Rifle stock build progress thread

Decker9

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I received a few PM’s about my my previous post so thought I’d make a progression post on my current stock project. I’m about 50 hours into it as of now, so I’ll post up to where I’m at, after this post, I will post progression photos/posts as I move along with it.

Also, Macintosh, super generous in helping with some tips on checkering (thank you!! ). His generosity gave me the thought to post this, hopefully it helps folks who are interested in stock building maybe get a jump into where to start. It’s really not as “hard” as most think, but more time consuming and tedious then anything. If you’re a person of attention to detail though, stock making might be your cup of tea.

For the record, this is the third blank Iv tied into. I am a self learner, so you will see screwups, mistakes, and ways of fixing them, I hope lol. The biggest number 1 goal for me, is no gaps. Nothing ruins the aesthetics of a nice rifle more then gaps between the metal and wood. Secondly, the lines, everything “should” flow in harmony, as old stock makers would say.

This project all started out as a want for a carbon barrelled walnut stocked rifle. I recently had a custom rifle built, and figured I’d use that barrel/action for this build.

The components are,

Defiance deviant ga hunter action with a 22” carbon IBI barrel chambered in 7 saum. I decided to go with a BDL for the bottom on this one.

The blank, was sent to me from a good friend in Turkey. It has the perfect grain for a stock. I haven't been down the road of crooked grain, but in my learning, it’s best to leave some figure behind and go with the right grain.

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I cut a template from cardboard to get my layout with the grain flowing properly.
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Screw up #1

I cut the profile of the stock 1/4” big all around…. Lucky I did!! To start the layout for the barrel and action, I need a perfectly flat surface all around, that is perfectly square to one side (I work off the left side, being a left hand shooter). Unfortunately I missed the rear tang and cut the start of the grip, which was lower then the top of my blank. Luckily I added that 1/4” extra which give me enough wood so I could hand plane the top so it was flat, from rear tang hole all the way to the end of the forend.

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Next, is to get that top surface perfectly flat, and square to one side, which isn’t as easy as one would think. I stole a trick that I remember my grandfather doing, using grandmas lipstick on a flat straightedge to locate the high spots (hopefully my lady doesn’t see this thread, she’s missing her “expensive” lipstick she says)

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With everything flat, straight, plum and square, it’s time to put a centreline around the whole blank, top bottom and ends. Hopefully that centreline ends up right at the exact point of where you started, if it didn’t, then there’s more squaring up to do because this will cause issues down the road.

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Now that we have everything “right”, we can go ahead and find out where our metal will sit in the blank. A lot comes into play with measurements. I find it easier to copy a stock that fits me. This piece, I copied a lot from the AG composites privateer stock. I really like the comb and grip on it, so I used it for most of my measuring and stock shape layout.

Once the trigger is located, I mark my action screw holes onto the top of the blank. A little learning lesson here I’ll share. My previous stock, I went and cut the outline of my action and barrel layout, before drilling my screw holes. My one hole edged up about 1/32” out of line, which put my layout out of line. It was fixable, but a lesson learnt. Get those action holes drill first thing, to make sure everything it point on.


The rear tang with the tang screw located and the action laid out with pin marks.
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Another learning lesson, which Iv yet to do. Iv been cutting my inletting in about .010” shy on each side, which leaves a lot of fitting to be done still. I’m still getting comfortable with the layout, but if I can get to the point of cutting the layout “exact”, it would sure save time, and would keep my inlet edges sharper. But, that leaves little room for error. All part of learning I suppose.

Screwup #2.

I got restless, instead of waiting to get back to work so I could use the drill press, I thought I’d try free handing drilling the action screws. In the end, I was out a hair, witch put my barrel about 1/16” off my centre line at the end of the forend. A little filing in the rear tang hole fixed this, but reminded me why we use a drill press to get these holes, perfect. Any slop in them, and the metalwork won’t go into the wood straight, and will give a false reading in the inletting black.

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Now with everything right, holes squared up, centreline perfect, it’s time to layout the metal ontop of the blank.

For this I use a piece of tape along the top of the barrel, and marked it in 1/4” and 1/2” increments, I think this probably depends on the barrel taper, how close you want these increments. I measure the diameter at each increment, divide it by 2, then lay it onto the blank measured off my centre line. It’s best to triple check these measurements, Iv caught myself a couple times mixing up numbers.
(Most of my marks have rubbed off the tape, each mark is numbered, to reference the same number on the blank and it’s diameter.
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All layout is done by pinholes from the dividers, then I use a straightedge to connect the dots.

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If this interests you, please feel free to follow along. I open to questions and suggestions. Happy stock building!
 
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Decker9

Decker9

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Now is time for cutting in the layout. A straight edge is a must, preferable one with a bevel, which I don’t have, yet.

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My last stock, I chiseled away at the inlet which took quite some time. This time, knowing what wood needed to go, I ripped through the centreline with a saw. This helped a ton, made things move along a lot faster.

