Eddystone M1917 Stock Warp Issue

[Hcompton79]

Well, I went ahead and cut the stock, and the end result came out perfectly.

I made sure to take out as little wood as possible with the cut and then trued up the cut ends to make them as square as possible. I went ahead and fabricated a shim, as I realized in addition to the barrel band retaining pin moving, taking a bit of wood off the forend could cause issues with the attachment of a bayonet. I modified the thickness of the shim in order to change the angle and thus where the tip of the stock touches the barrel.

I reattached everything with acraglas and drilled out and installed a several inch length of 1/4-20 threaded rod for strength. I used the barreled action as a jig to hold everything together while the epoxy set up, with a shim under the chamber end of the barrel to make the muzzle end a bit higher so that when reassembled normally the stock will put up pressure on the barrel.

After letting it setup overnight under the heat of a lamp, everything lines up correctly now . I did have to remove a small bit of wood from the inside of the forend on the right side near where the joint was made, and now there is no contact from the action to the muzzle except for at the tip where I probably have 3-4lb of pressure pushing up on the barrel, and its centered.

The joint is barely noticeable and will be hidden under the barrel band anyway:Attachment 96440

Now I do have one question, with the rifle set up now, when the nose cap/front barrel band is on the stock it pulls the barrel firmly against the forend and there is no play. Is this how these rifles are designed to be set up or should it be more like a no.4 lee enfield where there is a bit of play in the barrel but it comes to rest against the top of the stock due to the up pressure?