Hello GunNutz,
Last week I shared with you my thoughts on barrel break-in and moly bullets. This week I will touch on something dear to my heart: accurizing your hunting rifle. Col. Townsend Whelen summarizes this as "Only accurate rifles are interesting." Or something like that....
Anyway, as many of our forum members know, there are always heated debates regarding the accuracy of rifles. Frequently we hear terms thrown around such as "benchrest accuracy", "Minute of deer vitals", etc. Anyone who has been on an internet forum knows that accuracy problems ALWAYS lay with the rifle, and never the shooter. And as such I will share my knowledge on how to remedy this.
If you have spent any time on the internet, you know that the #1 way to improve the accuracy of your rifle is to "bed" it (I will expand on this in a moment). So if you find you are having accuracy issues, don't bother doubting yourself regarding those $4.00 discount scope rings you purchased. They are fine. And don't listen to your friends if they ask if your bases are loose. What do they know about YOUR gear. You would never have such a silly thing like that happen to you. So again, don't fret about these things. They are small peanuts compared to this holy grail of accuracy I will introduce you to.
Bedding the rifle. Doesn't that have an awesome sound to it? Almost sounds as good as the first time you had some "fun" back in high school, except without all the awkward teeth-knocking and fiddling around with that cursed contraption called a bra.... Anyway, bedding the rifle, or more accurately, the action, is a way to create a stable and repeatable shooting position for your rifle's action. Or something to that extent. All I know is that it tightens up groups like a hot damn.
The amount of products you will find to do this process can be a little bewildering, but no worries: I will guide you through this. AcraGlas, Glasbed, SteelBed, DevCon. Fancy names, but they all do the same thing. The catch with these products is that you are paying for the name. And why waste good money on such nonsense like that, when you can instead put your savings towards another set of $4.00 scope rings? Here is where I will let you in on my super-secret accurizing agent.
What is the one thing in common with all the above agents? They use a resin, and a hardener. And in Hansol's world, anything that uses a resin/hardener is called BONDO! That's right GunNutz, those crazy developers above want you to spend all your hard earned money on some fancy 12oz tube that barely does one rifle. Instead, use that same money and buy a GIANT tub of fiberglass bondo. It costs about the same, and you get 82x more of it. Whatever you don't use in your bedding project, you can use to patch the quarter panels on your Ford, or repair the stucco hole that the wife is always nagging about.
Now, let me touch on another scary subject: release agent. Don't let the internet commandos scare you with all the stories of release agent gone wrong. If you follow my advice, you won't have to worry about a thing. Often, the above-mentioned companies will supply a release agent of sorts. I say don't trust them. I mean, when your rifle is on the line, would you trust some company that just cares about their bottom line? Hell no. That's why I trust WD-40 as a release agent. It was developed for the space program, so if it has NASA's approval, it's good enough for me.
So after clearing all that up, I will touch on the process. It is rather simple:
Hansol's Patented Bondo Bedding Procedure
1. Take some sandpaper and scuff up the recoil lug area of your rifle. Bedding agent won't stick to a slick surface, so scuff the hell out of it. Once finished, blow out with an air gun, and give it a quick rub with acetone to eliminate any grease.
2. Mix up the fiberglass bondo. I use about a half-and-half mixture of resin to hardener. If this is your first time, cut back on the hardener about a third. That will give you a bit more time to work with the resin mixture.
3. Put on some rubber gloves, and slap the freshly mixed bondo into the recoil lug area, as well as in the first 4" of barrel channel. There is no easy, clean way to do this, so just scoop it up with your hand and slap it in there.
4. Take off rubber gloves.
5. Now grab your can of WD-40, and spray the hell out of your action and barrel. And I mean spray the CRAP out of it. Get it all nice and covered and gooey.
6. Once the action has copious amounts of WD-40 dripping from it, take it and insert it into the stock. If you have done this correctly, you should see fiberglass ooze out the sides. This is good. Hold the action firmly against the stock.
7. Listen to a song on the radio. Listen to another song. After the second song has finished, carefully remove the action from the stock. You should have a perfect imprint of your action in your stock now.
8. Let the stock sit in a corner overnight. The next day, sand down the excess fiberglass, re-fit your action, and you are good to go.
