WildRose
Well-Known Member
I had some time the other day and decided to bed my M77 Hawkeye FTW edition .260.
It already shot very well but I wanted to see if I could improve on it any.
With the angled bedding screw at the front of the action they ride differently than any of my other rifles but I'd noticed my rear trigger guard screw in particular loosening frequently.
It was late at night an found my clay had dried up to the point of being useless so I looked at what I had around that might allow me to get it finished anyhow.
I have learned to use plenty of release agent and use two different types. One, a spray on zinc stearate RA and Score High Gunsmithing which is almost the same consistency as Kiwi but works much better.
It dawns on me that it's very similar to Johnson's paste wax so I lit it up and let it burn long enough to melt about an inch or so of it.
As it began to thicken I took a brush and just packet it into every nook and cranny of the action I thought might even suffer from "epoxy creep".
It looked like one heck of a mess for sure but I kept on with it.
After doing my stock prep, taping etc I mixed up the bedding epoxy, put a liberal amount of it around the recoil lug and rear tang.
Now this is the important part. When packing the action with release agent, that included the screw holes and I also dipped the screws into the RA leaving them thickly coated and cooling and I repeated it a couple of times as you would making candles.
Well I drop the action in, lightly snug it in place and sure enough the screws just push the RA out as intended.
I checked the screws once an hour or so later and sure enough they move completely without resistance so that part I'm sure worked.
Next day I pop it out and just run hot water over it in the sink to melt the RA and brush/scrub away the rest.
Not only did it work exactly as intended the cleanup was an absolute breeze.
It already shot very well but I wanted to see if I could improve on it any.
With the angled bedding screw at the front of the action they ride differently than any of my other rifles but I'd noticed my rear trigger guard screw in particular loosening frequently.
It was late at night an found my clay had dried up to the point of being useless so I looked at what I had around that might allow me to get it finished anyhow.
I have learned to use plenty of release agent and use two different types. One, a spray on zinc stearate RA and Score High Gunsmithing which is almost the same consistency as Kiwi but works much better.
It dawns on me that it's very similar to Johnson's paste wax so I lit it up and let it burn long enough to melt about an inch or so of it.
As it began to thicken I took a brush and just packet it into every nook and cranny of the action I thought might even suffer from "epoxy creep".
It looked like one heck of a mess for sure but I kept on with it.
After doing my stock prep, taping etc I mixed up the bedding epoxy, put a liberal amount of it around the recoil lug and rear tang.
Now this is the important part. When packing the action with release agent, that included the screw holes and I also dipped the screws into the RA leaving them thickly coated and cooling and I repeated it a couple of times as you would making candles.
Well I drop the action in, lightly snug it in place and sure enough the screws just push the RA out as intended.
I checked the screws once an hour or so later and sure enough they move completely without resistance so that part I'm sure worked.
Next day I pop it out and just run hot water over it in the sink to melt the RA and brush/scrub away the rest.
Not only did it work exactly as intended the cleanup was an absolute breeze.
