Just got these photos from James Flynn with his stock finish and flat-top checkering on my 404. I'll take some better ones when it arrives.

Very nice look forward to seeing a picture of the full rifle

Wow! That's going to be nice. Looking forward to seeing the finished rifle.


Terry

Here's the rifle with the unfinished stock.

I had James reshape the forend tip when he finished and checkered the stock. He added a little red to it also.

well done and a fine looker to boot!

Like I said before, WOW!

Chris fine looking stock. You really have the nack.


Roger

Now that's the way a stock on an African rifle should look. Check out the pics on small bores under phill's 223 and you will see a similarity.I had a 223 made scaled down to get the same effect as a big bore english rifle. I like the flat top checkering and have it on a 300 H&H. I think its actually more difficult to do than pointed up checkering because you can't hide a line out of parallel. Nice work goig to be a beautiful piece.

quote:

Originally posted by phill pittman:
I think its actually more difficult to do than pointed up checkering because you can't hide a line out of parallel.

Phill - that's a wonderful rifle built by two of the best imo. M&H do flat-top checkering as well... keep that in mind for your next project.

Based on cost, however, I would say flat-top is about 4x more difficult than pointed up checkering.

Very nice rifle Chris!
Butch

Chris
Looks nice I like the look of the added color to the stock as well. Makes it look older.

Thanks James. As usual, my only regret is not spending more money the blank!

Although this piece is "correct" in my estimation, and is ¼ sawn like I wanted, it could be flashier.

Lesson learned:
The cost of the blank is really like the cost of a surplus Mauser... you've got so much in it by the time you're done that it really doesn’t matter if you paid $300 or $500 for the action.

In the end, a few hundred extra is just a drop in the bucket.

Chris-

Congratulations, the stock is absolutely stunning!!!

The flat checkering and the staining are great touches.

Just saw your post, Chris. Very, very nice. I really like the forend tip re-work....looks like a buff hoof! I've been watching your rifle come together since I first saw the posts over a year ago and then looking at it with Stuart at SCI in '07. It has turned out awesome....you should be proud of this piece. I think the blank you picked out is nice....looks real nice on what I'm sure is a real shooter in a great caliber.

Gary
DRSS
NRA Lifer
SCI
DSC

NewGuy Yes, M&H do great flat top. I have a 300H&H done by them with flat top. Pretty much a replica of the 223. I also like the feel of flat top. They do nice mullard borders too.I think your wood is plenty fancy for a big bore. If you look at the old H&Hs, Rigbys etc they didn'tuse a lot of fancy wood I think grain orientation and lay was and is more important especially in a thumper. Having said that I have a vintage single sq, bridge 375 Rigby that does have beautiful color and contrast but the layout is perfect also.

Very nice checkering, well done!
But to my taste, this competition of who has the smallest forend/forendtip has relly gone to far...

Not to offend you, but what kind of salestalent is required to make people think that a semi finished checkering becomes unik, by calling it flattop

All my checkering people has started that way, comming and asking,"is it soon deep enough, to be called finished"
And after a few month they have learned that a checkering is ok when the tops are completly sharp.
When the checkering then becomes heavy used, it again becomes more exclusive, looking "flattoped"

It remindes me of the marketing guye who made new classic stocks becomming fancy.
In my oppinion, bacically both is way cheaper to produce

Uh, don't think it was done to save money and I am pretty sure it isn't cheap...

Chris
The checkering looks great. I like the color of the stock much better with the red in it.
I think the "piece of wood" looks good too, the grain looks like it is alligned right.

Only one question, "Where does the second barrell go???

I also think the wood is a fine choice. Too many gaudily stocked rifles out there. Most English rifles are a bit understated in the wood department and yours follows that tradition. I think it was a well thought out combo that works!

