys there are synthetics and there are synthetics. I have a Mod 700 .243 that I bedded in 1978. It is in a Brown Precision FIBERGLASS stock. The original synthetic. They bed very well.

Tupperware stocks on the other hand do not bed easily or well. They are the factory cheapie stocks made of polypropylene, polyethylene or nylon.

Not only do they not bed they are thermally unstable. They have flow lines from molding that become built in stress paths when the stock gets hot or cold. They are advertised as being stable for humidity and this is true. They just neglect to tell you about the temperature instability

By the way...ONE bedding kit should be good for at least 3 and maybe 5 rifles. That is why they are VERY good deals.

One I am definately going to do. It is a Savage 93 17HMR with heavy barrel and wood stock. May do a pillar bedding on this one too.

The other two I am still afraid to try. And the last post didn't help much. One is a Rmmington 597 I have mods on, and is consistently shooting 1/4" groups at 50 yards and sometimes better. I wanted to bed it to make always better. The other is a Stevens (Savage 110) 7mm Rem Mag - sorry for mentioning it on RFC, please don't rat me out. I have just started to mod it, started with the trigger. It is double pillar bedded, but I was hoping to bed the action too.

Thread revival

Today I was cleaning my 10/22s (the actions, that is) and noticed when I tightened the screw in the stock I could really feel the barrel and stock come together. It is the original stock. The gun currently doesn't have a scope on it, because I found that it was accurate enough for me, but the scope would suddenly become way off so there wasn't much point. So I did a test; I put a straight edge on the scope rail and brought it up to the front sight. I held it there while turning the takedown screw, and it moved...A HELL OF A LOT. This means the takedown screw is bending the barrel and changing the relationship of the scope and barrel. I now see why it would suddenly change so much. An eighth turn really does a lot. So I want to bed this thing, and I want to do it now, like tomorrow! I know, I should buy a bedding kit.

But here's my question. Can I use polyester resin? It is really hard and sticks quite well. I know I can get it to stick to the stock just fine, and it gets HARD, so what would be the problem? It is runny, also. Or could I use some epoxy that gets really hard, but is more like toothpaste in consistency? I think the polyester resin would be better. I can't see what would be wrong with that, but if you guys can think of something, please tell me.

Thanks

all I can say is..........don't use liquid nails