Hey guys,

Can anyone tell me if there is a specific grade of aluminium I need to use to make the bedding pillars for my rifle.


Cheers,

Michael.

I prefer an aircraft type like 2024 which has the highest tensile, Brinell/Rockwell hardness and yield of the aluminum alloys, but I won't turn my nose up at ANY alum I can get scrap wise, whether I can determine the alloy or not.

I like brass and stainless if I can find it also.


Online metals will give you the metallurgy of many types of metals...http://www.onlinemetals.com/

Anything will work; you are not putting any stress on it axially; just compression. I have made them from aluminum, brass, valve guides, etc.

G'Day Fella's,

KiwiWildcat, you don't need 7075 series, your normal 6061-T6 will do a great job!
Depending on the stock material, I would go with 16mm or 5/8" Dia for Wood or Plastic stocks and 12mm or 1/2" Dia for a proper synthetic/fiberglass stocks!

Also, when correctly installed, the action screws should not touch the inside of the pillars! This will have an adverse effect on accuracy potential of the rifle!!!

Hope that helps

Doh!
Homer

I make them out of brass rod.

I use old stainless steel .22 caliber barrels.

Well put and good advice. I should have added that I do not install pillars on wood stocked hunting rifles; there is no point in it as Duane stated.

quote:

Originally posted by dpcd:
Well put and good advice. I should have added that I do not install pillars on wood stocked hunting rifles; there is no point in it as Duane stated.

As accuracy is not the dominant consideration when building big game rifles, I agree to that point. But for small game (such as head shooting squirrels or long-range shooting small varmints such as prairie dogs) accuracy IS a primary consideration...not the only one, but a very important one. And for that use I do install pillars in wood stocks.

The primary purpose for bedding on pillars rather than on wood, as it has been explained to me, is to bed onto something which does not change as much dimensionally due to field conditions as wood does. Basically, the wood just becomes a carrying and pointing handle, not a source of bedding. If a bit of gap occurs later between the inletting and the action or barrel, it really makes no big "never-mind". The gap is not occurring between the wood and the pillars, which have been solidly "glued" together So the "bedding" remains the same.

So I make my own aluminum pillars to fit the action of the rifle, and epoxy-bed the rifle action and bottom metal to the top and bottom of those pillars which, in turn, have been epoxy-bedded into the stock.

Strength is not the object, consistent bedding is. No system is perfectly stable, but in my experience, bedding to pillars is more stable than bedding directly to wood. When one is shooting P-dogs at 500-600 yards or more, that can be a significant help.

Whether it is worth the effort is up to the shooter to determine IMHO.

There are about a million and one ways to "pillar bed" OR stock a rifle and all can be a "bone of contention" without hardly trying.

I found all the replies were excellent and covered, partially, some of the aspects of why pillars are being used. Simply put ANY material with less compressibility than wood will work.

I pillar bed so I can get a metal to metal contact which makes the torqueing job on the screws stay put, mainly, doesn't matter what type of material the stock is made out of. If there isn't any "compressible material" in between the receiver and the trigger guard then the torque won't change.(arguably a nitpick)

Sometimes I incorporate the recoil lug with the front pillar and/or a skeleton receiver bedding block with pillars and a rod imbedded in steel epoxy up the barrel channel screwed to the pillar for rifles in the 40-50 cal shooting 500-800 gr bullets...it all depends on ...

I've been using 1/2" - 9/16" NC steel/SS bolts threaded/and steel/alum/TI epoxied into the stocks in last 3 stocks I've done for 45 and 50 cal rifles. Definitely more surface area in threads for the epoxy to grab than in a hole, even though I "key" both the pillar and the hole in other stocks.

When you get right down to it, whether or not to "pillar" depends on your personal thoughts.

A well sealed walnut stock, fiberglass, Kevlar, plastic, or laminated wood won't creep/crawl very much without pillars and even less with pillars and there are always ways to solve movement problems during a hunt.

I never bed directly onto wood; always make sure all metal is supported by glass. I would consider a prairie dog rifle to be more a target than a hunting rifle, so I might put pillars on one if the customer wanted, but those are far less likely to be made from solid wood anyway (99 percent are laminated birch or fiberglass); still I bed them in glass/steel/aluminum epoxy bedding. Some pillars.

The use I have found for pillars is not a real useful one, as there are better answers. They are REAL good for taking the "mush" out of a tupperware stock. Install pillars, fill the hollow channels in the stock with fiberglass and epoxy, and glass bed the lug and a Remington 700 in a tupperware stock will shoot pretty good.

