Bedding Question

[lrshooting]

So ive looked around and I cant seem to find a general consensus on how far up the action savages should be bedded. I have a McMillan A5 and a centerfeed SA with a 26 inch Shilen no. 7 contour barrel. Its really quite a bit of stress for an action to handle so It seems that the bedding compound should at least go to the end of the barrel nut.

I understand the tang should be floated and understand the reasons why. It only makes since...zero stress is best. But there are a 1.2 billion articles on whether or not to bed the tang. I havent found anything definitive so far on how far to bed in front of the action though. Im gonna have a steel TPS one piece base on it that I think I will do before I bed the gun. It should help strengthen it a little. The base will be bedded to make up for any slight variations which there is because I torqued it down individually on each side and one side would stick up... So if I can hear your thoughts/opinions/experiences on how far up the action/barrel you normally bed your savages, thatd be great!

[FW Conch]

None !

What you ask is akin to putting up pressure on the barrel at the end of the fore arm. Sometimes it helps, but usually with sporter barrels, and rarely with heavy barrels. The only way you would know if bedding in front of the action would help is to try it both ways.

Your action is quite capable of supporting your barrel. :-)

[lrshooting]

None !

What you ask is akin to putting up pressure on the barrel at the end of the fore arm. Sometimes it helps, but usually with sporter barrels, and rarely with heavy barrels. The only way you would know if bedding in front of the action would help is to try it both ways.

Your action is quite capable of supporting your barrel. :-)
So not even the barrel nut? I think its like you said and the only way to really know is to bed both ways. Its just somewhat of a process to do. I guess the best thing in that case is to bed the action maybe an inch or two in front of the nut, develop a load that shoots fairly accurate, and start grinding back the bedding all the way to the action in half inch increments. Surely there needs to be a sweet spot somewhere. Down side is having to rebed the gun after I get to the action unless thats the most accurate place to stop bedding.\


Of course thats only if the only way to know is to bed both ways. If 1 out of every 100 guns shoots better with bedding in front of the action a little bit, then Ill just stick to the proven ways you savage people know.

[big honkin jeep]

Just to the recoil lug. I put several layers of tape on the sides bottom and front of the recoil lug. I relieve the area around the front pillar and the contact area for the recoil lug with a dremel and also drill small holes there to create a mechanical lock with the bedding and then let the bedding around the front pillar flow into one continuous block just the back side of the recoil lug for full contact. After the bedding cures I clean up anything in front of the lug and the tape creates a space on the sides and bottom to prevent contact there. This gives me perfect full contact of the action and recoil lug to the stock.
Good luck.

[Heavyweight]

I have three model 10 variants and only one of them really benefitted from bedding significantly. I bedded from the rear action screw to the barrel nut. I'm not sure how one would go about bedding the tang on a Savage. With the safety in the tang I was afraid of screwing up the mechanism. Not like on a Remington 700 where your rear action screw comes up through the tang.

Good luck!

Heavyweight