pillar bedding

243ME

243ME

New member
Im putting together a rifle on a Boyds target varminter stock and want to pillar bed it. I have tried using acraglass bedding compound in the past, not installing pilars, without the results I was looking for. i ended up rebedding it 3 times. Every time I shot it with the same load it would group different(it now wears a HS prescion stock). If I would take business cards and jam them between the barrel and stock it would close those groups right up. The third time around of trying to bed the rifle I jammed those business cards right back in place while letting the compound dry. I know now that this would cause stress and was probably not a good idea at the time. With the cards jammed in place it would clover groups, without them in place with the bedding job the best groups were at a 1/2". Dont know what I did wrong? The next rifle I bedded I just glued in place all the way from the receiver to the complete barrel channel and that did the trick. Now, this is rifle and round number three. I want to give it a go at pillar bedding and from my guess if I would have thrown these in the first rifle it would still be sitting on the original stock. The rifle is a Springfield 1903 so I dont know if score high's adjustable pillar bedding will work? I have read a few articles on this subject and watched score high's free "slide show cd" so i feel pretty confident on the installation. I even found a website where someone used "black gas pipe" on a Mauser to accomplish this feat. Can anybody give some suggestions on what pilars to use?
 
Some rifles shoot better free floated. Not all. The heavy varmint barrel type seem to like this IMHO.

Some rifles shoot better with the receiver and the barrel glass bedded. Usually the sporter barrels. IMHO

Some rifles shoot better with some tension under the barrel. Hence what happend when you added the business cards under the barrel. Usually the sporter and pencil thin barrels. IMHO

I don't think pillar bedding would have changed your results. If you want to add pillars then go ahead and add them. So "in the future" the wood or synthetic stock doesn't crush or colapse under pressure from the receiver screws.

I will guess that you were using factory ammo, or just one type of reload.
 
BTW

From my experiances, or IMO

Free floated barrels generally give the Best/tightest consistant groups with loads that the rifle likes. You usually have to reload to achieve this. Free floating helps to remove contact to the barrel from the stock due to the barrel warping from heat, the stock warping, or using a sling, or barrel wipping ( I can't think of the correct term "occilation maybe").

Full length bedding/and or adding a pressure pad usually gives better groups with more DIFFERENT loads.

You may have noticed that the factory stock may have a pressure pad in the front. Many do. Acts the same way as placing business cards in there.
 
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