Building a Southern Mountain Rifle.

P

petew

Regular
Rating - 97.4%
38   1   0
Location
Alberta
Here is a peek at a Southern Mountain Rifle I am working on. It is a 45cal flintlock, 42" long barrel, 13/16 across the flats. It will be steel trimmed, and browned. The stock is a grade 4 curly maple , treated with Aqua Fortis, and it's first coat of Tru Oil.

10433845_636776103110390_1196292052549177194_n.jpg


10703775_636776519777015_7753657455181453296_n.jpg


10599713_636776636443670_2523434931845087937_n.jpg


10268448_636776669777000_6923214165199412057_n.jpg
 
Musketfire said:
Thats really nice, maple is frikkin hard to work, so I appreciate that!!
Click to expand...

Careful use of a bandsaw to rough out the square shaped block. Follow that with a spoke shave to work the basic shape. Then switch to bastard or coarser cut metal files that ONLY get used for wood. With these tools maple isn't that bad. And the files are especially nice for working with figured wood like this which loves to tear out.

I don't like rasps because they are simply too rough and tend to gouge out contrary grain.
 
Nice work so far - I too am in a flint So. Mtn Rifle build but the early stages and I am not looking fwd to inletting the lollipop tang. Of course every one was different but most had stocks that were quite dark rather than blonde. Regardless, the iron furniture will look very nice on the light wood. Congratulations on a pretty build!
 
Nice work. Show us some more pics as you progress. Seeing your stock is making feel like I should get off my a$$ and build another as well.....
 
Thanks for the comments guys. I just came in from draw filing the barrel and the first coat of browning solution. One tool I used a lot on the stock is a Ferriers rasp on the fine side. It is better than a plane or spokeshave for not tearing out the wood if you push it like a plane with the grain. I also use a #49 and #50 Nicholson rasp and a cabinet scraper a lot.
 
Scrapers can be amazingly effective. I have several I use for final fitting the barrel into the half-octagon or round barrel channel...easier to control than chisels, I have found.
 
Yep, scrapers are excellent for not tearing out the grain on figured wood where each ripple is produced by a grain direction change.

There's a trick to keeping them correctly sharpened and having a good burr for cutting. But when just right it's probably the ultimate tool for things like a barrel channel.
 
now I am waiting for it to rust so I can have a nice browned barrel. This is worse than waiting for paint to dry. I am using laurel Mountain browning solution, and it is not going very fast.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom