Thomast,
TO pillar bedd a rifle properly there are certain steps you need to take to get it right. It is not like bedding or gluing in a barreled action and your good to go. A few more steps.
The pillars can be either radiused to match the receiver or they can be flat to contact on the centerline of a round receiver. As long as the contact is even this really makes little real difference in the finished product.
First thing you need to do is modify the stock to accept the pillars. The pillars should then be attached to the receiver using the receiver screws, just as the barreled receiver will be held in the stock when its finished.
A support pad should be built up around the barrel near the end of the forend to maintain proper center of the barrel in the barrel channel and also to provide proper freefloat after the job is over.
With the pillars attached to the barreled receiver, and laying on the work bench with the pillars pointing up, the stock should be set down on the receiver. It should drop on easily with no resistance. This will insure the pillars are not stressed as they set up.
If there are contacted then the stock needs to be relieved to correct this.
Once this is done, you use a small amount of 5 minute epoxy to "spot weld" the pillars to the stock. Put a bit around the top of each pillar and a bit in the holes in the stock. Put the stock on the barreled receiver, still on its back and then I generally apply several wraps of tape around the receiver and stock to hold it securely in place while the 5 minute epoxy sets up. I usually give this 30 minutes to an hour just to make sure the epoxy is securely holding the pillars so there is no shift in their position.
After this time I pull the receiver screws, put the rifle in a rifle cradle and pull out the barreled action. What you have are two pillars spot glued into the stock. I generally let these sit for most of a day to insure the epoxy fully cures so that when I tighten the receiver screws down on the pillars they pillars have a strong bond to prevent them from rotating.
After then are fully cured, then you bring in the conventional bedding compound, I generally use marine tex in most cases. Basically you give the rifle a conventional bedding job on top of the pillar job. The only difference really is that the stock has been relieved around the pillars so that you can get a good amount of bedding compound around the pillars for a secure bond.
When finished, you can instantly see if you have a properly bedded rifle as soon as you pull the barreled receiver out of the stock.
If you have radiused pillars, you should see the full clean surface of the pillar with bedding around it. There should be no spots where the bedding has gotten between the pillar and the receiver.
If your using a flat topped pillar, you should see bare metal just in front and in back of each receiver hole. These bare metal marks should be even on both sides in length and width. If they are not, the pillar is not straight in the bedding to the receiver.
The point of the pillars is to provide a consistant platform to apply a certain level of torque to the receiver screws which will not compress and will maintain this level of torque over a long period of time. Something a conventional glued in stock will not do, at least not with a bolt action rifle.
The conventional bedding around the pillars, controls the total surrounding surface of the receiver to control any rifle torquing and to prevent the receiver from shifting laterally or rotating at all under recoil.
The receiver screws should be totally floated in the center of the pillars so they will do nothing but hold the receiver down into the bedding. This also allows the recoil lug to do all the work as far as transmitting recoil energy from the barreled receiver to the stock which is how it should be.
Besides using a barrel bedding block or Barrel V-Block, pillar bedding the receiver is the most consistant and strongest bedding system you can have in your rifle.
Just one opinion so take it for what you will, alot of cats out there to skin!!!
Kirby Allen(50)