Does the rear pillar need some clearance from the triggerguard? if not seems to me you would be tightening the tang screw against the pillar and the action won't be pulled into the wood . to put it another way how long should the rear pillar be?

I'd measure an original one. The pillar is there to prevent over-tightening the guard screw and crushing the wood to the point the mag box hits the receiver. There should be around a 2-3 mm gap between the top of the mag box and the receiver bottom on a Mauser 98.

THROW THEM AWAY! On a sporter. The purpose of them is only on a military rifle so if/when the wood got oil soaked, the tang would not bend and render the action inoperable3. On a sporter, if that happens, you have real problems.

I use/have them on all my sporters, never had a problem. You must be doing it wrong, come on over and I'll show you.

I put them on every Mauser action I rework

Have to keep that proper gap between the top of the guard and bottom of the receiver when changing calibers - reworking the rails for a bigger caliber.
Many times they go into stock pattern, again to keep the parts properly lined up in relationship

Just my 2 cents.

James Wisner

Yeah, me and the millions of other rifles out there that do not use, nor need them, are doing it wrong. With all due respect; they do NOTHING to align the receiver and TG. They do not touch either piece. I want the metal parts to be bedded in wood; not held apart by steel, which, when your wood shrinks, how do you get the action rear screw tight? You can't.
Come over? I don't think so. I've got 200 Mausers and I sort of know how they work.
They are not needed on Mausers, nor any other rifle. I explained the original purpose for them. And it is not on sporting rifles.
Same with the front of the TG; it should NOT touch the receiver; if it does, how to you ever know if your screw is tight? You won't.

Thanks for the replies, the pillar is out of a markx, the triggerguard unknown , Hinged , bow release, barreled action early Fn commercial . Messed with it a little this afternoon, put it together tighened it up looks like I've got the right clearance on magazine box. Hope it will stay that way when I bed it.Just playing around to get my mind off my cancer treatments.

Mike Ray,
I this a factory stock or a newly made custom stock?
CB

I should also have mentioned that that part is not really a "pillar" as we know it in modern custom stocks. The original piece is just a spacer, not firmly held in place. A pillar, is usually an aluminum bushing, with grooves machined into it, which is epoxy bedded into the stock, front and rear. That is a totally different animal than the original Mauser stock bushing. And if you don't epoxy/bed the pillar or bushing into the wood, to does nothing but hold the top and bottom to a specific distance but does not help with metal to wood fit or seating.
Here are some actual stock pillars, in and out. These really do serve a purpose in a modern sporter rifle stock.

custom bolt its a semi- inlet custom stock

I have installed pillars in all my rifles both Classics and Legends for a damn long time to prevent the owner from over tightening the guard screws when pre-pairing for a hunting season. The 98 rear tang suffers the worse as it’s very easy to bend, crush and collapse the wood under the tang. No matter how well it’s inlet or glassed.

I have a Classic Mod 70 in my shop right now that I put together in 1987 that has suffered this very problem until I installed a set of pillars and carefully applied glass bedding material under the metal around the pillars. This surgery can not be seen and is the only way I know of to prevent this happening over time if the rifle is seeing any serious use.

Say what you want to the contrary but I see this all the time

Yes, you correctly install true pillars; the original stock spacer is NOT a pillar and does not act as one since it is not affixed to anything. Real stock pillars are in the picture above and are epoxy/glass bedded in; they can't move. I make and install these true stock pillars all the time. I use aluminum bar stock. I once made some out of some WW2 jeep engine valve guides I had. Iron. Worked great.

A stock spacer of the appropriate length epoxied in the stock does the same thing/serves the same purpose as your Jeep valve guides.

A true pillar needs to be adhered to the wood. The military stock spacer is not adhered to anything. And the OP did not say he was using any adhesive.
Valve guides are actually 5/8ths OD, not thin walled stamped sheet metal. And they make excellent pillars. So I cut grooves into them and they were exactly the same as the aluminum ones.
So, even epoxying the original stock spacer in does not provide nearly the same surface area as a true pillar. Do not bother doing that.
Again, do not use them. Use real pillars, installed correctly. Bonded to the wood.
The pillars sold by Brownells are called Pillar Bedding Sleeves, and are 9/16ths OD, and .3 ID. That will provide a good seat for the steel; a Mauser stock spacer is very thin rolled sheet steel. A very small contact surface.
This is not a hard concept to grasp.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Bobster:
I'd measure an original one. The pillar is there to prevent over-tightening the guard screw and crushing the wood to the point the mag box hits the receiver. There should be around a 2-3 mm gap between the top of the mag box and the receiver bottom on a Mauser 98.[/QUOTE


2-3 MM? Wow..that's one hell of a gap, I would think a trap for the edge of the follower to get hung up...Wrong

If you glue the sleeve into the stock, it becomes a pillar. Otherwise, it is a spacer. If the boss on the front of the Mauser trigger guard/mag box contacts the recoil lug, it becomes a spacer, unless the whole unit is glued to the stock. Of course, before that happens, the mag box contacts the receiver and the mag box becomes the spacer!
I have always (since 1972 anyway) cast fiberglass pillars in most stocks. I liked to use metal pillars (aluminum or steel) on Mausers, because the tang is on the small side. Same thing with the middle screw on model 70's. There isn't a lot of surface, so I'll use metal. Regards, Bill

Lot of overthinking. As long as you can stabilize the spacer you have a Pillar, chuck it up in a drill press and use a file or hacksaw and spin it and cut some notches and glass it to fit.

