RCS,

Your 218 Bee Martini is absolutely beautiful. I'll be thrilled if my rifle turns out half as nicely as yours. That wood is stunning - very nice job.

I think I understand what you're talking about regarding milling the tang slots. Someone suggested to me I use a cheap piece of wood to test fit to the receiver. I looked in my garage an found an old piece of pressure-treated 2 by 6. I milled the slots as you suggested, however, I did not put enough time and planning into the wood-to-metal fit. The results look sloppy. However, at least I can now shoulder the rifle and get a feeling if the comb is too high. I roughly copied the stock shape on my son's Henry 22 lever action rifle.







Pretty ugly huh? Have you ever seen a rifle with a stock made out of a 2 by 6? One of the things that makes the inleting tricky for me is that both the upper and lower receiver tangs are tapered. I got fed up with this and milled the upper tang to remove the taper, and I'll do the same to the lower tang. The reasoning here is to make the stock inleting easier for me.


Mr. Skeels,

That's a very generous offer you made me, however, I really don't want to destroy your stock. That's a piece of history. It was very kind of you to offer it to me - thank you. I think the 2 by 6 stock is working okay as a rough template. I may even inlet another piece of 2 by 6 as practice before I move on to the final claro walnut blank.

Thank you again for the help!

Dave