Guys,

I am just curious ... on a hard .458 kicker if one uses a synthetic stock built around an aluminum bedding block, is it necessary to have a second recoil lug on the barrel?

Thanks!

Mike, for what its worth, I had a Wunderby Accumark in 338-378. The recoil on that rifle was far worse with 300gr Sierras than any of my 458s with 580 gr bullets, let alone 400 grainers. The Accumark was in a fiberglass/kevlar/armid super stock, that had no second recoil lug and promptly broke in half beginning at the left front corner of the mag box. The rifle had a break on it from the factory, but I never installed it so every round it fired was full power with no break. I shot 1154 rounds out of that rifle and went through three stocks. Weatherby must have been regretting ever selling it without being bedded into the stock better and without the second lug. I 458 Lott for a short time that I bought from a friend in need. I shot the rifle with the hopes of developing a good load for a 580 cast gc bullet. After about 40 rounds the stock began to split length wise from about two inches in front of the trigger all the way past the mag box to the forend. I put it on the bench and removed the stock(bell and Carlson on a Mark X action) only to find that there was no bedding done and no second lug. I think I would go with a second lug no matter what.

I suppose define 'hard' kicker is the question, some reckon a 45/70 is a hard kicker. I split a Ramline stock (unbedded) on a Zastava 458WinMag which was replaced with a cheap Butler Creek synthetic and bedded properly. It then held up perfectly.
Cheers...
Con

I built two .458 win mags on M98 actions and simply steel bedded them into a el cheapo synthetic stock from brownells. They weighed about 8lbs with fluted barrels and as much skeltonization as I could muster. No second lug and never had any problems. With that said, I had a synthetic stocked 6.5X55 break clean at the wrist. Generally synthetic stocks require lots of carefull prep before bedding and make sure you have enough relief around the back of the mag box. Many of them fit too tighly there and if there is play around the screw, the action can get a good running start on the stock.-Rob

Has anyone ever seen that Ruger boat paddle stock fail? Gumboot has one in 458 and a friend has one in a 50 cal wildcat that does about 50 Alaskan type velocities and both seem to be holding up at last report.

NO.

I miss those boat paddles. The plastic was denser than normal. The stock and barreled action on hard kickers with a fast recoil impulse really need to be as one, no matter how you do it.

I lean toward McMillans with a heavier fill (They have five fill weights from feather to solid - I use the 416 fill), and use Titanium or steel Devcon.

The worst rifles are those with a lot of powder going through a narrow bore. The recoil curve is a sharp spike. By comparison, a 416 Remington magnum has a much more spread out recoil curve. The area under the broad and spiky curves may be the same, but the spiky curve delivers a faster shock to whatever the stock is; and that makes it much more likely to crack.

The popular terms are under or over bore capacity. That is why a 7mm Rem Mag "snaps" and a 30-06 "shoves.

LD

The question is: Does a .458 need a 2nd lug if bedding block in play?

Answer: NO!!!!!!!!

For what it's worth I have a Remington 700 Safari Grade in .458 Win. Mag. that had a Walnut stock. After about 40 rounds the stock split right at the tang. Remington wasn't very helpful about solving the matter, and I didn't feel like tieing the gun up for months, so I purchased a H&S Precision stock with the full length Aluminum Bedding Block. It fit perfectly, and shoots even better. I've fired hundreds of rounds through it with no ill effects. H&S Precision is on everyone's $h!t list now because of the Horiuchi deal, but that's another story. The stock has been flawless. When I called them with the problem they even told me to buy it from Midway because it would be cheaper than if they sold it to me factory direct. Bill T.

Mike, what I forgot to make clear was that my Accumark had the aluminum bedding block and still broke three times.

Joe,

I wonder if your rifle had the Bell & Carlson knock-off of the H-S Precision stock. B&C was low-bidder for the OEM stocks for Remington and Weatherby and supplanted H-S as the supplier for several years.

George

I put a ruger boat paddle on my 458ar after spliting the wood on the first stock. All my firends make fun of me, it is with out a doubt the ugliest made, but I bet one of the strongest. It has cross bolts in the forearm that fit perfectly (fore and aft)around the front recoil lug when bedded. I wouldn't hesitate to use it as a club!

No doubt George. I had four H-S Precision stocks on Remington 700 rifles. All of them were chambered in 7.62 or 300 win mag and none ever even flinched considering how harshly they were treated. A friend of mine is a big bore nut as I am and he swears by McMillan for the heavy stuff. Just a side note with his rifles. None of them have a second lug and all are bedded with Marinetex with steel fibers.. He shoots two days a week and has yet to break a stock.

P.S. That 458 Douglas barrel that you got from me was intended for a rifle that was heading into a Bell and Carlson stock that I had. After my experiences with the Accumark, I scrapped the stock and sold the barrel. I should have bought a decent stock and built that Lott as I had intended to do.

When I re-stocked my CZ 550 in .416 Rigby with a McMillan stock I specifically asked this question to one of the people who work on such things at McMillan and he was adamant that no recoil lugs were required. He said if the stock splits they would replace it no questions asked...

I can't speak from any other level of experience here...

quote:

Originally posted by Joe Miller:
The rifle had a break on it from the factory, but I never installed it so every round it fired was full power with no break.

Why?? Bill T.

Because I despise those damn things.

I think there are multiple problems occuring with broken stocks...some are the shooters fault...loose stock screws, not checking the fit around the mag, stock screws, tang, bolt handle etc...some are the stocks fault...Pi**Poor fit, poor materials, hidden cracks...and some are combinations of the two.