A labor intensive solution that could just be solved by buying a better stock to start from.

dave

That's absolutely correct, Dave!!!! Problem is some Tupperware stocks are slick or they have some kind of "stuff" on/in it that even epoxy won't stick to.

I try the steel epoxy mixed with lead shot if I want weight or add in some "flock" from my golf club making days to stiffen it a bit, but I usually end up with a hunk of walnut in the end. I still put in some kind of pillar/Al receiver block and leave about 1/4"-3/8" for the epoxy even in wood stocks.

To overcome the non-stick surface, I take an 1/8" drill bit and drill a series of shallow holes all over the surface where the epoxy can fill in and grip. Then, roughen the surface with coarse sandpaper or a rasp.

A lot more work than it's worth when you're done, unless you just want to do it and time is less important than money.

dave

Duane, you're not going to be educated much by me, quite the opposite situation would be more applicable!

You're absolutely right about the plastic stock movement. The only virtue to these stocks is that they are cheap to manufacture.

To make this work, you have to overcome the stock deficiencies as best as you can. The pillars need to be rough on the outside, and something like my hole drilling/rasping to give the epoxy you bed the pillars in with a place to grip.

The epoxy/fiberglass in the hollow channels helps stiffen the stock some so it doesn't shift around as bad. I free floated my barrel, to avoid the stock movement from affecting the barrel, but the flimsy stock bends and slaps the barrel, making a tapping sound as you walk with the rifle. So, I put a spot of silicone sealer at the front pressure point to bed the barrel and stop that.

Like I said before, there's better answerss; just use a good stock.

In my case, I did this as an interesting exercise. My premise that I started from is that I could take a factory 700 and make it acceptably accurate for long range hunting by careful rework without spending any money, just time. I started with a 700 action, a new factory 300 win mag barrel, and a tupperware stock.

I set back the barrel 1/4", and rechambered it concentric with the bore, with a good reamer. I set the headspace to just under the go gage, as magnums are always chambered too sloppy; the belts are way thinner on all types of brass than the go gage. I trued the action to the threads, and put in a thicker lug, lapping the lug to the barrel and action.

Then, I pillar bedded the action, filled the channels, and bedded the action to the pillars.

I had fired the rifle before the work, and after, it improved from approaching 2 inch groups to somewhere around 3/4", if you spaced the shots. However, if you fired them fast, they would walk as the barrel heated.

I repeated this with 3 more barrels, and two of them did the same. I eventually found a .338 barrel that did not walk, and shot under 3/4". That was the final product. It made a decent rifle, but not an exceptional one.

The takehome lessen from this I got was you can improve the accuracy, but the basic barrel limits you. Don't waste time with a factory barrel, just go right to a custom maker to start with. Same with the stock. You can make it better, but if you want to make it good, start with something good.

It was an interesting experiment, and not directly applicable to anyone doing this work for money, as it is definitely not cost effective.

dave

FWIW from a nobody...the pillars I've threaded and screwed in, or the pillars I've cut annular AND longitudinal groove set in epoxy will only move if the stock material moves, doesn't matter what the material is. The same way with bedding blocks grooved along with the stock itself...that keys the two together.

I don't think there is a stocking material that doesn't squirm a bit here and there, even solid alum. Laminates come closest to being "solid state" but I've had a few split with 375 H&H and above.

I have several wood/synthetic/laminated stocks I did 30 plus years ago that have only moved a little over time.

You can almost tie some synthetic stocks in a knot for sure, but if you leave plenty of gapitis it doesn't seem to matter.

I have a Remington Rhynite? synthetic stock on a Remington 700 338-06 I did over 40 years ago with a gap around the barrel you can throw a large cat through...makes it easy to shake out the trash. Most years I don't touch the scope adjustments and only then when I change components. I can twist torque the forend if I get gorilla fisted, but otherwise I just grab it and go.

Right again Dave...definitely not a professional quality stock job, but I would rather have a straight shooter than a pretty rack queen, and you would go broke trying to sell that kind of stock job.

I always wonder just how the professional hunters of yesteryear kept their rifles shooting straight or did they have a different definition of "accuracy"

quote:

Originally posted by dpcd:

.. I do not install pillars on wood stocked hunting rifles; there is no point in it as Duane stated.

If I am not mistaken, M98 bottom metal old or new,has an integral [steel] pillar.
Has Duane removed that pillar in all the wood stocked Mausers he has built?

quote:

Originally posted by Alberta Canuck:

The primary purpose for bedding on pillars rather than on wood, as it has been explained to me, is to bed onto something which does not change as much dimensionally
due to field conditions as wood does.
Basically, the wood just becomes a carrying and pointing handle, not a source of bedding.