There you have it GunNutz. Bedding is an easy project that anyone can do, and is guaranteed to improve your groups. Just remember to use lots of WD40. Keep your stick on the ice, and happy hunting -Hansol
Last week I shared with you my thoughts on barrel break-in and moly bullets. This week I will touch on something dear to my heart: accurizing your hunting rifle. Col. Townsend Whelen summarizes this as "Only accurate rifles are interesting." Or something like that....
Anyway, as many of our forum members know, there are always heated debates regarding the accuracy of rifles. Frequently we hear terms thrown around such as "benchrest accuracy", "Minute of deer vitals", etc. Anyone who has been on an internet forum knows that accuracy problems ALWAYS lay with the rifle, and never the shooter. And as such I will share my knowledge on how to remedy this.
If you have spent any time on the internet, you know that the #1 way to improve the accuracy of your rifle is to "bed" it (I will expand on this in a moment). So if you find you are having accuracy issues, don't bother doubting yourself regarding those $4.00 discount scope rings you purchased. They are fine. And don't listen to your friends if they ask if your bases are loose. What do they know about YOUR gear. You would never have such a silly thing like that happen to you. So again, don't fret about these things. They are small peanuts compared to this holy grail of accuracy I will introduce you to.
Bedding the rifle. Doesn't that have an awesome sound to it? Almost sounds as good as the first time you had some "fun" back in high school, except without all the awkward teeth-knocking and fiddling around with that cursed contraption called a bra.... Anyway, bedding the rifle, or more accurately, the action, is a way to create a stable and repeatable shooting position for your rifle's action. Or something to that extent. All I know is that it tightens up groups like a hot damn.
The amount of products you will find to do this process can be a little bewildering, but no worries: I will guide you through this. AcraGlas, Glasbed, SteelBed, DevCon. Fancy names, but they all do the same thing. The catch with these products is that you are paying for the name. And why waste good money on such nonsense like that, when you can instead put your savings towards another set of $4.00 scope rings? Here is where I will let you in on my super-secret accurizing agent.
What is the one thing in common with all the above agents? They use a resin, and a hardener. And in Hansol's world, anything that uses a resin/hardener is called BONDO! That's right GunNutz, those crazy developers above want you to spend all your hard earned money on some fancy 12oz tube that barely does one rifle. Instead, use that same money and buy a GIANT tub of fiberglass bondo. It costs about the same, and you get 82x more of it. Whatever you don't use in your bedding project, you can use to patch the quarter panels on your Ford, or repair the stucco hole that the wife is always nagging about.
Now, let me touch on another scary subject: release agent. Don't let the internet commandos scare you with all the stories of release agent gone wrong. If you follow my advice, you won't have to worry about a thing. Often, the above-mentioned companies will supply a release agent of sorts. I say don't trust them. I mean, when your rifle is on the line, would you trust some company that just cares about their bottom line? Hell no. That's why I trust WD-40 as a release agent. It was developed for the space program, so if it has NASA's approval, it's good enough for me.
So after clearing all that up, I will touch on the process. It is rather simple:
Hansol's Patented Bondo Bedding Procedure
1. Take some sandpaper and scuff up the recoil lug area of your rifle. Bedding agent won't stick to a slick surface, so scuff the hell out of it. Once finished, blow out with an air gun, and give it a quick rub with acetone to eliminate any grease.
2. Mix up the fiberglass bondo. I use about a half-and-half mixture of resin to hardener. If this is your first time, cut back on the hardener about a third. That will give you a bit more time to work with the resin mixture.
3. Put on some rubber gloves, and slap the freshly mixed bondo into the recoil lug area, as well as in the first 4" of barrel channel. There is no easy, clean way to do this, so just scoop it up with your hand and slap it in there.
4. Take off rubber gloves.
5. Now grab your can of WD-40, and spray the hell out of your action and barrel. And I mean spray the CRAP out of it. Get it all nice and covered and gooey.
6. Once the action has copious amounts of WD-40 dripping from it, take it and insert it into the stock. If you have done this correctly, you should see fiberglass ooze out the sides. This is good. Hold the action firmly against the stock.
7. Listen to a song on the radio. Listen to another song. After the second song has finished, carefully remove the action from the stock. You should have a perfect imprint of your action in your stock now.
8. Let the stock sit in a corner overnight. The next day, sand down the excess fiberglass, re-fit your action, and you are good to go.
There you have it GunNutz. Bedding is an easy project that anyone can do, and is guaranteed to improve your groups. Just remember to use lots of WD40. Keep your stick on the ice, and happy hunting -Hansol
Last edited:
.
