I've heard that thick epoxy shrinks more so my question is what consistency is best for bedding a rifle thanks fellas for any advice
Epoxy thick or thin
- Thread starter Gryntch
- Start date
I would recommend using DevCon, as well. ACRAGLAS will work fine, too. Most of mine are skim-bedded. You don't want to hog out a bunch of material that you need to fill back in with epoxy. You just want to make sure the bottom of the action and the recoil lug, and about 1.5"-2" in front of the lug is bedded. Make sure you use modeling clay to plug all the holes in the action and stock that don't need bedding compound in them (like the trigger hole, and the magazine hole, etc...), and cheap Kiwi shoe polish as a release agent to put on any metal parts (action, action screws, etc...), or you'll basically weld your action to the stock.
You also said "thanks for any advice" so I was trying to help, since you've obviously never done this before. Enjoy your experience.
Slower cure times typically have less dimensional change than faster cures. Maybe not 100% of the time, but it's a pretty good general rule. I've never heard of one shrinking during curing, usually the problem is expansion
We use accelerated cures all the time, good epoxies do not shrink to any measurable degree.
Epoxies are not rocket science in this day and age, they have been around for decades, it's a pretty sound system by now.
Like I said, I've never seen any shrinking, usually expansion from the exothermic reaction is the issue with fast cures.
For the application of bedding, I would be expecting a fairly slow cure anyway
You are correct, short of an exothermic runaway, you should see no shrinkage.
I have used them all, worst was the non gel Acra-Glas, the metal infused epoxies, like High Score Pro-Bed are markedly better.
Usually thin/runny epoxies create more issues than shrinkage.
I don't know the absolute, scientific, answer but if we think about what we're trying to do with bedding ......
The thinner it is the less physical change when drying and temperature expand/contract. However, if it's too thin it's easy to break/chip.
The thicker it is you can fill in large voids and perhaps add a little strength.
Looking at pictures of bedding jobs and reading descriptions on how to do it, it seems a 1/32" to 1/16" thickness is a good goal.
The thinner it is the less physical change when drying and temperature expand/contract. However, if it's too thin it's easy to break/chip.
The thicker it is you can fill in large voids and perhaps add a little strength.
Looking at pictures of bedding jobs and reading descriptions on how to do it, it seems a 1/32" to 1/16" thickness is a good goal.