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Now to the fine stuff. Last thing we want is to touch that outline of the metalwork, until the inletting black tells us to. Reading the black has been a bit of a learning curve, a lot depends on the angles and tapers of the metal. This is by no means a pro job, but hopefully one day I’ll get there.

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Decker9

Decker9

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As of now, this is where I am at. I still have another 1/16-1/8” of depth to go before rolling it over to the bottom metal. Ideally, I want to get it sunk to 1/2 the depth of the metal. This part is mostly all scrapers, you’ll loose track of how many times the metal goes in and out of the wood, each time, scraping away the high spots that the inlet black leaves behind.

From here on, I work on it a bit here and a bit there, just whenever time allows (these are more winter hobby’s, by the wood stove in my warm basement lol). I will add progress photos as it develops, im hoping to have it complete sometime in the new year. Up to this point, I have roughly 50 hours into it. Lots of those hours were spent just looking and drawing, figuring out my next moves. It’s easy to take wood away, but not so easy to put it back.

Something I’m trying to wrap my head around, and I’m open to suggestions, is the rear tang. On Remington 700’s, the back edge of the tang seems to always sit, on the wood. I personally prefer, in the wood. I know about the cracking behind the tangs of rifles that don’t have a little clearance, but I’m curious if I’m ok with sinking the tang level with the wood, rather then on the wood…? If anyone has any insight to this, I’d be happy to hear.

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Here you can see a few little nicks in that top edge of the barrel inletting. This is from me cutting out the edge of the inlet with the straight edge. This is where a beveled straight edge would be a big benefit. Luckily with free floating the barrel after, they should buff out.

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Macintosh

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Looks great Ed! Following.

Agree 150% on the stock layout, have had to repair a couple very $$$ stocks for folks that broke due to poor layout in the wrist, one being a stock I did early on and another a big-name smith did. Give me the blank with straight wood in the wrist every time. that piece of wood is going to be PLENTY fancy, anyway. (we should all have close friends in Turkey that send us nice stock blanks...care to make an intro?? :) )

Do you plan to pillar and bed the action?

Your question about the tang—not sure I understand the question in detail as its been a while since Ive been inside a 700. Hopefully someone with more experience stocking rifles can chime in and tell me if Im full of it. In general a crack in the stock behind the action is because the action is being literally hammered back into the wood via recoil and either the inletting was sloppy or the wood is soft enough or oil-soaked enough to compress allowing the whole thing to move back relative to the stock, and the angled rear surface of the action acts as a wedge. The recoil lug and any other designed-in recoil-bearing surfaces are where the recoil should be absorbed, not the angled back surface of the action. Hard to tell online but that action appears to have a tiny “flat” at the rear of the tang that is not angled and is let into the stock (??)—If im seeing that image correctly it’s possible this is actually designed that way specfically to see if the stock has set back at all—if its flat perpendicular to the stock it wont crack the stock (maybe a tiny chip, but it wont split), its the wedge-shaped bits to worry about--definitely do not want to give them anything to push on outward if the action sets back at all so would not set the angled sides into the wood. Personally my approach would be to check with the action manufacturer on where they intend to be recoil-bearing surfaces, and would plan to bed those areas for perfect contact, and maybe slightly relieve the tang and leave angled parts on the top so any rearward movement doesnt split the wood. I doubt many of their actions wind up in wood (?) but you cant be the first. I'd think they would tell you what they recommend for the rear tang.
 
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Decker9

Decker9

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Looks great Ed! Following.

Agree 150% on the stock layout, have had to repair a couple very $$$ stocks for folks that broke due to poor layout in the wrist, one being a stock I did early on and another a big-name smith did. Give me the blank with straight wood in the wrist every time. that piece of wood is going to be PLENTY fancy, anyway. (we should all have close friends in Turkey that send us nice stock blanks...care to make an intro?? :) )

Do you plan to pillar and bed the action?

Your question about the tang—not sure I understand the question in detail as its been a while since Ive been inside a 700. Hopefully someone with more experience stocking rifles can chime in and tell me if Im full of it. In general a crack in the stock behind the action is because the action is being literally hammered back into the wood via recoil and either the inletting was sloppy or the wood is soft enough or oil-soaked enough to compress allowing the whole thing to move back relative to the stock, and the angled rear surface of the action acts as a wedge. The recoil lug and any other designed-in recoil-bearing surfaces are where the recoil should be absorbed, not the angled back surface of the action. Hard to tell online but that action appears to have a tiny “flat” at the rear of the tang that is not angled and is let into the stock (??)—If im seeing that image correctly it’s possible this is actually designed that way specfically to see if the stock has set back at all—if its flat perpendicular to the stock it wont crack the stock (maybe a tiny chip, but it wont split), its the wedge-shaped bits to worry about--definitely do not want to give them anything to push on outward if the action sets back at all so would not set the angled sides into the wood. Personally my approach would be to check with the action manufacturer on where they intend to be recoil-bearing surfaces, and would plan to bed those areas for perfect contact, and maybe slightly relieve the tang and leave angled parts on the top so any rearward movement doesnt split the wood. I doubt many of their actions wind up in wood (?) but you cant be the first. I'd think they would tell you what they recommend for the rear tang.


