M14 Forum

cottondoctor

I have been bedding bolt action rifles since I was a young chap starting in 1971......I have never bedded an M1A buy am considering doing so.
I have a couple of questions....
#1 - what do you suggest I use to obtain the proper tension on the front of the stock?
#2 - what do I use to hold the trigger group at the proper tension against the tension that is imparted on the front of the stock???? Do you simply wrap the action in surgical tubing to hold it in and bed the trigger separate? Or do you make a clip of some sort the hold the trigger in tight but not latched?
Thanks in advance for any and all help.....

Dave P

This is a major topic that should be covered in previous posts. Lots of details and gotcha's to watch out for.

This amateur would do it like this:

1 coathanger under barrel
2 bed top and sides of rcvr (clamp it down)
3 let it dry
4 bed TG with wire to hold the latch open


Use lots of release agent so things dont get glued together.

theiss

Have a look at this posting.

http://imageseek.com/m1a/M1A_Bedding/


1. I used a coat hanger for the front of the stock; I had to find a thin coat hanger with a rubber/plastic coating. Some coat hanger were too fat, I found.
2. I used the trigger group for tensioning and made a tight clip inserted into the safety hole to hug the trigger guard.

I also used devcon plastic steel putty and clear kiwi shoe polish as release agent to bed my M1A.

hope that helps.

Rojkoh

Anytime

Gus Fisher

I absolutely advise AGAINST using the Brownells bedding fixture, because of all the problems we had using this kind of set up with REAL NM M14's in the early to mid 70's. We STOPPED using a fixture like that because it often caused the front band lip to be off center and to dig in or drag heavily on the stock ferrule. If you have a unitized gas cylinder and front band, it is as likely to screw up the fit of the front band lip to the stock ferrule rather than center it. That's why we came up with the coat hanger method.

art luppino

Where can I find a picture of Brownel'ls Bedding fixture Gus mentioned, I have tried the site, no luck. Art

Gus Fisher

Ask and ye shall receive, Art. GRIN.

http://www.brownells.com/.aspx/pid=8...DDING-FIXTURES

m14nm

I made this about 20 years ago. It's the 1.200" size, and has worked very well. For the "U" shaped wedge for the trigger housing/safety, I used a piece of 1/4" steel brake line.

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Photo copied from this,



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art luppino

that is a barrel centering devise, also builds in draw pressure. That fixture is a carry over from the Garand days, also, it is one of three ways to do the same job. I believe Ted uses the center devise, very successfully.

The Stand Off devise is different, it works from the inside the barrel channel.

Best regards, Art

Gus Fisher

On the "doughnut" bedding fixtures as we called them almost 40 years ago: What most people may not know is they all go back to bedding the M1 Garand. Springfield Armory National Historic Site gives credit to the Marines as being the first service to glass bed a Garand. I don't know if the Marines came up with "the doughnut" and would be very surprised if we did. I am pretty certain it was developed by the REAL Springfield Arsenal as a way to do production glass bedding.

The doughnuts worked pretty well with the Garand BECAUSE the Garand stock ferrule is significantly "beefier" AND the relationship of the top of the ferrule to the bottom of the lip is fairly precise - even on the stamped and brazed stock ferrules. I hope everyone understands the point that the lip is on the stock ferrule and NOT on the front band as on the M14. OK, so what does that mean in the real world? Well, when you place the doughnut on the beefier top portion of the stock ferrule, you don't have to worry about where the lip is. It is an ENTIRELY different set up than the M14. Further, the Garand ferrule lip contacts on the BOTTOM of the rounded lip and really on basically two small areas of the lower band. The lower band is both beefier than the M14 stock ferrule by a major amount and there is a lot of open space at the bottom of the lower band where the lip doesn't contact. IOW, the rounded BOTTOM of the lip "settles in" to contact on the lower band without digging in or significantly jamming or rubbing.

I guess I had better mention the problems with the M14 doughnut really show up the worse when a unitized gas system is used. If the front band is not unitized, then there is enough "slop" side to side to make up for the fact the M14 doughnut often will not properly align the front band lip to the stock ferrule.

The metal thickness of the M14 stock ferrule is MUCH thinner than the Garand ferrule or contact point on the lower band. The lip of the front band has more of tendency to dig in or jam on the stock ferrule when it is not aligned well with the ferrule and THAT'S where the problem starts to come in with the M14 doughnuts.

The M14 stock ferrules being so thin, don't always align with end of the stock that well as to alignment and uniformity. There is more variance with the top inside edges that the doughnut has to rest against. THAT can and does cause the lip of the front band not to properly align with the ferrule when the doughnut is used. That causes the front band lip to dig in more on one side and cause jamming or sticking of the lip into the ferrule. That REALLY screws up accuracy because the barrel does not come to rest at the same point after every shot fired.

Back in the days we still struggled with the M14 doughnut, we had a test to see if the front band lip would spring back without jamming, rubbing too hard or "squeeking." We placed the rifle upside down and tightened the barrel in the vise above the gas cylinder and let the stock rest on the bench. Then we pushed JUST the front of the stock side to side to see how much rubbing or digging in there would be. We pushed the stock from both sides as one side almost always rubbed more than the other. Quite often, you could SEE the front band lip was not aligned on the stock ferrule correctly after using the doughnut. Even when it looked "OK," there were still many times the lip rubbed way too hard. So, what then had to be done was take emery cloth and place it between the ferrule and front band lip with the "grit" facing the front band lip to cut the metal there so it would slide freely over the stock ferrule AND return to the same position after every shot fired. As one who spent WAY TOO MUCH TIME doing that, I was happy as a clam when we came up with the coat hanger method.

