Gunsmithing Release Agent for bedding

repiv

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Minuteman
Jan 10, 2010
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The Colony Texas
www.dallasmicro.com
I am about to do my first bed job (I have paid to have others done) and have ordered 1 pound of Devcon 10110 and some WD-40 for cleanup and some toothpicks, razorblades, tape, etc. I was looking for Kiwi natural shoe polish but my walmart and target do not have that color.

Dumb question...... Would it hurt to use a different color? The receive is black so could I use black polish? Or for that matter should I use something else all together?

Am I missing anything else I will need to do the bed job?

Thanks
 
I have never used the black polish only the neutral so I cannot say. Baby wipes work well for cleaning up the devcon along with any copper cleaner with ammonia in it. You might want to get some play dough to fill places on the action where you do not want the bedding to get in.
 
I use meguiars car wax. Works great. Any wax will do though.

I used Hornady 1 shot on my Savage 22, and it stuck in some spots. Only "stick" I've had, and my bedding count is up to 10-15.
 
RustGuardit is the best stuff that I have used. Spray it on liberally from all angles and let it dry for about 20 min. Nothing will stick to it. Very clean lines compared to messy paste wax. I will never use paste wax again as long as I can get the spray.
 
Everything you need.....

Devcon, Kiwi neutral & plumbers putty......


TOOLSNEEDED_zps78492262.jpg
 
I use meguiars car wax. Works great. Any wax will do though.

I used Hornady 1 shot on my Savage 22, and it stuck in some spots. Only "stick" I've had, and my bedding count is up to 10-15.

I use HOS as well, on top of a buffed coat of Kiwi neutral. I stuck my first one by using the shoe polish only, and not enough of it, so I go with the more is better approach now. I'm up to 6 or 8 using that method and they've all released smoothly. Just like spraying cases before sizing, you need to shake the shit out of the HOS before you spray it on. I don't know what's mixed in the can, but it'll settle and separate if it's left to sit for a while. The stuff I use is the aerosol cans, the stuff in the pump sprayer is absolute garbage.

cam00037j.jpg
 
I remember that Chad Dixon uses (or used to) a spray on release agent. I would think the ability to spray the agent on your action would be a great way to get even coverage.


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I have an article in The Accurate Rifle (1/2004) magazine where Norm Chandler from Iron Brigade Armory describes his bedding process.

For bedding material he uses devcon titanium epoxy putty with an over skim coat of marine-tex.

He cautions that titanium putty has a fast set time and that mistakes need cobalt tooling to be "fixed"

For release he uses kleenbore "rust guardit" spray.

I have not been able to find a source for this release spray.





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So that's what it's suppose to look like? I did my first and only thus far bedding a few weeks back. I thought it looked good but not compared to the pictures above. Oh well. There's always next time.
 
I used a dremel and this is the main reason why mine lacks the aesthetically pleasing traits of the above pictures done by a mill. If the above weren't done by a mill congrats on your dremel skills as the are far superior then mine.
 
I used Redding Imperial die wax for years.
But wax is too hard to get off.
If I want to paint a barrel or put the barrel in the barrel vise, I have to use Ammonia to get the wax off.
And it it hard to see that wax.

Now I am using synthetic motor oil painted on with a toothbrush as the release agent.
I can get oil off with alcohol.
The important thing for me is to get release agent on the masking tape, otherwise I might be scraping masking tape out of the hard epoxy. That still happens, but it is easier to scrape out with lots of release agent on it.
 
Another vote for the Brownell's release agent here. I've used Kiwi and it worked.... It wasn't pretty and was a lot harder to work with (messier), but it worked. If you do use Kiwi and looks are important to you, use a color that will match the bedding compound. I've had the color of Kiwi contaminate the color of Brownell's Acraglass.
 
Brownells spray release is very good but we starting using Molykote mold release agent a few years back and it's really nice


you can get it from MSC
 
Results can vary with a paste wax. Stick with an aerosol based product and you'll find you get better surface finishes.

Examples:

DSC_0001-3.jpg

DSC_0002-3.jpg

103_0753.jpg

103_0750.jpg


10+ year old bedding job, still going strong:
beddingII.jpg

Very clean bedding jobs, going to take a picture of the HS stock butchered by a so called "Riflesmith" before I toss it into the trash.....worst part of it was, I was ostracized by a SH member for "Daring to inlet a HUGE Lawton 700 action into an HS R700 stock"...........drop in fit minus the side bolt release and the 1/4" or so at the ejection port. Gotta love them fanboys, and the correspondence course "Gunsmiths"..........