My first attempt at installing Pillars and Bedding my 111 Savage .270 win PIC HEAVY

First off I have to say a huge thanks to Foxx for answering the many, many questions as I have attempted this one. I hope this helps someone else give it a go even if it is what not to do! So the Specs: 111 Savage .270 win in a Boyds Heritage stock, Devcon, Acca-release, Pillars from Ebay that came with two part epoxy, Plumbers putty, the end of a pool noodle float, two 1/4x28 screws I used 3", wd 40,and Q-tips.

Quick Note: there are a couple of times I misunderstood the directions Foxx sent me and did things kinda on my own, so live and learn.


Pillars:
on the 111 from boyds there isn't much meat to the stock for the pillars drill them out and I had to rasp them a bit to pen them up as I found it hard to keep the bit square in the stock.
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Cut the head off the screws and grind a notch across for a flathead. Also bevel the end to help guide screws into pillars helped a lot with locating barrel/ action for fitting repeatedly. I ground my drilled my pillars out and extra 1/64" to assist in clearing a wrap of tape to ensure the screws are floating in the pillars not contacting them.
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I used a bit of paper towel to build a wall behind the pillar so it would setup in the void caused by drill out the screw holes.
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let the epoxy setup up
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IMPORTANT NOTE: I was warned to be sure the rear pillar notch was square and even marked it and still it ended up canted. I had to chisel out the pillar (luckily I bought aluminum pillars and could do so)
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Okay so Pillars are installed (and I have fixed my screw up on squaring the Rear pillar. Time to start relieving material from the stock. I tried the rasp, dremel, and finally opted for a good old fashion sharp chisel. I started by relieving some out of the recoil lug area. There is not a ton of room to take material before you get into the are of the bottom metal. I just taped and puttied this area later.
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Next I started relieving the top area around the front action screw pillar
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Now I sent a lot of pics and kept getting told take more material so be generous in the amount you take.
On to the Rear Pillar
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I had to relieve some material from the rear tang to get it to free float
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At this point I also got a piece of pipe and some sand paper and heavily sanded the barrel channel to be sure it was free floating
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Note: I went back and relieved even more from the front pillar but don't have a pic of it. Also I relieved a large (to me) amount from the top of the wall of the magwell where the action will contact it. 1/8" is what I was instructed to relieve everywhere the action will contact forward of the tang. This doesn't leave much material on the sidewall of the action between the pillars, but as I was told the more relieved the stronger the bedding.

Next I taped the trigger and the recoil lug up. The recoil lug was a bit more tedious then I expected. The tape needs to be smooth so it doesn't give the devcon a chance to lock the action into the stock. I also started to put Plumbers Putty in any area that devcon could get in. By the trigger, under the bolt, holes on the side.
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Now this is another place I misunderstood I left the bolt in place and puttied under it (We will see if this bites me in the butt)
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Next I started on the stock. I cut a piece of the foam pool noodle in the shape of the magwell (instructions called for styrofoam and wouldn't you know it I just threw all of my boxes out that had packing stuff in them) and then puttied the foam in place.
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I also built a little dam forward of the recoil lug to keep any devcon from running into the barrel chamber per my instructions
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and I drilled some small holes by the pillars at different angle to help form a mechanical lock per the instructions
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You can also see where I have removed a lot of material down the sidewall of the magwell as mentioned earlier
what I don't have pics of here is I sanded the action channel and everywhere I relieved with 60 grit paper to remove any sticking/binding points

Next I sprayed the entire action/barrel down with the accu-release from Brownells and let it sit for half an hour while I drank a cup of coffe and smoked a cigar (I don't condone starting the second habit, but if you already partake well it gives ample time for the release to dry evenly)
Then I got my devcon and mixed up a batch I took what I thought was enough to do the job and added half more to the mix.
I applied it what I thought was very liberally to the stock (you will see later I didn't quite put enough on one side of the sidewall of the magwell on one side)
http://i154.photobucket.com/albums/s...pspvnparsv.jpg
That pic was a bit before I was done and I didn't snap another one. I added a bit more and smothed out it a little to more evenly coat it.
Then I inspected the barrel/action one more time to make sure I had any holes filled with putty and the release agent looked even (you can see the shine of it pretty easily.) I sprayed the trigger area down one more time (I was nervous about this area). Then set the action in the stock gently at first. Note: At some point I stuck some putty on top of the bolt in case more pushed out then I expected.
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I slowly pushed the action in the stock whipping the ooze with wd40 soaked q-tips until is was firmly on the pillars.
Then I firmly wrapped the action and stock with electrical tape near the action screws. I checked the tang and the barrel and both were floated.
It is hard to see but in the next pic the top side of the magwell didn't ooze devcon and I may have to go back and do it again later, but we will see. I can see devcon so I may be good just not pretty.
http://i154.photobucket.com/albums/s...ps2nkpq90m.jpg

And now we have come to the waiting game. Tomorrow evening I will remove it and share the results good or bad. Again I want to say a huge thanks to Foxx who let me bounce many questions off of him in this process. And if I missed something feel free to chime in or if you have a question about something I may have a pic of it.

Definitely not the prettiest bedding job I have seen but I am off to start cleaning it up.
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I got it cleaned up a bit.
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Assembled
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Looks good...how does it shoot?

Thanks man. I will find out Tuesday when I get off shift. Taking my sons .243 to the camp with me as a backup but if it holds poi good I'll hopefully be posting some pics of it and some yotes or cats. This week is predator control week.

Quick update the rifle shoots nicely I wasn't able to really shoot any groups because of the crazy wind but the redfield adjusts very nicely for zeroing and it was punching paper nicely at 300 yards even in the random 15+ MPH winds. I managed to get a few shots without wind at `100, 200, and 300 yards. Which was plenty to make me comfortable Yote hunting with it. I managed to call in one yote which I let my cousin shoot. Side subject: The only yote that came in I new where his den was and setup accordingly. Banged him on the first morning 45 min after getting settled. After that we moved around the property trying to locate more of them. Now I have as many as 7 on my cameras at one time but a random times and these yotes do not call in the evening like the yotes at my cousins place in Kentucky. How does one go about locating "quiet" yotes?

***Update*** I never got around to a good range report because I got busy and just haven't stretched it out other then slinging some rounds in pretty poor wind conditions. So I had to run to the hunting lease to remove our stands this last weekend and took the .270. Me and my brother decided to have some fun when the work was done. It was a nice day to shoot mid 80's and almost no wind. So we took a bunch of coke cans and 32oz gatorage bottles out and made an improvised range with the range finder. We were shooting off the cooler and some seat pads for the stands. So cans at 200, 240, and 300 yards. Gatorade bottles at 300 and 400 yards. well I will tell you I just could not get a hit on the gatorade bottles at 400 but impacts were all around. This could easily be from not have a good platform to shoot off or could just be the learning curve for me to shoot out that far. But 300 and inside was a whole different story. There were no misses at 200 and 240. (thought there was one but it was just a clean pass through and didn't kick the can for some reason.) at 300 I went 4 for 5 on cans and 2 for 2 on Gatorade bottles. I am sure this is not the range report style you are used but it was invaluable info for me the shooter and greatly boosted my confidence stretching my shots out it is one thing to put five rounds in an inch at 100 yards it is much different to successfully take out cans at 300 yards for me at least. Coke can at 300 is Minute of Heart for me on a deer!

Looks like the 270 is working out very well! Thats an awesome sounding series of stories. Nothing beats a dead Coke can. Shootin Tinnies as they say.. someplace... GoodTymes!