rnbra-shooter
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- New Brunswick
Good that you noticed that.
As things are right now, your action screws are too long. Their length must be set so that you get lots of thread engagement when they are fully tightened, but that you do not hit the bolt. Hitting, or just *barely* hitting the bolt lug, can give very frustrating vertical in your groups (sound useful/familiar...?)
If your are going to bed the rifle and (I would recommend that you do), do so before you fix this problem.
Once you have bedded the rifle, or decided that you are not going to bed the rifle, here's how you fix this:
Take the action out of the stock. Close the bolt, and determine how deep each action screw can go, from initial thread engagement until when it hits the bolt body. Record this for each screw (front and rear).
(The way I do this is to put the action screw in place, and slowly turn it counterclockwise, noting the exact location that it "clicks" as it jumps over the thread, once per turn. Then I slowly tighten it from the exact location of the "click". I could how many half-turns it takes to bottom the screw)
Put the action back in the stock, and determine how many turns each screw is making as you tighten it - it should be the same number as above, if it is hitting the bolt.
Remove a bit of material from the end of each screw that is hitting - carefully grind some from the end, and use a very small triangular file to maintain the shape of the start of the thread.
You want each screw to be able to tighten up *tight* (with a slotted screwdriver, as tight as you can reaosnably get it by hand without stripping things; with an allen-head action screw, you need to be more reasonable about it!). If you have a torque wrench or have an idea of what it feels like, you want 40 to 60 inch-pounds (note: NOT *FOOT* pounds) of torque.
Continue to adjust the length of each screw so that when fully tightened, there is at least a half turn to a full turn before it is hitting the bolt.
"Pillar bedding" is one good way (but not the only good way) of bedding a stock, in which a "pillar" of strong material is used to bear the compressive load that the action crews produce. In some styles of pillar bedding jobs, the pillars are used as the sole support points for the action. Materials that have been successfully used for pillars:
- steel tube (sometimes the threaded rod used to hold lamp fixtures!)
- thick-walled aluminum block (an inch or so in diameter)
- "plastic steel" or "plastic aluminum" bedding compound can be used to make "cast" pillars.
Various materials can be used for bedding compounds. Any local shop that sells the full line of Devcon products (e.g. a good auto supply or industrial supplies shop) should be able to get you one pound of any of the following:
Devcon plastic steel
Devcon plastic aluminum
Devcon plastic steel putty
Devcon plastic aluminum putty
The "putty" versions are lower density, they have more bulk (volume) of material per pound, I would get them if you have a choice.
The "aluminum" versions are lower density that the steel; I would get the aluminum version over the steel, given the choice.
All of these are two parts, they have a one pound container of material, and a small container of hardener (a white cream).
You will also need mold release. You can use a spray silicone mold release (use several layers), or you can use Johnson Paste Wax furniture polish, etc. Go look up and read as many articles as you can find on bedding a rifle. Even better, join the ORA and have someone knowledgeable talk you through the whole thing.
Yes I drive 4 hours to Borden to shoot matches, but a couple buddy's drive about an hour and pick me up on the way. So if you do the math they are on the road for 10 hours round trip just to shoot a match, only 8 hours for me. We might do this once or twice a year for one day matches but would rather take in the 2 day matches and camp overnight. 
