Gunsmithing do AI stocks need to be bedded?

[Keith Johns]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

300, my post in the first place was in response to 11b-b4 about having 4 AICS rifles and saying none ever needed to be bedded.
<span style="color: #3333FF">And my point is, that in the life of 4 rifles, enough shit changes that how can you really claim you never needed to bed any of them?</span>
There could be an POI shift while your working up loads and you might not know. You could take the rifle apart and have a POI shift thinking its nothing, when really the action could be tourqued/bent differently than it was before.

Shit happens and goes on that one might not notice.

And "You", wasnt you 300. I was saying "you" as in anyone




Back to the topic...
You have a cheaply made action in an aluminum chasis. How could you think lug/receiver contact would be right? shootable yes, but right? not in my opinion

BTW, one year ago I looked at an AICS with a LA remy in it... the lug was making about 60% contact. Only at the top. the bottom was away from the aluminum.

The lug contact is between two, very un-parallel services. The Remy lug and the AICS aluminum chasis.

Dont bed em if you dont want to. I will

 

[300sniper]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: AZPrecision</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
BTW, one year ago I looked at an AICS with a LA remy in it... the lug was making about 60% contact. Only at the top. the bottom was away from the aluminum.

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ok, what is going to move more, a recoil lug making full contact against a thin layer of epoxy backed by fiberglass or a lug with the TOP 60% making contact against 7075t6 (just what i am assuming an aics is made from but i could be wrong on that)?

even if it was making full contact, do you think the bottom 40% of the lug is doing much work when it is backed against the aluminum aics? i'm definatly no engineer here but i'd be willing to bet you could cut off the bottom 40% of a recoil lug being used in an aics and not notice one bit of difference on target. we're not talking about the recoil lug pushing against some soft wood stock here where all the surface area is needed.

 

[Keith Johns]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

I agree about not needing the whole lug. The top 20 should in theory be enough right?

One thing I've recently learned is theres a lot of ways to skin a cat. What ever gets the job done I guess. I'll bed em

 

[Badshot308]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

I discovered the same thing that Sobrbiker did about the rear tang when I installed my MLR into an AICS 1.5 a couple years ago. I had good contact at the recoil lug, so I just bedded the rear tang. I didn't like the fact that at least 75% of the rear tang was unsupported and that's where the rear action screw was applying torque.

 

[Jackalope33B]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

Ok, after reading all these post about bedding or not for AICS, I cant figure out one thing. How do you determine if your stock needs to be bedded? Is it just by shooting it and seeing how bad your accuracy is, or do you look for something in particular on the stock itself?

 

[Captain Moroni]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

sobrbiker883, Badshot308 and anyone else who has an AICS stocked 700 were the rear tang doesn't fit properly, did the rifle shoot better after it was bedded? I was shooting this morning and tried adjusting the torque on the action screws trying to "tune" it into a sweet spot. I took the skins off and found that with the front screw tight the tang is floating. I think I will bed it tonight and see what I get. also should the recoil lug have any clearance between the stock on the front side? Mine is tight both the lug and the cut out measure .25

 

[earthquake]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

Good info here. (<span style="font-style: italic">Love the Google search function by the way</span>) I'm about to buy my first AICS and in talking to my smith for this CM build, he stated I should bed it. After reading this, I think I'll shoot it w/o bedding first and see how she performs. I'll probably try to skim-bed it myself later if it needs it.

 

[300sniper]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

i rarely shoot at 100 yards but here are the results from the last two times i did. 5 rounds down range was all i shot at 100 yards each of these days and this is what they were. prone off a concrete deck, harris bipod and a tac-ready tac-ball for rear support. this is with my unbedded, stressed, out of round and bent 700 receiver in an aics. several months and about 300 rounds apart and not much change in zero. i'm not convinced that bedding would help improve this one bit.

 

[Boomholzer]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: sobrbiker883</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: villhelm</div><div class="ubbcode-body">thanks for all this great info guys! I think I'm going to buy the 1.5 instead of the 2.0 (don't really get the point of the folding stock??) i figure i will shoot it for awhile and then if I'm haveing problems i will get it bedded

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And there you have it.

HateCa has probably grown weary of chiming in on these threads, but he always used to and his point was "shoot it first".

Its also a personal choice/confidence issue. If you want one less variable to consider, go ahead and bed it. If one of the variables id the AICS itself, and you may not like its ergos, keep in mind bedding may hinder resale.

I've bedded and not bedded AICS's I've ran. I've finally come to the conclusions that a) I cannot shoot groups well enough to shoot the difference if there was a difference; and b)the AICS's grip is not conducive to ME shooting well.

Was it the chicken or the egg??

Mr Roscoe and Mr Cross bed AICS's whenever they build one, HateCa and GAP (I'm pretty sure) do not.

I'm of the inclination that if there is stress that can be seen with instruments and you are building a custom rifle-eliminate the stress. If you are dropping an existing 700 you have into an AICS, shoot it first and see if it shoots as well or better than the previous stock. If not, try bedding it.

Due to the shape of the rear tang, the rear action screw WILL induce stress <span style="font-weight: bold">on a R700 action </span>(<span style="font-weight: bold">the tang can be pulled lower into the "V" shaped channel than the full round receiver can</span>). Will it make YOUR rifle shoot worse?-can't answer that for you.

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Agreed., sans I like the AICS grip.
Out of the two rifles in AICS stocks that Randy built, both have some bedding work. However these are full builds.

I think there is a difference in % of need with a drop in factory assembly vs. custom build. No one is doing it wrong but covering all bases on a turn-key rifle.

I’ve stuck three factory rems into an AICS and none went south. But that doesn’t mean much.

 

[300sniper]

Re: do AI stocks need to be bedded?

hmmm, maybe i do need to bed this thing. that or i just slapped the shit out of the trigger on shot 5. i guess we'll never know