First class all the way.

quote:

Originally posted by jørgen:
Not to offend you, but what kind of salestalent is required to make people think that a semi finished checkering becomes unik, by calling it flattop

All my checkering people has started that way, comming and asking,"is it soon deep enough, to be called finished"
And after a few month they have learned that a checkering is ok when the tops are completly sharp.
When the checkering then becomes heavy used, it again becomes more exclusive, looking "flattoped"

It remindes me of the marketing guye who made new classic stocks becomming fancy.
In my oppinion, bacically both is way cheaper to produce

You're not even on the paper! ..flat top checkering is what seperates the boys from the men....don't believe me? Try it sometime!

quote:

Originally posted by Duane Wiebe:

quote:

Originally posted by jørgen:
Not to offend you, but what kind of salestalent is required to make people think that a semi finished checkering becomes unik, by calling it flattop

All my checkering people has started that way, comming and asking,"is it soon deep enough, to be called finished"
And after a few month they have learned that a checkering is ok when the tops are completly sharp.
When the checkering then becomes heavy used, it again becomes more exclusive, looking "flattoped"

It remindes me of the marketing guye who made new classic stocks becomming fancy.
In my oppinion, bacically both is way cheaper to produce

You're not even on the paper! ..flat top checkering is what seperates the boys from the men....don't believe me? Try it sometime!

Hi Duane
Please remember that all checkerings starts as flattop, then they are finished, and after a few years of heavy use, they again ends up as flattop.
There is no problems in making a flattop checkering as the shown, in apx 1 hour, as long as there is no higher demands on lineuniformity and spacing uniformity, as on the shown.


Belive me i have done more than checkering 20.000 riflestocks in my time, and as said, the easy part is making standard flattop. Or even easier is making skipline checkerings, as it hides many iregularities. The difical part is making a wrap around large area pointed checkering that looks completly uniform, and remains the same angel on all lines.

quote:

Originally posted by jørgen:
Belive me i have done more than checkering 20.000 riflestocks in my time......

Twenty thousand!

Wow.........that must be pretty close to a world record!

20,000 stocks checkered? Damn.

Assuming 4 hours per stock, that is more than 9 YEARS of checkering time.

Did you do the 20,000 stocks by hand or mechanically?

Taken further, if we assume 4 hours per stock, 6 hours per day actually sitting at the bench working, and a 5 day work week, that is more than 51 years of checkering with no vacation, no missed days, and no breaks.

Just for clarity's sake, I assume 6 hours per day actually working, because there are phones to answer (20,000 stocks don't just magically show up at your doorstep, typically), errands to be run (like depositing all of those checks generated form checkering in the bank), outside appointments to be met, etc, etc, etc.

It also assumes that not a single mistake was made that needed to be fixed.

That is a lot of time at the wheel.

Certainly there is a large number of people who work more than 5 days per week, so if we assume 6 days per week, that is still more than 42.7 years with no break.

I think it is safe to assume that if in fact the poster did checker 20,000 stocks, it was done mechanically.

I am no expert, by quite a long shot, but I would venture a guess that checkering via CNC is quite a bit different than checkering by hand.

Very nice stock and checkering.

Jorgen is confusing incomplete pointed checkering with Best style flat top checkering, where the grooves are not Vee's but square sided channels.

As Duane said it separates the real pros from the rest of the pack. Woof, I say.

quote:

Originally posted by yeti:
Very nice stock and checkering.

Jorgen is confusing incomplete pointed checkering with Best style flat top checkering, where the grooves are not Vee's but square sided channels.

As Duane said it separates the real pros from the rest of the pack. Woof, I say.

After what i can see on the pictures from the small upses where some lines crosses the border, those lines ar normal v shaped

According the numbers of checkered stocks, the calculation are 20 min pr standard riflestocks, 16 lpi, or skipline, with 4 panels. And 45 min for a 2 paneled + a wraparound pannel on the forarms 22 lpi. Those times covers drawing of layout, frame and wheel type cutting.

That avarages 2-3 stocks pr hour 4 hours a day 200 days a year in 10 years.
Hawe been producing riflestocks since 1978, so theoreticaly i have been done nothing sencible for the last 20 years(atleast that is what the boss, my wife tells me constantly )

Today i have become lazy, and almost all our stocks ar fully cnc mashined this includes external shaping, inletting and checkering. And the productiontime is 1 hr of basically unmanned cnc mashining followed by 10-15 min of manual final sanding and oil finish. That for a MtCarlo stock with rose wood forendtip and pistolgrip roset.

