Gents:

I'm seeking input on the rifle I am about to pick up; CZ has finally gotten its act together and offered the LH 550 in 375 H&H. Mine just arrived at the gun shop and I'll pick it up on Monday. I'll try to get a pic in so it can be viewed.

If the grain flow is good as CZ's President told me it is, then I may keep the factory stock. I intend to get it bent to add a bit of cast but I am writing to inquire how the 'smiths have slimmed these chunky, clunky stocks in the past. For instance, all of the RH models I have handled in the past have felt oversized and rather clumsy in my hands. So, I think I would like to have the grip swept back and slimmed down as well as the forestock.

HOW is this actually accompished and HOW is the rest of the stock actually slimmed down?

Many thanks.

Not to trivialize it, but I did them with a good eye and a #49 rasp. I am not saying that to be glib at all and hope it does not come across as such on screen.

It is the same process as making a stock from a blank. I learned to stock by reading Dunlap and liked his saying that at soem point in making a stock, you just have to attack it. He did not care if you used a trained beaver to do it. We had a thread on Linden last week were we talked about using tomahawks on expensive stock blanks as a good way to get wood off in a hurry.

With the CZ stock, rasps, chisels, files, drawknives, spokeshaves, etc, are used just as they would be when reducing the size of a blank. There may be soem instructions on line on how to make a stock from a blank. "Gunsmithing" by Dunlap gives good info on how to do it.

Or even better, Mr. Wiebe posted good pics of making the Searcy Scholorship rifle in the sticky at the top of this forum. He shows how it is done. A WORD OF CAUTION: I DO NOT reccomend a novice using his suicide machine where he has the milling cutter on his buffer. Good God that pic gives me the heebee geebees! That man is crazy!!!

The reshaping of a factory stock is harder in a couple of ways. For one, you are constrained by how much wood you have to play with. From a blank, you can have whatever dimensions, comb noses, grip curves, or whatever you want. With a factory job, well, you only have so much wood to play with in certain places.

The second harder point is that it is easy to lay out certain points and lines on the blank, where a factory stock is already round. You can establish some key lines, but it is not as easy and possibly not as good.

I have posted my feelings about the CZ stocks serveral times-they are good in a way. The factory can make them cheaply and many folks are happy with them, so they get what they want for minimal cash outlay. The others who want a more svelt stock can pay soemone to rechape it, or do it themselves, far cheaper than a full blown custom would cost.

Yea, I have some CZ 550s in the standard action, but none in the safari magnum. I look at the stocks and especially handling them and can see and feel the heft, and wish they were slimmer and lighter.

But, they are as Marc says, getting what you want (or need as the Rolling Stones said) for minimal cash.

For me, I would go to work on one if I could figure out a way to preserve the checkering, which is one of the most expensive aspects to restore, if hired.

Maybe some day, but meanwhile I'm enjoying the CZs.

KB