On a hunting rifle I think cross bolts would do the same thing on a properly laid out blank?

On the other hand I've never seen a properly glassed bedded stock fail in such a manor as suggested. Only sloppy bedding jobs..Kinda like the grip safety on a 1911, they fixed a none existing problem.

From a novice view- My first few inletting jobs were not perfect. So, Acraglass bedding top & bottom was necessary for accuracy. Did not like the side to side 'play' of the ferrules. So they remain in the parts drawer. I bedded my custom stocked 98 actions at both the bottom metal ends and around both action screw shafts plus a slight clean up with a ?/32" drill bit in order to keep the action as rigid as possible. apples vs very ripe apples? Hah. My 2 bucks

Nope; apples vs avocados; when you glass bedded the top and bottom steel components, you still have a piece of sponge between them; called wood. It can and does, move.
With a real pillar which are about .4 inch in OD, and are solidly epoxied in place, the rifle steel sits on solid metal, and cannot ever move.
I rarely use them in sporter stocks however. I do it like you did; glass the top and bottom; no pillars.
(No the military spacers are not pillars.)

Gosh.....I had no idea there were so many alternatives to proper inletting

Where have you been all these years? There are many ways to compensate for less than perfect inletting! People do it all the time. Why do you think they sell pillars and epoxy bedding?
And also, wood will move no matter how good the inletting; wood never sleeps.

Oh..just been building custom rifles from 22's to 505's without a stock failure....and without the crutch of expoxy "bedding material"

"Crutch"

Amen to that. So true.

It's nice to have affluent customers, willing to pay for boutique work. Not all gunsmiths have that clientele. Not all clientele want that costly of work. Some do the work themselves, and are pleased to have something that works that was within their skill level to do.

There's a place for multiple methods, which is why they exist.

Just take a walnut stock from the midwest (90 plus percent humidity) to Arizona for a year and tell me that the screws don't change tension. Has nothing to do with craftsmanship. It's wood.

Well, not all of us have the talent and the milling machine to accomplish a perfect inlet. So, we epoxy. My first inlet job from a semi neeeded a bit of help. They got better with the ones that followed. But, still imperfect in some way. Same goes for semi inletted stocks I had cut by three different places using my blanks. Two duplications were over cut, some were near flawless.

As for those (ridged) pillars, I thought they were used in composite stocks only and spacers or ferrules for wood. Interesting post.

quote:

Originally posted by Duane Wiebe (CG&R):
Gosh.....I had no idea there were so many alternatives to proper inletting

quote:

Originally posted by Duane Wiebe (CG&R):
Oh..just been building custom rifles from 22's to 505's without a stock failure....and without the crutch of expoxy "bedding material"

Yes, sir, you have both skill and decades of experience - I am certain your first 10 weren't up to anything like the skills shown by your last 10 -- -

most of us don't have anything like your skill --

yep, i would expect masterworks from a master -

you know what a "Crutch" is, right? It's the correct tool for the situation, as read

Martin Hagn didn't even like to see any stock finish in the inletting. He told, if it was well fit, water couldn't get in there anyway! His were fitted well enough, he might have been right.
Even if I didn't really glass bed one, I liked to seal it with liquid epoxy. He chided me for putting that "shit" in there.
Still, it comes down to "different strokes". Also, it is good to keep in mind, quite often this work is remedial. The bedding may be flawed or the stock splitting. Or, the wood may not be as good as some of the fine walnut used by good stockmakers, and may need some reinforcement. Different strokes. Regards, Bill

CB:
Pillars are used in wood too; look at my picture above. Mostly for target stocks which are fired far more than any hunting rifle and need to be stable. No time to tighten the screws every hour.
Anyway, none of this has anything to do with proper inletting; even perfect inletting done by the top master himself, will not have the same stock screw tension year after year in varying environments.
It is a living material, wood.

quote:

Originally posted by jeffeosso:

quote:

Originally posted by Duane Wiebe (CG&R):
Oh..just been building custom rifles from 22's to 505's without a stock failure....and without the crutch of expoxy "bedding material"

Yes, sir, you have both skill and decades of experience - I am certain your first 10 weren't up to anything like the skills shown by your last 10 -- -

most of us don't have anything like your skill --

yep, i would expect masterworks from a master -

you know what a "Crutch" is, right? It's the correct tool for the situation, as read

Good point, I'd like to buy back some those early efforts...ya know, maybe keep the metal and consign the stock to the fireplace .

