This is alotta work! No wonder there are custom stockmakers making a good living. Jeez.



So I figure out a nice pattern after reading Westbrook, Linden, Worthing and Belk. R. Atkinson put in a few pointers plus J.Ricks. I look over my old Mauser sporter catalogs. I download and save photos of old doubles and bolt-guns. I measure drops at comb and heel. You know, try to get everything.



I finally get it into a plexiglas pattern. Now...getting that into a 3-dimensional shape is just waaaaaay to much work. Bondo on...grind Bondo off. And it STINKS! Especially when it is fresh. I HATE the smell of styrene. The dust gets everywhere too. I have worn out one rasp so far. It just quit cutting. The tips are worn off. I am now using the other, curved side, and sand down the little grooves it makes.



So why am I sniveling? I brush the dust off and set it up, taking the time to get everything nice and level. I run a piece of string down the barrel channel at the mid-bore position and check drops. Cool, right where I want to be. Then I decide to check the cast-off. I want about 3/8's inch (9.25mm). After all this trouble I find I only have 1/8 inch (3.17mm). GGGagagg! Now I have to slather on more of that stinking Bondo. I give up. At least for a couple of days.

has anything you have ever done in your entire life that has been truly worthwhile also been easy?

Im inletting a stock right now, I just do alittle each evening. A little at a time. If I get in to big of hurry wood might be gone from the wrong places.

I inhaled myfill of bondo dust from restorying old cars when I was younger. That plastic cant be good for your lungs. That smell brings back old memorys though.

I did the exact same thing. I even went to several local gunsmiths trying to have a stock fitted to me (largely a waste of our mutual times). I have many assorted pictures, the Wesbrook book, and numerous quips and quotes from Atkinson, Belk, Chic, and other veterans in the clan of the purple hand on this forum...

No wonder a pattern is made. You certainly wouldn't want to go through that type of frustration each and every time you wanted to engineer a rifle stock... I feel it is very difficult to add cast off where there originally was none.

My desire is an open (shotgun) grip English sporter style oval cheek piece design with standard cast off and toe out (3/8ths and 1/4?) set up for iron sights in a standard Mauser inlet. Sounds easy.

I would also like a similar classic pattern for a Pre War Winchester 70 but less British...

Any of you masters care to point us in the right direction or offer some insight???

hi Guys

Isn't it fun to learn? Learning about stock pattern making is not as much fun as learning about the wrong way to sharpen knives, the effects of gravity, or the pain of fire....but it's close!

Seriously, I would ask you folks this question.

Are You going to make more than one of the stocks your tring to come up with? If not, and if your only trying to restock your favorite rifle, I can tell you something that will make your lives easier.
SKIP THE PATTERN AND JUST RESTOCK THE RIFLE!
As your all now aware, pattern making is harder to do than stock making. If your not going to make several of the same kind of rifle, just make the stock. The pattern will only be of use to you if you have access to a panagraph anyway.
I am a full time gunsmith, and I don't have a panagraph. I make almost all my stocks from blanks, and it's really not that hard. The secret is to do all your layout on paper first. If it won't work on paper, it won't work in wood!
Trace your barreled action on a large piece of butcher paper, and then draw the stock you want around it. Get all the dementions correct on the paper (L.O.P. Drop at comb, drop at heel, drop at toe, and pitch) and then carefully cut around the drawing with scissors. Glue it to your wood, and cut it out (outside your line) on a bandsaw. Put on the butt plate/pad,(with cast off if You want. Remember that it is off-set like a spoke on a wheel, not like a stare step!) And the forearm tip at this time. Then, when You put in the guard screws and the magazine, everything else will go in nicely as You inlet it. Do the inletting all in the "square" and then cut off everything on the outside that doesn't look like a rifle.
Yes LOTS of work, but not that hard to do.

The great smell of bondo. Boy does that bring back memories.

Ask John Ricks about the stock pantograph his friend has. There are about 250 patterns that went with that pantograph and I did every one of them.

I will now tell you a secret I came up with making a pattern.

Lots of times I would take the butt section from one pattern (carve it on the machine). Then take the grip and action from another pattern, (Again carve it on the machine).
Then cut an 30 degree notch in the grip area and splice the two together with Acraglass Gel.

This way you can work out the cast off etc, along with the length of the pistol grip. If it was not right just recut and change it and reglass. When you have it were you want it then drill thru the grip lengthwise from the action mortise with an 3/8 drill and glassbed in a 1/4" piece of allthread to reinforce it.

You can do the bulk of the work this way and just have minor bondo work to do.

BTW I used Kiln dried Adler for the pattern wood most of the time, with black walnut sapwood as the back up.

Bondo is fine if you are only going to cut a few of the pattern. One thing about bondo is don't get it wet, it will start to crumble. Otherwise use some type of fiberglass or epoxy in the main inletting areas, or sharp corners such as the grip cap and shawdow lines.

Jim Wisner
Custom Metalsmith

Ohhhhh man...why is it when you get real far into a project...then along comes The Revelation that you could have done it THE EASY WAY! Man!

Ok. Now that I took a time-out I am all better now. I will work to get what I have nice and shapely, then check the drops, cast-off, grip length and feel and then cut and re-glue.

I don't want to do anything to a decent piece of wood until I think I have got it just right.

Thanks for the good suggestions. I was going to go with paper but I wanted to use a plexigas form so I could see the grain under it.

An easy way to build a pattern is to call someone like GAG and have them build you a pattern and then modify it to your tastes with bondo or acraglass or add wood. You can use an existing stock if you have one also. If you go with GAG or someone similar, tell them it is for a pattern and they can use some crap wood that is useless to them and you will get it cheaper. Plexiglass?

What Chic said! Buy a "cheap" semi-inlet and go from there. I have found that it is easier and faster to remove a little more wood than needed and bring it back out with Bondo, than to rasp and sand down the wood. Your mileage may vary! Have fun!