what should i do!!!!! stock options

BCRider said:
A hearty DITTO! to the idea of doing a first run on some cheap house building wood to work out the processes and motions first. It'll also allow you to iron out things like the size of the wrist and any pistol grip sizing and spacing along with setting the cheek height to suit your sights or scope use. For a one off which has to be right the first time around it's well worth the time and the $3 worth of wood.

I've done a bit of work with zebrawood and it's not that soft at all. I'd class it in the same range as a softer walnut but not quite as hard as black walnut that I've worked with. So perhaps a little more area for a recoil lug to sit against or possibly an inletted hard maple pad for the recoil lug to seat against. But if you like the look of zebrawood it's more than usable.

Maple is far too heavy for a carry around gun unless you make it quite slender. Oak is tough but heavy and can often be rather brittle. As in if you accidentally drop it and even if it's in a sleeve it might just shatter at the wrist sort of brittle depending on how deeply the wrist is shaped. Mahogany, the real stuff and not the luan from the Phillipines, is pretty good but the grain tends to be rather "meh.... " in some cases. But if you can get it with a nice ribbon texture it CAN look positively electrified when the light hits from various angles. But if you find such a piece it's a bugger to cut with anything but rasps, files, scrapers or sandpaper. Any use of planes or spokeshaves will produce lots of tear out since each ribbon band has the grain running at a different angle so NO direction is good for planes. It also responds best to sharp scrappers for the final finish to best bring out the brilliance in the ribbon pattern. Using most sandpapers on it results in greatly dulling the magic down.
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i looked into zebrawood! its gorgeous! but when i went and found some, i like it!! i was talking to the guy at windsor plywood today and hes got me looking into bubinga and paduk. both exotic african woods, and they are beautiful!! i just out if they can take the recoil. its for a 243 so im not terribly worried. the mahogany they had was pretty meh.. so ill probably end up not going with that.
its going to be a heavy gun no matter what. its a heavy barrel. im not to concerned about the carry weight either; all my rifles are heavy and i carry them around (remington sendero and a vls)
 
gunner1911 said:
thanks! thats a lot of good suggestions. im a framer so theres no end to the free lumber to test ideas on :p
i was talking to the guy at windsor plywood today and hes got me looking into bubinga and paduk. both exotic african woods, and they are beautiful!! i just out if they can take the recoil. its for a 243 so im not terribly worried.
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If you look around the web at the target guys' stocks, you will see a LOT of laminated chunks of whatever caught the guy's eye, usually in contrasting layers. The real advantage is that the laminations will help make up for the shortfalls of the various layers, some of which may be brittle or prone to splitting or warpage. You can also work in the reinforcements needed throuh areas that would otherwise come out weaker, such as through the wrist area.

If you are going to try the junk lumber route, remember that Bondo is yer friend! Goober the stuff on, shape it and sand it to what you think looks best, cover the whole lot in a layer of primer, so it does not look like its cobbled together, and arrive at a shape that suits ya! This is a GREAT way to work out the details, without making $50-$500+ worth of firewood out of a stock blank. You could also end up making a composite stock this way, using your original to make a mold from, if that attracts you at all.

If you talk to the guy with the duplicator up front, you can find out what he prefers for extensions to allow him to mount your pattern on his machine. Or you just trace and follow the original, when you get to it.

Post pictures! :)

Cheers
Trev
 
Bubinga and padauk are both very heavy and very hard woods. For a "sled gun" used for nothing but benchrest shooting either would be amazing when done in the right finish. But for a carry gun? Not so much unless you are big and make body builders look like wimps. Purpleheart is much the same. Padauk and purpleheart are also best done in a sealing finish such as polyurethane. If finished with hand rubbed oil the oxygen in the air can still get into the wood and over time "browns" the brilliant red or purple colour out to something far more plain.

We always think of walnut as a hard and durable wood. But really it's only middle of the road in density and hardness when we look at the whole range of attractive hardwoods.

One reason I like the idea of zebrawood for YOUR situation is that since the barrel and action is done in tan it would match up well with the lighter part of the zebra colouring. And then if you pick the slab so the grain is oriented right the stripping would be amazing. Like a natural camoflage.

Which does raise another issue. Figure and curl in the wood often only presents itself when you have the surfaces of your finished product shaped to get the best from the grain. Things like the checkerboard like flecking or quilting found in a lot of woods can only be seen when you have a very pure quarter grain cut on a face. Alter the angle by more than a couple of degrees and the effect is lost. Same with boldly grained woods like zebra. You need to have the grain oriented to the more exposed surfaces in such a way that there's a shallow angle to the growth rings for the stripping to be heavier and show off the wiggles and other details to the best effect. Pick a slab of zebra which is strongly quarter grain to the side faces and much of the dynamic look is lost. So keep this in mind when you shop for a suitable blank in any wood you decide to use.
 
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One thing you can do to ensure that the wood doesn't become compressed and "bruised" where the recoil transfer is strongest is to soak the end grain in any screw holes or the cutout for the recoil lug with the very thin formula CA glue. It soaks in and kicks off to greatly harden the wood by locking the fibers in a "casting" that reaches along the end grain by a surprising amount.
 
BCRider said:
One thing you can do to ensure that the wood doesn't become compressed and "bruised" where the recoil transfer is strongest is to soak the end grain in any screw holes or the cutout for the recoil lug with the very thin formula CA glue. It soaks in and kicks off to greatly harden the wood by locking the fibers in a "casting" that reaches along the end grain by a surprising amount.
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So what your saying is to water down titebond3 just a little and let it soak into the back side the recoil slot? Sounds logical... Would that make it swell at all?
 
gunner1911 said:
Thanks for clarifying. Didn't know that. :) would it make the wood swell though?
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The reason some glues make the wood swell is that they contain water as one of the ingredients. CA, or cyanoacrylate glue does not have any water in it. That's not to say that SOME other glues won't cause the wood to swell but that would be as a result of expanding as they cure. For example polyurethane glue has no water in it but it foams up and expands when it cures so in some cases you may see a slight swelling of the overall size of a glued assembly. We're talking miniscule amounts though if the wood is correctly clamped.

The CA you want to get for this hardening treatment is the "thin" formula stuff found in most hobby shops that cater to radio control stuff or even plastic models. You'll know it's the right stuff for this because the glue in the bottle will look like water. And I mean literally as "thick" as real water. Not "sort of" or "close enough". It'll act just like water when you shake the bottle. There's too many possible name brands of it to list but if you buy it at a proper hobby shop that has the full lineup of "thin", "medium" and "thick" you'll be getting the proper stuff. Don't compromise on this. The common stuff from the lumber yards is typically what I consider as "medium" viscosity or at best half way between the proper "thin" stuff and "medium". So find a well stocked hobby shop and get the proper stuff.

When applied to end grain a drop of the thin stuff will literally all wick away into the wood pores. You may even see wet spots appear a half inch away on the surface because it'll wick so far so fast before it kicks off and cures. The result of filling in the grain in this way is that the wood is greatly more resistant to crushing in that area now.

It'll also darken the wood where applied a little much in the same way as an oil finish or oil based varnish. But that's OK since you're going to finish the wood later on anyway. Post glue sanding also removes this glue related darkening as well anyway.
 
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