Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Aluminum Cradles In Stocks

I see that a lot of aftermarket stocks utilize a frame work of sorts, mostly aluminum, that stiffen the stock and supposedly create a unique mating of the barreled action to the stock. What's the thoughts on this set up? Do they still require proper fitting? Do they still require proper bedding?

Yes, they still need to be bedded.

It's called a bedding block.

It is almost never used in handle laid up fiberglass /kevlar cloth gel coat type stocks like Mc Millains etc.

In synethics you see them almost always in the hand pored , foam matrix stocks like HS Precision and Bell and Carlson. They did it becuase to improve the stiffness of the action area in those stocks since the structral foam used in them tends to compress. It works well in them as the bedding block can be cast into the stock when it is pored.

Lately some wood stocks have been made that way as well. In any case, they work well overall.

The factories merely drop the metalwork in the bedding block, but most rifles shoot best if the action is glass bedded one to one with the actual action used in that stock.

Follow up question, let's say a "Bell and Carlson" is purchased and the stock is bedded properly with the cradle in place is it going to be as impervious to moving or changing zero as would the much more costly McMillan?

If both stock were both bedded the same, the B-C with the bedding block should hold its zero as well as the McMillain all other things being equal.

You have to remember, the aluminum edding block system in the Bell and Carlson stocks is the same as the HS precsion units that have been used by the US Army on the m24 sniper systems the FBI sniper rigs etc for the last 20+ years.

They work just fine in terms of holding zero. That is their purpose.

is the military/FBI M24 skim bedded?

Bed it. No possible way you can get an exact match on the inletting. Witness the fact that bench shooters bed their rifles. In fact, they are "glued" in-no release agent.

I have no idea what the US Army or FBI armorers do to their issue rifles once they arrive from the MGF..

All I stated was the truth, that their guins are the same basic HS precision design with Aluminum bedding blocks.

What is your point?

I don't think Toad has his rifles bedded. I may be wrong though.........

Forgot to add you need to bed it tight.

my point is, i'd be interested in knowing what the military/FBI armourers do, and it sounded like you may know.

and i bed some and leave some as-is myself, depending on what happens when i shoot them first. i've even been known to full length neutral bed. i do not see a downside to bedding unless the stock will see another barreled action down the road (which happens pretty often in this household). but, i always shoot them first to get a baseline.

sorry if you took offense to my post.

Toad,

No offense taken.

Thanks for clarifying what you meant.

I know that a basic system gets aproved in procurment ,and then sometimes permision gets granted over time to "tweek" things in actual use.

One thing is for sure, precisely bedding ANY stock to the individual rifle action is usually better than not doing so.

The original M24s were not individually bedded. Over the years some may have been but the vast majority of them were bolted together.

One small area of advantage the bedding blocks hold over a straight synthetic is the aluminum block below the action will counter act the thermal expansion of the aluminum scope above the action.

Aluminum linear thermal expansion is 2 � times more than the ferritic stainless steel commonly used in rifle actions. This will have an effect on your zero over a relatively large change in temp.

By using a bedding block stock I no longer see the � MOA shift from my summertime zero to my winter time zero.

Our bedding block has a double radius design that will work very well without additional bedding but I do bed all of my rifles and all customer guns are bedded. The addition of the bedding gives one peace of mind.

i really would not be surprised if the military/FBI guys bedded at least some of their M24s

Further follow up question (this one may take the stupidity cake today but...) I've seen weathered (and that may be the key to my answer) aluminum that was very brittle with age? Does Aluminum usage in gun stocks have a chance to get brittle or is it only aluminum that is weathered in the elements that does this?

Mr Burns,

While we are on the subject of stocks on your rifles..

I have two questions-

1) are they infact made by Bell and Carlson?

2) If so ,are they a completely custom molded design to your specs or, are they a reworked excisting B&C design?

The reason why I ask is that they realy don't look excactly like antyhing B&C currently catalogues and I am very familiar with the tooling expense to have them build custom molds and cores for proprietary designs.

Dawn2Dusk,

I have never seen this to be a problem. Consider that aluminum is used in the manufacture of many top to the line horse trailers. That should give you some peace of mind.

Jim62

I am not going to get into who makes the stock for us. I will say the finishes are strikingly similar to those that B&C offer and if someone were to ask us about custom finishes available I would say we can do anything you see on B&Cs website and in their catalog.

The design is proprietary to Greybull and we did pay for the custom molds and cores.

John,

I understand completely about the stock source.

It looked like a proprietary design.

Military? No