Unlike the doughnut that aligns the barrel to the top of the stock and the front band lip may be way off, the coat hanger aligns the front band lip to the stock ferrule. There is very little to no cutting or polishing required for the lip to match the ferrule because they are already aligned. That means there will be virtually no problems with the barrel coming back to the same point after every shot, as long as you use lubrication on it - as you should with any NM rifle or even a standard infantry grade rifle.

One last thing, UNLIKE the doughnut that does not allow you to vary the tension on the ferrule to front band lip easily, it is a very easy thing to use different diameters of wire or thin drill rod to get different levels of tension with the "coat hanger method." Yes, you can shim a doughnut and we did it at times, but it is much more difficult to do.

I have almost forgotten how many dozens or even hundreds of stock ferrules and front band lips I had to sandpaper cut and polish using that DAM M14 doughnut. When we came up with the "coat hanger" method, I was downright joyous to never use that DAM doughnut again.

Oh, since the coat hanger method also works as well with the Garand, I have not used one of those doughnuts in over 35 years and am very much relieved to say so.

Gus Fisher

BTW, back in the days we used the M14 doughnut, we each had to turn FIVE standard M14's into "light barreled" NM M14's per week during the five or six months we built or rebuilt Division Match Rifles. THAT was humping. It was easier when we only had to rebuild 5 rifles a week. When we first switched over to building light barreled NM rifles with rear lugs, we had to go on extended hours to get 5 rifles done a week, due to the added time to have the lugs welded and dress them up. Rebuilding 5 such rifles a week was a lot easier as well.

Everyone in the NM rifle section always dreaded the months we built or rebuilt the Division match rifles as we had to do around 1,200 a year. The rest of the year we built/rebuilt Post and Station rifles at a far less stressful quantity required.

When they changed to using the M16A2's in Division Matches, it really took a huge load off the RTE Shop and allowed us to develop better Marine Corps Match Rifles, Post and Station rifles and take on more projects like the MEUSOC pistol and other special guns we built or rebuilt.

When I was the Instructor of OJT's (Apprenticeship Instructor), I had the new guys build three rifles with lugs and light heavy barrels in about three to four weeks. That gave them time to go slow enough to learn well and make really good rifles. The quality of rifles slipped a little for a while when they went to the Rifle Section and had to build more rifles per week, but they already knew how to build REALLY good rifles and then developed the speed to do them that well as their experience level grew. Actually, some of my OJT's were building better rifles than some of our 2112's for a while and that is exactly what I intended as some of them had gotten a bit sloppy. Nothing like the new guy sitting across from you building better rifles to tighten up the sloppy work.

Gus Fisher

BTW, as I understand it, Ted Brown uses the "doughnut" when he glass beds an M14. Ted also knows the problems associated with the doughnut and will FIX them when they come along, before he lets a rifle go to a customer. Also, with 35 years plus experience using the doughnut, he knows how to use it to get the most from it.

Some others have used the doughnut with good effect on a comparatively small number of rifles. Please understand I'm not criticizing them, but you may not run into some of the worst problems until you do a couple or more dozen rifles.

I first described the "coat hanger method" we used on Culver's Shooting page some years ago. Probably in the late 90's or so. I am not saying that only the Marine Corps Armorers used it. We may have gotten the idea from someone else in the mid to late 70's. It may also be a case where the idea was thought of and used independently by different people who had not heard of or seen it in use somewhere else.

I don't believe I ever heard of the "Stand Off Device" until Art Luppino mentioned it here on this forum. That is yet another way to get draw tension and center the barrel in the stock. I get a kick out of some of the things Art has come up with over the years as I do with ideas from other sources.

I LOATHE the M14 doughnut only because we had so many problems using it on NM M14's when we were in mass production of building them. The coat hanger method is far easier to learn and far harder to make a mistake. That's why I suggest that new people, especially, use it.

I do want to mention something again, though. There is no "WRONG" method of building a rifle as long as the rifle is safe, reliable and accurate. There are many ways to "skin a cat" in building a NM or precision shooting M1 Garand or M14. There were things all the service teams did that were similar and some to many that were different when building their rifles. The rifles, even though built differently, got to the point that any service shooter of good enough ability could win up to and including National competition on any given day with any rifle the service teams or a few civilians built.

I will never forget a conversation I had with Gene Barnett years ago where he basically stated when all of we service Armorers got together and discussed how we built our rifles, we ALL learned things from it. His theory was we all should give the very best rifles of equal quality to the "Trigger Pullers" and then sit back and watch them fight it out in competition.

I also want to mention that I personly learned a HUGE amount about building a NM .45 pistol when I went to the One Week National Guard Pistol Armorers School that CWO Dave Mattias taught when the Guard was still in Nashville. Dave not only could build an EXCELLENT pistol, but he was a FABULOUS Instructor. I can't say enough about how he turned lights on about building a NM pistol even though I had built many before. We used a lot of Dave's techniques to significantly improve Marine Corps NM pistols and as a spring board to take his ideas even a little further.