Mr. Echols pillar beds both synthetic and wood stocked rifles,
Which tells me that both syn. and wood stocks, regardless or quality, are susceptible to undesireable compression.

Echols installs an aluminium beam in the for-end of his walnut stocked rigs,in order to stabilise the for-end.
TO the best of my knowledge, he does not see the need to do so in his syn. Legend.

quote:

Originally posted by Duane Wiebe (CG&R):

My eyeball experience has seen plastic stocks, especially the molded type move about like a snake during exposure to hot sun..more than I've ever seen seasoned walnut.

Firstly,
we need to point out that both the cheap factory syn. stocks and high quality syn. stocks, ARE BOTH MOLDED ITEMS.
The cheap one being injected moulded from temp. sensitive/dependent thermo-plastics,
They other being hand laid with resin/glass/carbon/aramid fibre composite materials.. into a mold.
such high quality composite material stocks are cured by chemical reaction.
Environmental temp.[high or low] does not adversely effect the structure-integrity of the advanced composite stock.]

The hand-laid Brown Precision stock I installed on my 300 Weartherby, endured from sub zero temps right up into the high 40s deg. celcius,
[likely more]
yet the stock didn't snake around. The action & chamber area was fully bedded in Devcon aluminium putty...the rest free floated.
The optional addition of carbon to their std fibreglass from Brown Prec., did help stiffen the forend/reduce the flex found in the std fibreglass version.
However that flex/non flex is in relationship to the construction fibre-, not the air temp of where you are with the rifle.

quote:

e

quote:

If I am not mistaken, M98 bottom metal old or new,has an integral [steel] pillar.
Has Duane removed that pillar in all the wood stocked Mausers he has built?

The M98 front "pillar" is not meant to limit compression,it should have the same clearance as the mag box to action relationship.
What it does do is lock the bottom metal to the action so as to distribute some recoil to the rear face of the mag box,a feature of the M98 thats often overlooked.

I buy 1/2" od aluminum pipe cut to proper length and then cut grooves every .200 in the outside for "retention slots.
Do I pillar every stock? Only if the customer wants pillars.
I do pillar Tupperware stocks, I also place an aluminum arrow shaft in the forend,the rear portion seated in a hole drilled into the solid portion in front of the recoil lug and then cover the shaft with acraglass, adds some weight, but makes the forend ridged, the barrel is free floated. The Tupperware makes a perfect truck gun stock as it is virtually "damage" proof.

quote:

Originally posted by Duane Wiebe (CG&R):
I need some education here! The pillars are to keep action and bottom metal at one relationshsip to each other...can't compress...obviously. What is to keep the pillars from moving about vertically?

Sorry to respond to your question so late, Duane...have caught the bloody flu this week...

What keeps the pillars from moving in relation to the stock (at least in wood stocks) is the fact that the pillars are epoxied to the wood....the pillar surfaces (mine, anyhow) are stippled and the wood is left unsanded where the pillars will be, and the epoxy around the pillars sets into & mechanically binds to both...

I suppose it would be possible to rip/tear the whole barreled action out of the wood with enough thousands of rounds of 450 Watts being fired, but I have never seen it happen.

Another thing which helps keep the pillars bonded in place is the action screws themselves. By holding the trigger guard/floorplate up snug against the inletted and epoxy final-fitted bottom of the stock, and the action down against the epoxy-bedded top of the pillars and the top of the stock inletting, the pillars are certainly not likely to move away from, or up and down in, the wood stock.

I can't say anything about pillar-bedding plastic stocks. I hate those suckers. I do have some plastic-stocked rifles...one is a Rem 700 which so far is a genuine 1/2 MOA rifle in .257 WBY, which I pillar bedded just like I do my wood ones. One of my other three plastic toys is intended for hunting men, & the remaining two are both big game hunting short rifles intended for lousy weather, an 8x57 Steyr Professional and a .376 Steyr SBS Pro Hunter. Those work all right for their all-weather purpose, but I have at least 70 wood stocked rifles which are ether as accurate or more accurate....some of them
pillar bedded, some not, depending on their intended use. I just don't like taking really nice-shooting wood stocks out in the rain or snow.

And just to prove all rules can be broken and beliefs confounded, I have a .270 Win M70 FW that I have hunted with off & on since 1957. It has never been out of the stock, doesn't seem to ever need the action screws tightened or loosened, and remains sighted in every year as long as I don't change the ammo or components. It still shoots 1-1/2" (3/4 MOA)3-shot clusters at 200 yards and I have hunted elk in the rain and snow with it, too.


A final word on pillar bedding. A true artisan, such as yourself, can pillar-bed a rifle so that there is no sign externally of the pillar bedding being there...at least 'til some wood shrinkage occurs. But as none of my pillar-bedded rifles are show-pieces or art work, I like a tiny bit of gaposis around the action, and enough clearance around the barrel to throw a cat through.