I got pretty lucky with meeting this fellow named Murat from Turkey on Instagram. I follow a handful of stock makers and stock blank sales people, and a few follow back. Murat contacted me a number of times trying to sell me a blank, of corse I was quite hesitant. After a year of bs’ing him about walnut, he offered to gift me a blank, if I paid the shipping. I figured the risk was worth the reward, $225 Canadian and 6 business days later, I had this piece of walnut.

The deal was, that I would purchase my next blank through him, which I did a couple weeks ago. Now a couple years of talking with Murat, I have no problem at all recommending him for a blank. Comparing to me buying from the states (mostly looking at Dressel’s website) , I think I saved a bit by ordering direct from him.

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I do plan on pillar bedding. Another stock (my second from a blank) i pillar bedded with the the score hight pillar bedding kit. It was my first time installing pillars, but seemed super easy to work with.
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That stock is also for a rem 700 footprint, you can see how I countersunk the metal a bit, so it’s flush with the wood.

Now with my ag composite stock, and also other rem 700 walnut stocks Iv searched on the internet, all seem to have the tang resting ontop of the wood. ( ignore the epoxy hillbilly fix, you can’t see it from 20’ away 😂). Like the mauser tangs, I’m wondering/hoping a few thousands clearance behind the tang will help from any chips/splits. The bedding around the lug is pretty tight, so another plus.

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I would inlet your tang because that's how you like it. Leave a 1/64th gap at the rear and fill it with beeswax that is dyed to match the color of the stock. It will be pretty unnoticeable.

This is very common among American longrifle builders where the rear of the barrel tang is square. If square and inketted tightly, you run the risk of having it crack or chip out. So, they will generally do as I described above.
 
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But thinking about it from an accuracy perspective, having any of that rear surface (even the angle part on the way to the rear) in solid contact with the inlet could act as a 2nd recoil lug surface. That's no good for accuracy. If I were doing it, I'd probably leave a 1/64th around the entire rear of the tang and fill with dyed wax.
 
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Decker9

Decker9

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But thinking about it from an accuracy perspective, having any of that rear surface (even the angle part on the way to the rear) in solid contact with the inlet could act as a 2nd recoil lug surface. That's no good for accuracy. If I were doing it, I'd probably leave a 1/64th around the entire rear of the tang and fill with dyed wax.

Thank you Tock!! That’s kinda what I’m thinking. If I use a piece of masking tape on the end of the tang edge, I’m thinking it should give me a little clearance. The beeswax is a good idea!!
 
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Decker9

Decker9

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Thank you bc54!


It may not look like much since yesterdays post, but another 10 hours of scraping and fitting, and I got the top side inletted to half depth. A guy doesn’t want to go any more then that or he risks locking his metal into the wood with bedding.

I did make a screwup. The short taper section on my barrel inlet didn’t come out “exact” on each side, so I opened up both sides of the barrel channel to match that little section. It’s still ok, but is a little more free floated then I’d liked. In my layout, when I mark in the pin marks, I suspect I lined up 3 holes on one side, and 4 holes on the other, when I cut them in. Learning lesson, always make sure to cut them in the same on both sides.

I’ll add a little something I learnt on the last stock I built. I had taken a lot of extra time in fitting the action to the wood like a glove, only to decide to bed the entire action afterward, so I ended up hogging out my beautiful inlet job, another 1/16” or so to allow for bedding (minus the top edges, I leave these still fitted to the metal, but undercut them a hair for bedding).

Needless to say, I didn’t spend any time trying to look pretty in the action inlet, except along the top edges of the inletting.

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I’m touching in a few spots, most importantly though, im snug along the top edges. When it comes time to bed everything, I will go back in and hog a little wood out.

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Playing with a couple finishes. I generally used tung oil in the past, but another smith put me onto Daly’s ship’n shore.

I sometimes will add 10-15 percent spar varnish to my last coat of oil. The top finish on the wood is straight spar varnish, middle is Daly’s and the bottom is tung oil. I will add a few coats as they dry, but I’m liking that Daly’s in the middle. Each has 2 coats now, Dalys snd the tung were wet sanded in with 400 grit.

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I gotta get to work for a few days, next days off, it’s time to flip it over and start laying out the bottom metal. Roughly 55-60 hours into it this far.
 
Joined
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That's going to be an awesome looking stock. I'm excited you decided to model it on the privateer. That's a stock I've been wanting to get and would like to see it in walnut!
 
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Decker9

Decker9

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That's going to be an awesome looking stock. I'm excited you decided to model it on the privateer. That's a stock I've been wanting to get and would like to see it in walnut!

I really like the privateer, it feels nice and shoulders perfectly. I think with a long tube, it could get front end heavy, but I’m hoping with the walnut and my 22” barrel here that it will balance ok.
 

CB1

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Really enjoying this thread. Definitely making me want to start on the blank I have in the garage!
 
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