Progress on New Stock

[ArtS]

I received the duplicated stock and fore arm from Dan Rossiter on Monday evening. This is for the 10 Gauge grade 3 lifter with Parker laminate barrels which I recently bought. Total time in Dan's shop was 4 days, but shipping and weekends ate up another 2-1/2 weeks. Dan did a great job considering what he had to start with. The new stock wood came from a blank I got years ago from Luxus Arms during a truckload sale.

I managed to get the stock headed up yesterday and trimmed the surfaces down to the action close enough to start inletting the sidelocks.

The first two pictures show the stock on the gun as purchased. It was a train wreck. (The fore end was the original high grade wood). It was not for the gun and had been cobbled to bolt on. It barely fit on the gun and was lopsided in two or three places. They had ground the original skeleton butt plate on one side to the point it appears unuseable. When I removed it, the head fell apart into four pieces. It was so oil soaked that glue wouldn't stick, even after a mineral spirits and an acetone soak. The third picture is the pattern I eventually made from it. I tried gluing and glass bedding and nothing held long enough to bed it, so I plugged everything solid except the top tang and trigger plate inlets and glassed those in. I then dammed them up and poured a solid bottom in the lock recesses 1/4" thick to give it enough strength to stand up to the duplication. I didn't have any attachment holes inlet so I could drill those myself. I built up the outside in several places around the locks, butt and grip with wood and Bondo to give enough volume to end up where I wanted.

The last three pictures are of the stock headed up and leveled down around the action close enough to start inletting the sidelocks. I want to have the stocks shaped and finished when I get the barrels back. I will have the checkering done last.

I don't really know why the metal looks so funky unless it's caused by the flash. The metalwork is actually pretty smooth and has quite a bit of the case color remaining,although faded.

[GH-16]

This project is coming along nicely! Thanks for sharing it and keep us posted as things progress with it.

[charlie cleveland]

looking good....charlie