I recently bedded and pillar mounted a Boyds Stock to an Axis Heavy Barrel in .308. The Boyds Stock is the Varmint Thumbhole and it comes with a plastic trigger guard and a plastic front mounting clip or pillar. GET RID OF THE PLASTIC! When I mounted the stock and torqued the mounting screws down, the plastic pieces were cracking and splitting. I did not find out until I went to the range and the groupings were all over the place. When I got back to the shop and dismounted the stock, the plastic pieces had definitely split into pieces. I decided to get rid of the plastic and bed the stock. The metal trigger guard is available from Boyds but there was no metal replacement for the front clip. I ended up CNC machining a piece out of 6061 aluminum. Here are the steps I took:

The pillars I used are 3/8"OD x 1/4"ID x 1" for the rear and 1/2" for the front. I started by drilling the stock to fit the 3/8" pillars and bedded the stock.


Front Pillar
The front bedding and pillar turned out great.


Rear Pillar

For the rear pillar, be very careful when drilling out the hole. The rear wall of the laminate wood will be paper thin and will chip off very easy. If it does chip off, you can go ahead and size the pillar down and seal it with epoxy to fill the void.

I went ahead and purchased the metal trigger guard but I did something different with the front mounting clip.


Front Mounting Clip

I redesigned then CNC milled a mounting clip out of 6061 aluminum. The Boyds plastic clip had a hole extension or pillar extension on the clip which I did not include in my design. This optimized the pillar mount in the front.


Front Clip

Now, I can place the aluminum mounting clip on the stock and have metal on metal contact.


Rear pillar

In the rear, you can see where I bedded the rear trigger guard cavity.




I did this to get a flush fit with the trigger guard and to make sure I have a good flat surface when torqing down the rear screws.

I now have a good metal-on-metal mount on the front and rear and can torque down the mounting screws without worrying about any cracked plastic.



It is a good solid fit and the magazine clip pops right into place.

I would highly recommend getting rid of the plastic hardware, pillar mounting and bedding the stock. The mounting of the Boyds Stock is now much more solid and secure. I also have a video online if anyone is interested.