Personally see nothing wrong with a good sealer in the inletting..I like Ship n' Shore

MY favorite rifle, a 270 (on it's second barrel) has seen conditions from outrageous heat to freezing so bad the safety froze up

I fired five 3 shot groups over five years and never had to touch the scope adjustments. Guard screws ...same thing!

I just have not experienced all this swelling and shrinking hysteria....no glass, no pillars

Course, I've only used the rifle for 38 years for game from pig to elk, so maybe it's not been proven yet

For a good lesson on inletting techniques. read Modern Gunsmithing by Clyde Baker. Alvin Linden's books are another good source, ditto with Dave Wesbrook's book.

Go live in Arizona for 5 years and I guarantee the screw tension will change. Most guys never touch their guard screws on hunting rifles so they have no idea what they are doing and they kill game all the same. But they do change.
It ain't the heat or cold; it's the humidity.
This has nothing to do with the inletting; it is the wood.
I never put pillars on hunting rifles; no need, and no need for the original Mauser stock spacer either. But I do check guard screw tension eery year or two.

Don't want to enter a PISSIN' Contest but I live on Long Island (yes an Island) and the screw tension on my many many wood rifle stocks changes very often. In fact just recently I had to use two hands on a screw driver to loosen the front action screws on two different rifles.

Hip

quote:

Originally posted by dpcd:
Go live in Arizona for 5 years and I guarantee the screw tension will change. Most guys never touch their guard screws on hunting rifles so they have no idea what they are doing and they kill game all the same. But they do change.
It ain't the heat or cold; it's the humidity.
This has nothing to do with the inletting; it is the wood.

I never put pillars on hunting rifles; no need, and no need for the original Mauser stock spacer either. But I do check guard screw tension evry year or two.

Im from Arizona and DPCD ain't lying. I live in central AZ where it is dryer than a popcorn fart 8 months out of the year and high humidity from July to September. Action screws do indeed change tightness. I use a tiny dab of blue loctite and torque most of my rifles and customers between 40-50 in lbs, just the front of course.

Duane I will buy all of your old sorry stocks and put them on my finest rifles!!

quote:

Originally posted by Duane Wiebe (CG&R):


For a good lesson on inletting techniques. read Modern Gunsmithing by Clyde Baker. Alvin Linden's books are another good source, ditto with Dave Wesbrook's book.

Linden sure had some unique techniques, and a lot of beating with a hammer. I have 2 confirmed Lindens and another likely, and have seen several others. His quality was all over the place. I have a Hornet (you can't have to many Hornets) that was in Kennedys checkering book that is as good as any of the pre-war work, but have seen others that were above average hobbyist work at best.

John

quote:

Originally posted by gasgunner:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Duane Wiebe (CG&R):


For a good lesson on inletting techniques. read Modern Gunsmithing by Clyde Baker. Alvin Linden's books are another good source, ditto with Dave Wesbrook's book.[/QUOTE

Linden sure had some unique techniques, and a lot of beating with a hammer. I have 2 confirmed Lindens and another likely, and have seen several others. His quality was all over the place. I have a Hornet (you can't have to many Hornets) that was in Kennedys checkering book that is as good as any of the pre-war work, but have seen others that were above average hobbyist work at best.

John

Well....like I said "a good source"

As I read these postings...I pondered: Wonder what the quality of wood is being discussed here? Missouri outhouse black wanut is prety common, pourous as hell...plenty soft.. reason to think this junk wood may very well shrink and swell a bunch with changing temps and humidity.

That wood (no offense to Missouri) is best used for fence posts. Fine tight grained thin shelled walnut may very well, because of it's makeup be less likely to have these outrageous dimensional changes encountered here.

For instance..I built my own 270 while living in N CA...Moved to WY (3 yrs) where humidity is zero even in a thunderstorm, then to WI...100% humidity most of the time, then back to CA, then to WA...and I used that rifle every hunting season for years and POI never changed.

My 338, built in WI, two trips to Africa, then to CA, then to WA...again no POI change


GOTTA BE THE WOOD! Fine thin shelled Walnut ! What do you think? By the way...the reason for all these moves is a story unto itself

I don't think there is any doubt that the quality of the wood has a huge effect. I have seen a lot of black walnut which looks a lot like a dried out sponge; it is porous and soft. On the other hand, good quality, dense walnut of whatever variety is hard and almost seals itself. I'm sure there is a difference in stability. Regards, Bill.

However, realize that only .1 percent of all rifles are built on wood that never moves. Of course top quality English moves least, but how many rifles have that?
Wood never really stops moving; just some more than others. I am sure no one ever checks the exact guard screw torque every 6 months.