Many shooters blame the stock or the stock maker because they won't own up to the fact all they did was grab and shoot and didn't bother checking out the fit or bother with checking the screw torque...blame it on someone or something else.

I never bought anything that didn't need checking out or some tuning up...NOTHING...but when it comes to guns that is a horse of a different color.

I had a Sav 114 Laminated stock crack between the stock screws AFTER I re-barreled it to 375 H&H...I called Savage and they said it was not guaranteed for recoil over a 300 WM...OK...My fault...I just epoxied up the problem, added 0.030" steel walls to the mag area and added a larger recoil block connected to a bar bedded up into the barrel channel, relieved the tang, added pillars and REAL cross bolts and went shooting....at least 300 rounds of 300 grain bullets loaded to top velocity so far....no problems, no cracking, nyet...

I won't use a laminated stock on anything larger than a 338...I pay very close attention to fit...I use pillars and/or full or partial bedding blocks, and WOOD stocks with a steel wrist pin, cross bolts to help absorb the twisting recoil and install 0.030" plates inside the mag well, and a recoil block with a steel rod threaded into the block embedded in a groove in the stock forend...I relieve the tang area, stock bolts and the receiver is bedded ONLY at the tang and bedding block and I order a stock with extra wood around the mag area...I don't have ANY problems with stocks cracking... I don't think a secondary recoil lug is needed.

Most shooters have no clue as to just how the recoild forces are transmitted from the barrel/receiver to the stock...you have both transverse and axial forces...thrust back against the shoulder and a twisting of the receiver...if the stock bolts don't hold the receiver rigid against these forces you can have many differend twisting, compressing, stretching forces all trying to rip the stock to pieces...and sometimes they do...

Many shooter pi** and moan about their problems but don't take the time to really analyse what actually happened so it can be corrected...I read too much "I dindonuttn....it jus broke". Well maybe it did, but I would bet 90% could have been prevented with cooperation between the maker and the buyer and the buyer taking the time to pay attention.

No flame intended.

I'm not saying what you wrote was wrong...but your perspective may not be shared by everyone b/c not everyone who hunts puts as much emphasis on their tools as you.

Lets face it. If you sell a product (gun) with the attitude that you don't have to take the time and trouble to make it right and functional and expect that your customer will know this, have the technical expertise to diagnose and correct said problems, and finally expect your customers to have to spend more money to correct something that you produced then I say that's a pretty crappy business model.

Now I know we don't live in a perfect world and that rifles are mechanical things, made with imperfect machines, by imperfect people, using imperfect materials. So certainly SOME percentage of your production can be expected to be faulty. But there is frankly no excuse for all or most of your junk to be that way.

So its not unreasonable to see that most people have a reasonable expectation that the rifle they just bought should do what it was designed to do.

You can argue the technical competence of the average hunter to me all day long. But his actions are not illogical nor are they unreasonable. What doesn't make sense is that gun makers who make crap continue to do what they do and we are shocked when they go out of business! Certainly gun makers go out of business for being bad business people too. So a good product will not, by itself, save you either.

Let me put it this way...if I paid someone like MArk Penrod $4-5k to build me a rifle (and I have)...I would not expect to have to re-do the bedding around the screws (or anyplace else) nor would I expect that it would come with loose action screws etc... That's why I PAY them that premium.

If I buy a $10k double rifle from Butch Searcy or Kreighoff I don't expect that I'll need to go back and re-bed the stock. I don't need to know how the recoil forces are distributed in the stock nor do I really have any interest in studying it. I paid someone else to take care of those details. I want to hunt with my gun not re-build it. If that's incompetence or being unreasonable on my part I can't see how!

KY Nimrod,

Wait a minute! I'm building this thing for me ... not for sale. Am in the process of learning new things and ask a question to help me learn.

That aside, I did put a large recoil lug on the barrel but had to silver braze it to get it to hold with full power ammo. I checked with the barrel maker and their last step is stress relieving to 1140F, so heating the barrel enough to get an extremely strong bond on the recoil lug should not have damaged anything they tell me.

If this one screws up during a DG hunt ... I'll pay the price not someone else.

. I like how the Bell& Carlson Medalist stock,s aluminum bedding block comes thru the wrist of the stock .. I think it would work well . . .....With a dangerous game rifle it seems like to stay ahead of Murphy and his problems is of utmost importance ..... A 2nd recoil lug doesn,t have any ,or at least very little negative effect on accuracy .... Real world accuracy ............

All I can say is every heavy rifle [ 416 cal. and up] I have had and used that didn,t have a 2nd lug that stayed put under the barrel broke the stock . A friends 416 Rem Custom shop rifle with a McMillan stock broke the stock , it only has one lug ....... .. My 458 Lott CZ torques up to the right some but I did a fair amount of stock and bedding work to it and last I saw it it was still bear fighting solid and perfectly reliable ....... Like KY Nimrod said . If I paid alot for a rifle and it broke there,s a good chance someone would get a whippin with a cleaning rod . I would say 2500 $ is the point where one should be able to mindlessly shoot the hell out of his rifle with little concern of it breaking ... Not counting old rifles .. New guns above 4 K the blankety blank who sold it needs needs to be beat with the broke rifle ....... All I gotta say about it ............ 1500 dollar rifles tend to need fixin once the gunfire starts ...........