Those stocks ar mainly used on our own rifleproductions, or sold in batches as subcontracting.

Our present production is about 3000-6000 riflestocks pr year

New Guy - nice work for a rifle that will be a "kicker" (or get hard work or both !).

I would love to know what the lines per inch count is, and what form of cutter was used (conventional, 60 degree or other).

Many thanks - Foster

Well, at ten CUSTOM stocks per year, guess I'll have to stick around about 2000 years to match the prestigious accomplishments of our Northern expert...really embarassing to be so unaccomplished.

slacker

Wow!
That rifle is going to be so awesome when she's a finished.
I really like what James has done with it.
Did James have the metal too? If so did he have any comments in general about the rifle as a whole?
Thanks for posting this Chris. Quite interesting indeed.
Stu

How many rounds does the magazine hold on that rifle?

Ah, Jørgen...........


20.000 is not an impressing number when it comes to checkering - it just showes it is of poor quality...

quote:

Originally posted by Bent Fossdal:
Ah, Jørgen...........


20.000 is not an impressing number when it comes to checkering - it just showes it is of poor quality...

Hi Bent
That statement is potentialy verry ofending to all those people who has been checkering shotguns and rifles professionaly in the entire industry for decades.
Looking at what the ladies in Suhl was capable of acheving of checkering in about 4-6 minutes pr panel.Not to mention the folks at the old Steyer factory, og Husquarna, or Sauer, or recently Belgium Brownings. The checkering at the top is rather mediocre, but still acceptable.
When somebody tryes to impress a customer by caling a semi finished checkering, with varying linespaces, varying linedepth, and changing angle in the corners, and a few overruns, not to mention the conflicts in the center of the wrap around panel, for a unicque flattop checkering. I ame just starting to wonder.

There is no doubt that ther is a large amount of talent around AR, but i can guaranty you that almost all of these giftet custom gunsmith, could improove both quality and speed indeed, by working a year dooing nothing than checkering miles of standardcheckerings.
After sutch a time more than 90% would be capable of checkering atleast 4 times faster maintaining minimum the same quality

Bent has the bulls eye..The true craftsmen on this forum are not interested in your "minimum quality"...neither are the clients!

Checkering is for girls.....real rifles ain't got no checkerin' y'all!!

quote:

Originally posted by Duane Wiebe:
Bent has the bulls eye..The true craftsmen on this forum are not interested in your "minimum quality"...neither are the clients!

Hi Duane
Quality is a funny thing.
If you look at two different chekerings, not knowing how long it tok to do them, and they are of the same objectiv quality. In my opinion none is bettet because the one is don by a unrutined artist in 2 days, an the other is done by a highly rutined factoryworker in 1hour.

I can guaranty you that the shown checkering would not have passed QC in the manlicherfactory 50 years ago.

I personaly find your responce verry interesting, instead of beginning to think abour improving your buisness you defend the ineficiency, and tryes to convince that long time and limited rutine is better.
It surely is a buissnes tactikal evaluation, telleing how long time it takes, and how dificult a task might be. But improving rutine gives you a better buisness, because you dont ned to pass this knowledge to the customer.
So in that perspective it is unapropriate that i comes up vith some productionstimes from the both current and previus industry.
So if you feel that those informations gives you a hard time, please tell, then i will keep my mouth shut, or join the corus singing beautifully, fantastic, marvolus and a true pice of art, every time anybody posts a picture of an avarage work, made by an smith with limited rutine.

Sometimes we all go further by looking over the fence surounding our own little backyard

If Lance Armstrong had only cykled once a week, i ame rather convinced that he never wonn the Tour De France, no matter how talented he was or what vitamines he ever took .

quote:

Originally posted by jørgen:
So if you feel that those informations gives you a hard time, please tell, then i will keep my mouth shut, or join the corus singing beautifully, fantastic, marvolus and a true pice of art, every time anybody posts a picture of an avarage work, made by an smith with limited rutine.

Having seen Duane's work.....here and in person......I think he's already stepped up to the plate re: checkering. Particularly on this forum.

https://forums.accuratereloading.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/...043/m/347103474/p/15

Perhaps we could see some of your work posted here?