In target shooting or P-Dog hunting, those barrels can get pretty darned warm, and I like all the air exchange flowing through there that I can get.

Cheers!

quote:

Originally posted by metal:

The M98 front "pillar" is not meant to limit compression,it should have the same clearance as the mag box to action relationship.
What it does do is lock the bottom metal to the action so as to distribute some recoil to the rear face of the mag box,a feature of the M98 thats often overlooked.

I was already aware that the front pillar on mauser BM locks to the action to help in distribution of recoil,
[maintaining a slight gap]

Q./What happens when gun owners over-tighten[as they do] the screws on their custom rifle compressing the wood?

The narrow tang contact surface area on mausers is rather susceptible to this, Mr.Echols has found it also happens on the
larger surface area M70 tangs....and going by the amount of surface contact area on mauser bottom metal in the front pillar area,
that too would compress into the wood over time....hence the slight gap that is supposed to exist, would diminish or cease to be.
Mauser-Werke installed a steel pillar in the tang of its rifles in order to prevent over compression of the wood.

quote:

Originally posted by metal:
The M98 front "pillar" is not meant to limit compression, it should have the same clearance as the mag box to action relationship.

I’m not sure I agree with this…

I seem to recall that when the front trigger guard tang is mated up with the recoil lug, (metal to metal contact) there is still a gap between the top of the magazine box and underside of the receiver. This gap can be squeezed down at the rear if there is no pillar supporting it, but then it would be sloped and only the rear of the magazine would be making contact.

I’ve always been of the belief that the front is supposed to come together metal to metal in this manner, and the rear was supported by the pillar in the stock. Is that not the case?

What I do is cut a rear pillar of hollow, threaded steel rod (inexpensive and available from any hardware store) to a length that will maintain a uniform gap from front to rear of the magazine, and attempt to inlet and bed everything to achieve metal to metal contact and avoid any compressive stress on the wood. Not sure how close I’ve come to achieving that as I don’t know a way to accurately verify that the metal is actually contacting. I then epoxy this rear pillar in place, and glass bed the action and a couple inches of barrel as a gap fill to take out any movement, vibration, etc. and ensure even stress when the actions screws are tightened up.

Does anybody see problems with this method? What purpose would it serve to add an additional gap between the trigger guard tang and recoil lug so that they are separated and bear down directly on the wood? This would seem to be the antithesis of pillar bedding…

quote:

I seem to recall that when the front trigger guard tang is mated up with the recoil lug, (metal to metal contact) there is still a gap between the top of the magazine box and underside of the receiver.

I have not found this to be the case. If it is hard up at the front it will be hard up under the receiver.
Like Trax said if you continue to over-tighten the front screw you will get metal to metal contact.I stand by my opinion that on a properly set up and maintained Mauser there should be .030"-.040" clearance at the front screw and the mag box.

I just checked two of mine that were out of the stock, definitely daylight between the mag and receiver at the front when the lug was bottomed out. Tried some feeler gauges and it was about .015" on one and .008 on the other.

As long as the mag isn't touching the receiver I guess there really isn't any critical number it has to be, right?

6061-T6 has the best combination of mechanical properties, availability and cost.

quote:

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


Hi Homer: While I personally do not install pillars unless asked to do so, I wonder why you install 5/8" pillars on a wood stock.

Any stock I've seen broken in two usually breaks at the rear guard screw..seems like you'd be removing wood at the weakest point?

Would not the old/original style Mauser bushing prevent this compression theory without so much wood removal?

Then too, if the wood used was not seasoned and MAY shrink, the pillar would prevent wood to metal seat BECAUSE of the bushing???????

Regarding plastic stocks/bushings advice...I have no issue.

G'Day Duane, the theory behind my thinking is, most factory stocks use pretty soft wood and I hope to give the bedding a bit more stability, by using these larger diameter (5/8") pillars (along with epoxy/metallic bedding).
I have had good results doing this, and so far, happy long term customers, which is what I judge my thinking on.
As to the stock breaking situation, most of my bedding work is on lighter recoiling rifles, so other than breakages from falls, I haven't experienced any stock breaks from recoil.

Duane, Thank You for your thoughts on this subject, very much appreciated!

Yes, Mr Mauser new a thing or two!
The first time I handled a 1898 rifle (many decades ago now), I have to say I wasn't that impressed!
But since then I have nothing but admiration for the man, as I now have a better understanding of why Mr M did the things he did!
These days, I'm an unabashed fan of Mr M's original designs and products!!!

Regards
Homer