Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Bedding a rifle...tape the lug or not?

Here's how I do it, in this case on a Savage Target Action with pillars. First start off with clearing all wood interference with the action, so the inletting black only appears on the pillars. On a Savage the rear tang will remain free floated after bedding. White arrow points to area yet to clear.



Next, trigger mortise and bolt handle notch are filled with modeling clay pressed over plastic wrap to make it easy to remove and reuse to prevent epoxy from entering. Also, any recesses or slots in the action are filled with modeling clay and struck off flush. Red lines indicate where epoxy relief runners are cut with a 1/8" Dremel burr, this allows excess epoxy to escape so the action sits down on the pillars with no stress. The recoil lug is wrapped with 20 mil pipe wrap and the barrel nut wrapped with several layers of plastic electrical tape. NOTE: I coat the I.D. of the pillars with release agent (auto wax) using a Q-Tip then stuff them with modeling clay. Then I use three headless guide screws (visible above the action) wrapped with electrical tape to just fit through the pillars and coated with release agent, screwed into the action holes to mount the stock. These screws push the clay out the bottom and no epoxy enters. The guide screws are removed one at a time and replaced with stockmaker's tee handled screws coated with release agent to secure the action until it cures, being careful to use just enough torque to bottom the action on the pillars. Those runners bleed the epoxy as everything seats, making it easy.



The Front, Sides and bottom of the recoil lug are taped with 2 mil pipe wrap and the barrel nut, or chamber area wrapped to maintain free float. The object is to prevent any part of the lug, especially the bottom, from interfering with the stock, which will make accuracy erratic.