Wow - been so busy, so far behind, but got an entire long weekend to catch up in the shop, just some pics from Saturday:
- Fore end is completely inlet, bolt hole drilled & rescued ebony end glued up
- butt stock is completely inlet & fitted
- stock bolt hole is drilled (whew!)
- everything is test fit!
Today (Sunday) we are going to:
- spend an hour at the range with a new Mosin
- fit & inlet the butt plate
- locate & inlet the bipod lug.
- start shaping!!!
If all goes well, we should be ready for dye by end of day on Monday. Lots of pics taken, will spread them over several posts this time... but lets start with these:
Here is where we start with the butt stock inletting - just the gross material has been removed with the router at this point.
Could not do the top of the action, so that had to be measured & cut by hand - wish I had cut the blank a little tighter, that was a lot of material to go through.
At this point I am using dry erase markers as a transfer agent ... they work well & don't penetrate into the wood much, but can be really tough to get into tight areas.
Here; we can see there is still a ways to go to get that nice tight fit.
Checking the fit with a scalpel blade. Generally I'm satisfied with the fit when I can't get the tip of the blade in there....
Checking to make sure the top of the butt stock remains parallel with the bore while inletting .
So one of the big things with making stocks/inletting is finding a good transfer agent, generally referred to as 'inletting black' - same idea as 'prussian blue' or layout ink for metal working ..
the problem is, that it's not readily available in Canada (volatile, won't ship across the border) so there's all kinds of crazy 'home made black' recipes out there. Mostly what you hear is blackening with a candle/lamp, dry erase, sharpies, lip stick (yes, lip stick!!)- I've used them all (including layout inks - but not lip stick) all have problems.
But I think I came across something that shows GREAT promise...... That is ... oil paint, (very expensive Windsor & Newton oil paint)
I realized I had a stack of this stuff sitting around from my toy airplane building days & it has all the properties that I want in a transfer agent!!
- very thick & does not penetrate wood well (it will get into the pores)
- moderate dry time - aka good open working time
- can be applied to tight areas
- color can be matched close to (any) final finish color in case there is some staining
- easy clean up (so easy!!)
Here it is applied with a brush - probably not preferred, a natural sponge would be better, but you don't actually have to reapply it after fitting, you can just 'push it around' a little.
To finish off this receiver, I used less than a pea sized dab. a $40 tube will last a lifetime
(prices vary by color, depends what sorts of materials go into them - if I remember correctly white will be the most expensive)
Beautiful clear transfer, no smudging almost no penetration and doesn't dull your tools (like some agents will!)
So I'm going to pick up some small natural sponges today & see if I can improve on the properties by adding microfibers &/or silica, just to see if I can keep it from penetrating the pores at all.
Finally for today, some tools. Thought it might be interesting to see what tools I use:
From Left to right:
- a couple of chip carving knives, I bought 2 different profiles from a 'mid-grade' quality manufacturer to see which profile I liked better & was more useful.
Turns out "both" - but these ones do not stay sharp very long, an upgrade is required. BTW, they get used mostly for layout lines, clearing areas where you can't get a chisel but primarily creating a stop cut.
- scalpel, you saw how I used that - could use a feeler guage I suppose, but this works. It has no use for cutting or inletting. none at all.
- 6" engineer's steel ruler. INDISPENSABLE!!! an absolute must have (graduated in 32s, 64s, mm and .5mm)
- drill bit...
this one just happened to be there, got some nice high quality brad points recently, this is one of them - you'll see more in a follow up post.
- pencil: you may have noticed that I lay things out and plan pretty meticulously - layout marks all over the place. This guy is just one of the culprits.
- bees wax, an absolute must IMO - keeps bit cool, prevents squealing in those deep holes & will seal up those deep holes as well.
- chisels. I shopped long and hard trying to pick which chisels I would NEED & use the most. Did pretty good there are only 2 out of I think around 10 or 12 that don't get regular use.
At $40 a piece, I wanted to choose carefully, I like the Two Cherrys over the Pfiels, I find they hold an edge longer. anyway - the first 2 are 5mm & 10mm Pfiel straight gouges, they just happen to have the same 1/2" radius as the end of a Winchester tang. very handy, 3rd is a Two Cherry 10mm skew, good for cutting flat received ends. next 3 are all straight beveled chisels. the widest is good for cleaning up the insides of receiver inlets. ......
That thing in the middle that looks like a ruler?? That is a scraper. I make those things as needed in the profile needed from cabinet scrapers, the cheapest & probably most used tool of all (other than measuring tools) You can cut & grind them to match a specific barrel profile, square them up to get into tight spaces, a nice flat one works great for cutting a butt plate inlet... WAY-WAY-WAY faster and cleaner than sandpaper for cleaning up rasp marks (technically it is a 'finishing' tool)
- best of all you can pick up a pack of them for like $10 cut em as needed with an angle grinder.
Off to the range, more to come
