Basic gunstock inletting

[SimplyMichael]

Basic stock inletting for a .22

An ideal blank has wild feather crotch on the butt but the grain magically becomes almost straight but flows up straight through the wrist and parallel to the barel both from the side and from,the,top. Now on a .22 its not so critical but on a heavy recoiling rifle the wrist,is,super,important and if its meant,to be super accurate, the,forend having straight grain is important. Now, if you are buying a blank (ebay is bad, they are all green) you can call a stock place and tell them you want pretty but its for a .22 and,you dont mind,if,the,grain runs off at the wrist and,you can,sometimes get a deal that way.

Joint the right side of the the blank flat and then join,the top at a perfect 90° .

Now mark a layout line down the length of the stock. It doesnt have to be centered but it needs to leave enough meat on both sides which is why most people drawn it down,tas close to the center as they can. If you have a planer, thin it down to the widthe of the widest poetion of your,stock plus a bit extra.

Okay, now layout your holes for the action. Mark them on the top and the side and write on each line what its for...trust me!

For common actions like mausers stockmakers have fancy extra long action screws that help in any number of ways but this is for the typical round reciever 22.

Here is why joining the sides and top flat is so important. It allows you to use a router or a table saw to speed up the inletting. At the front of the stock your centerline on the top of the blank you then draw a half circle to match the barrel diameter. You can then take lots of small cuts to sneak up on the radius. Leave it a bit oversize. You can hog away a bit roughly and crudely everywhere BUT the sides and front as those are the only areas you see.

Since the reciever is ususually about 1/8 bigger than the barrel, same thing, hog out the underside but do careful work on the edges and rear..

Its easiest if you pop the sights off so you can inlet using the top of the action but once you are ready to drill the action holes you wedge it in your vise keeping the right side perfectly verticle. Most .22s are pretty forgiving about stock scew holes but if you blow it, just drill a bigger hole, glue in a dowel and start over.

Now you can cut to your profile and start shaoing but the inletting is done first.
Also, this company has a ton of blem stocks $5! CHEAP , good for http://www.gunstocksinc.com/web_pages/Odds-n-Ends.htm projects, call em and they might have a perfect piece.

[tree-ratsniper]

A milling machine doesn't hurt either...

[SwissArmyKnife]

The problem with the Romanian M-69 trainer I've got is it only has one action screw. So, since the current inletting is so rough, it pivots left and right slightly in the stock. The only decent remedy for this would be to weld a tang on the rear of the action to drill/tap another action screw. Since I'll be doing so much work anyway I might as well draw up schematics for that too.
How much different is stockmaking by hand with laminate blanks? Since the grain changes about 90 degrees between layers, I imagine it makes carving difficult.

[SimplyMichael]

You can tighten up the old stock by adding paper shims in the places its loose. Those rifles are a good gun for cheap and anyone who doesn't buy a few will regret it!

As for laminate, its not the grain direction that is going to frustrate you its the resin they use to glue and impregnate the wood with. Its hard on tools and is likely to frustrate you. What hand and power tools do you have available?

[SimplyMichael]

As someone who has owned a few pantagraph machines and even done work on high speed Italian and CNC duplicators and they are far from magic. Until you build one on a par of a "Don Allen" with lineaer bearings and spend about $10,000 it is VASTLY easier and faster to inlet a stock by hand.

A stock roughed out by a router will still require all the same tools you need to finish it anyway. If you go to any serious stock.manufacturer, they will have a pile of rejects. The cutter slipped out of the collet, the wood slipped on the indexer, the wood grain wasnt perfect and that 24,000 rpm cutter cracked the wood, etc.

The price most production companies charge for a roughed out stock.is less than many could buy the wood for. Some companies offer "dtop on fit" which means all you have to do is a tiny bit if fitting and then all the sanding and finish work. If you can find someone making the wood you want its often the best way to go.

However, not all stocks are available and inletting a .22 especially simple ones is pretty easy.

[SwissArmyKnife]

You can tighten up the old stock by adding paper shims in the places its loose. Those rifles are a good gun for cheap and anyone who doesn't buy a few will regret it!

As for laminate, its not the grain direction that is going to frustrate you its the resin they use to glue and impregnate the wood with. Its hard on tools and is likely to frustrate you. What hand and power tools do you have available?

Craftsman rotary tool with flexible pencil attachment, drill press, craftsman cordless kit - drill/sawzall/circular saw, no dedicated woodworking tools or knives.
I might try the paper shims, that and some wood glue could make a shim harder than the original wood.
I've been looking at getting a milling vice attachments for my drill press. That may allow me to do some of the inletting. I've been wanting one anyway for small machining work.

Thanks about the heads up on factory seconds, I'd never thought of that.