Guys,

Working on the "inexpensive practical" .458 AR Mauser rifle build. Stock is the cheap Fajens synthetic. Won't be pretty but will be servicable. Has a Bold trigger w safety.

Will have 1 large recoil lug.

The barrel contour I've chosen is a pretty thick walled fella with a long cylinder before the contour starts. Wanted a relatively heavy rifle as this fellas gonna kick some. The cylindrical section in front of the action is 2.2" long. Muzzle is 0.750 and the taper is relatively slow. Weight of the rifle with mounts, Leupold QRW rings, snd s 2.5 Leupold Compact with an A5 reticle is currently 9 pounds without bedding, front sight, and recoil lug. Will be aiming for 10 to 10.5 pounds.

I want to float the barrel. Thought I'd use 4 thicknesses of blue tape to get the spacing.

Question I gave for you all is ... How far down the barrel do you float? All the way to the action ring? Back to the cylindrical section of the barrel in front of the action ring?

Thanks for your guidance!

When I bed rifles as you've described I use 10-mil pipe-wrap tape on the barrel to get the float space. I bed the action and the first 1.5 to 2" of the chamber area of the barrel. Once the bedding is hard and I've removed the barreled action, I square off the end of the bedding materail so the barrel has an even bed accross the bottom surface.

That being said, for large calibers, say 375 and up I recommend bedding the entire length of the barrel and adding a second recoil lug as well.

I've had success bedding about 1 1/2" in front of the action (the chamber area in front of the action) and then bed about the last 1" of the stock foreend (for a pressure point), with freefloat area between the two bedded areas. This is not my idea, but how the gunsmith beds that I have used. It's worked well for three rifles that he's done for me.

Oh, I also agree with John on the second recoil lug.

I bed full length of the barreled action and wrap two layers of electrical tape around the barrel to provide a float....more or less.

I like to seal completely the barrel channel with acraglass to prevent any warping of the wood or at least reduce it dramatically.

I sometimes do as Vapo has explained, fill the entire channel with bedding to seal. In fact, this has become my norm for the same reasons he's stated. I've never used a pressure point at the tip of the forearm but I know that has worked well for others; I just never had one that didn't work either free-floated or fully bedded. I may have to try it sometime though.

If you don't float your barrel enough to insure the barrel doesn't touch in ANY shooting position then you're defeating the purpose of free floating. Depending on how stiff your forearm is, (no high school humor needed here) you could easily have contact with the barrel when you use a sling to steady in your shooting position. I really doubt that a few layers of tape would insure no contact. 035"-.040" would be more adequate. The forend tip is where it will contact first. The contour line at the cylinder of the barrel is a good place to stop the bedding. Roll a little weenie out of oil clay and place it across the forend a little ahead of where you want the glass to stop. You can use paste wax on the rest of the forend to keep the extra glass from sticking. It should just peel off. MAKE SURE you relieve the front, sides & bottom of the recoil lug glassed in section before you put the barreled action back in a new hardened glass job. This way the tight fit won't scrape the recoil surface when you put it together.

Toomany or anybody else, how do you square off the epoxy bed at the end of the barrel's cylindrical surface ?

I've seen some that looked as if they were cut it was so precise. How do you accomplish that?

Thanks

Gunmaker described what is probably the best way I know of; roll out a rod or "weenie" as Gunmaker said, of modeling clay or plumber's putty and put that across the forearm where you want the bedding epoxy to stop. If it does leak-by it usually won't be much and is normally easy to screpe away. You get a similar effect if you use tape to provide clearance for free-floating the barrel. Just trim the tape squarely on the barrel where you want the bedding to stop and free float to start.