Bedding synthetic stock

[Tim433]

ok, here goes. I’ve had my Patriot for a little over a year now. Love the thing. I’m sending my scope in to have a reticle swap done so I figured, while my rifle is out of commission, I should look into some performance upgrades I could possibly do at home. First thing that pops up is bedding the action. Now I’m no gun smith, but from what I’ve seen this doesn’t seem to be a terribly hard project. Question is, is bedding the plastic stock worth the time and exspense or should I just look into replacing with something like a Boyd’s stock?

 

[MikeD]

Typically people tend to pillar bed OEM synthetic stocks. They flex to much to make a std bedding job worth it.

If you are not familiar with pillar bedding, it is basically affixing metal tubes to the stock such that when the action is attched the bolts run through the tubes so contact with the action is metal on metal. The tubes are epoxied to the stock. There is a bit of playing around to make sure everything lines up before epoxying the tubes in place.

The tubes do not have to be anything fancy, some people use bearing bushing sleves from the hardware and grind to fit.

 

[CaddmannQ]

The plastic stock flexes a lot, so you are probably just wasting your time.

The best thing you can do to improve accuracy is probably add mass inside the hollow plastic stock.

I used sand inside of a plastic bag and added some fishing weights. The two extra pounds I added to the gun made it a lot more stable on the bench.

I did that to my plastic stock & I was very pleased with the results.
Now if you're carrying this gun around in the field your opinion might differ.

 

[Don Fischer]

Ya know, if your gonna go with an after market stock anyway, I'd give it shot! I have a 700 ADL I got as a gift from a girlfriend that mush have hated me. It came with a plastic stock! Worst shooting rifle I ever had! So I tried taking it apart to check the bedding, couldn't get the barreled action out of the stock! Finely just in front of the fore arm I slammed the barrel on the back of the couch. Took several blow's but it came off. That thing didn't need action screw's! The inside got a really major over haul. the stock was tight into the barreled action every where! Today I have replaced that stock with a take off 700 stock I found. But when I was done with the plastic stock, it would do 3/4" all day long!

I have a plastic Patriot stock because the only thing I could get that first one in was a plastic stock. O ordered a new wood stock soon as I got home with it new. I do always check new rifle's for bedding problems and couldn't find any on this rifle, I was impressed. But couldn't see how to bed it if I needed to, plastic insert get's in the way. Think I have it now though, going to try bedding under the plastic insert under it and on the wood. Mostly what I think might be inproved
is the recoil lug. I have also though of piller bedding but don't think I really want to try myself as I've never done one myself before. No idea what will happen yet but we'll see. Anyway so long as your going to go with an after market stock, I'd give it a try if I were you.

 

[CaddmannQ]

Most plastics tend to shrink a little bit when they come out of the mold. Modern high-tech glass filled plastics and carbon fiber + plastics are a lot better about this, but still not perfect.

Sometimes this shrinkage makes parts fit together better and sometimes worse. Sometimes they just fit differently or don't fit it all.

This is one reason why I don't like plastic guns.

I believe that when you shoot a gun with a hollow plastic stock it tends to wag its tail in response to the muzzle motion. This has everything to do with the fact that there is not much weight and a lot of flexure. That means it will Flex "off axis". The gun will shoot crooked.

When you add weight to the stock the tail won't wag quite as soon or quite as hard.

Anyhow, that was my logic, and it worked on my cheap Savage target rifle.

(My good Savage target rifle has a Boyd's stock. )

 

[Tim433]

thanks for the replies guys. i think ultimately I'll replace the plastic with a boyds. seems like the smarter route.

 

[zzrguy]

I will say the plastic stock on the MVP scout is pretty rigid the stock that comes on the Ruger American you can twist around the forend like a pretzel. If you want to make you stock forend more ridged you could cut a grove in the inside of the stock and epoxy part of a arrow shaft in and it will firm it up. I'm thinking of pillar bedding and open up the front channel on my MVP to free float the barrel.

 

[1kulsol]

I have a Patriot Predator in 6.5 PRC and decided to get rid of the "terrible" synthetic stock .. I bought a Boyds Pro Varmint in Pepper laminate and had it pillared and bedded .. I just received it back from the gunsmith and will be taking it out to the range when the weather cooperates .. more pics to follow

 

[1kulsol]

here we go