Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Aluminum bedding block

Here's another reason I don't think it is ALWAYS necessary to skim-bed bedding blocks. This is the very first 5-shot group I fired at 100 yards from a slightly used Ruger American Predator, purchased off the Campfire Classifieds. The only modification I made on the rifle was to take the trigger apart and snip a coil off the spring, reducing the pull to a pretty crisp 2.5 pounds. The barrel was adequately free-floated, since the stock was one of the stiffer models brought out 2-3 years after the first RARs.

Thanks to plenty of experience with the 6.5 Creedmoor, I loaded 140-grain Berger VLDs with 41.5 grains of H4350. That's a 5-shot group, not 3-shot, which measured .33 inch.

RAR's have a pair of V-blocks inserted the stock, at either end of the receiver. Dunno if the rifle would have shot better if I'd skim-bedded them, but I doubt if I could.

Have owned and fooled with several other RARs in chamberings from .223 to .308, and while none has shot quite like this, I also can't remember one that did not groups three shots into 1/2" consistently with more than one load--often with factory ammo.