.303 British bedding

[Catch]

I have a Long Branch #4 Mark 1* that has a good barrel and will shoot lead accurately sometimes. The groove dia. is .314 so I have been using lead sized to
.315 or .309 patched to .316. Results are not consistant and I need to know what you .303 owners have done about bedding as I believe that this might be the problem. I have read some material on this situation and have placed two business card thicknesses under the muzzle area and two under the center area of the barrel where an article I read suggested. This doesn't appear to help the problem. I have thought of trying the rifle without the handguards in place. I would like to try things that can be undone or removed if they don't work so I don't change the rifle in any material way. Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated......Thanks:groner:

[Multigunner]

I have a Long Branch #4 Mark 1* that has a good barrel and will shoot lead accurately sometimes. The groove dia. is .314 so I have been using lead sized to
.315 or .309 patched to .316. Results are not consistant and I need to know what you .303 owners have done about bedding as I believe that this might be the problem. I have read some material on this situation and have placed two business card thicknesses under the muzzle area and two under the center area of the barrel where an article I read suggested. This doesn't appear to help the problem. I have thought of trying the rifle without the handguards in place. I would like to try things that can be undone or removed if they don't work so I don't change the rifle in any material way. Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated......Thanks:groner:

Its best if the muzzle end doesn't make any contact with the wood. Thats one reason why the shims are put in under the barrel much further back, to raise the barrel slightly above the barrel channel.

The standard military bedding was not worked out for best accuracy, but rather for more consistent point of impact whether the bayonet was fixed or not.
The No.4 was a new animal compared to the SMLE and the older SMLE had a separate bayonet boss that allowed use of the bayonet without any direct contact with the barrel.
The heavier No.4 barrels also did not display the excellent compensation factor which allowed the slim SMLE barrel to compensate for variations in shot to shot velocity and give best long range results.
The military bedding was more concerned with reducing vertical dispersion at long range rather than pin point accuracy at closer ranges.

This manual
http://www.euroarms.net/EFD/manuali/No4Mk1Arm.pdf

Has instructions to Canadian Armorers on bedding the No.4 for best accuracy.

[KCSO]

If you PM me I will send you bedding instructions for the #4 target rifles. I also have some old stuff from the 60 on preparing for the Canadian Matches. Bedding fir maximum accuracy is tricky and you need to follow each step as the pressure points and their location is critical. Done right a #4 will put 10 shots inot 1 1/2" all day long, and willl give a Garand a run for it's money out to 600 yards or more.

[Catch]

KCSO, thanks for your offer. I'm afraid the "PM you" went right over my head. At 75 I can't keep up with all the abbreviations......Let me know what to do and I will try to comply.....
Thanks for your offer and your help..........

[303Guy]

I bedded No.I into a fore-end I made - it is a big chuncky fore-end - fitted with a No.4 barrel. I set the reciever onto a bedding compound I made using sawdust and clear epoxy of the soft kind. The bottom strap got the same treatment but their I made sure the whole strap was 'sprung', giving an even clamping force over its length. The bedding went up under the knox form. I gave the barrel channel plenty of clearance. This rifle printed 1¼" groups all day long. When I tried it with my own 245gr smooth side cast boolits it printed a group the size of my heart-beat shake. One day I'll try it with much lighter and magazine fitting 208gr paper patched boolits. The barrel has seen only 500 cordite rounds - fired by me and a few hundred J-word hand loads.

[Catch]

You are doing nice work. Its all alot of fun isn't it. Its funny, my rifles that shoot really good, don't get the attention that the reluctant ones do. I guess I really enjoy screwing with something until it works. So far my results are promising, but not quite there yet.........I'll let you know how it turns out.

[KCSO]

Send me private message with your E mail and I will copy and E mail the instructions to you. Donr right the bedding can make a decided improvment. Also be sure and test at OVER 100 yards the 303 bullet doesn't settle in till about 300.

[303Guy]

... the 303 bullet doesn't settle in till about 300.True, but that doesn't apply to cast or paper patch boolits surely? Or even othe styles of J-words? I only have one SMLE barreled MkI and I haven't tried it out yet. I know this was true of SMLE's with the MkVII bullet but I don't know about the MkVII bullet in the P14 or No.4.

[MBTcustom]

I might be totally off base hear, but I just got done tweaking in a load for a 303 no4 mk1 and one of the mistakes that I made was that I didn't measure the slug correctly. As far as I know these rifles were only made with 2 groove and 5 groove barrels. If yours is a 2 groove just disregard this post and pretend I don't exist, But, if your rifle is a 5 groove, then you have to measure the groove diameter by inserting it into a hole of the appropriate size. You cant use a micrometer or a set of calipers to measure it because there are no two points on the slug that are directly across from each other. My slugs measured .315 with calipers and so I sized my boolits accordingly. My groups were all over the place until I noticed what I just mentioned. I used a different method to measure the slug and came up with a whopping .319!!! after correcting my boolit size, my groups improved greatly.

[skeet1]

303Guy,
Glad to see you are ok.

Ken

[Gtek]

Check wood at fwd end of forearm under band. I bet it is touching barrel. Barrel gets hot-moves (thin barrels)-harmonics change. Releive area at end and float barrel. For five groove tubes- find .002"-.004" shim stock, wrap 180 degrees around boolit and mic -subtract thickness of shim x 2. Gtek

[smokemjoe]

I have bedded 4 of them, do the action in 4 different steps, dont bed action all in one step or your never get it apart, Also bed the rear stock to the action solid for it will not come off. In the fouling shot I done a story on how to do it. Number 183 - 303s and issue 196 on the Ishapore 308 bedded, If you have a good bore to start and after glass they really shoot

[goofyoldfart]

Goodsteel: this is a very accurate trick to use with ANY odd number grooves barrel. slug your bore with a tight fitting slug (lubricated) and then wrap a 1 or 2 thousand steel or brass feeler stock around the bullet so that you are holding the stock at the bottom of the bullet as close as possible together and measure with a micrometer (or good calipers) at 90* (degrees) from where you are holding it. take the reading and subtract 2X the thickness for your reading. Betchum' your within 1/2 a thousandth of an inch. brass works best for me. God Bless to all.

ETA: okay, I'm suffering from CRSGO. (can't remember sh*t--getting old). I don't know how I missed GTEK's post, but I did, nonetheless I'll leave this one up. Sorry Gtek.