Please Help out!

Please Support Our Sponsors

It's that time again.

6 posts / 0 new
Last post
BigStick
BigStick's picture
It's that time again.

Stocks.
Shape? Material? Form and function? Bedding? Pillars?
Who's going to start?
Kim

wally289
wally289's picture
I’ll have a go

I’ll have a go I have been making my own timber stocks for quite some time I have used north Queensland maple strong good coulor nice grain and reasonably light compared to some I have also made one of a laminated timber just bits of thin ply I had laying around although it came out good it was a little heavy some have been for offhand shooting I have only made 2 in a bench rest style along the lines of a McMillan stock but with my center fire these were too heavy so I ended up buying a carbon fiber stock for lightness and was able to make weight of 6.123 kg for heavy bench rest I will be looking at making one of these soon as for style I prefer a straight pull type stock as they seem to sit on the rest and bags better and lower

My way of doing things
Wally

Wombat

ozeboy
ozeboy's picture
I'll have a go.

Have a go wally289, you'l get more satisfaction shooting your own gear than spending 7 grand on a USA job.
Bear in mind that commercially made products need to be made at a profit. I still make carbon stocks for myself even though I get a bad reaction to epoxies. I use multi layers of unidirectional carbon while the commercial stocks use one layer of twill over timber. There is about 1/4 meter of carbon in the USA and local clones which costs around $20 plus the timber and resin brings the material cost up to around $80. I put around $400 worth of carbon in a stock so they will never become a commercial proposition. Now I don't have access to the company Lab so recently tested a stock by running the back wheels of my Falcon Waggon over it and I could still use that stock. One could ask how strong and stiff has a stock to be.
I just made an F class stock at 3lb with nearly 4 meters of carbon on it. At $85 a meter it's not worthwhile except if you want the very best.
You definately need to have a go in timber, end grain is so stiff and strong. If I were to get back into building with timber I'd laminate 3/16 thick sheets end grain vertically through the timber laminate. Just a thought to get you thinking outside the box. I really like to see new ideas which brings me to the guy who thought of making a block of unidirectional carbon and milling it to shape. Sounds like a good idea but fails my test because joining two pieces of cured epoxy composite together never bonds well.

mushroom

ozeboy
ozeboy's picture
I'll have a go.

Have a go wally289, you'l get more satisfaction shooting your own gear than spending 7 grand on a USA job.
Bear in mind that commercially made products need to be made at a profit. I still make carbon stocks for myself even though I get a bad reaction to epoxies. I use multi layers of unidirectional carbon while the commercial stocks use one layer of twill over timber. There is about 1/4 meter of carbon in the USA and local clones which costs around $20 plus the timber and resin brings the material cost up to around $80. I put around $400 worth of carbon in a stock so they will never become a commercial proposition. Now I don't have access to the company Lab so recently tested a stock by running the back wheels of my Falcon Waggon over it and I could still use that stock. One could ask how strong and stiff has a stock to be.
I just made an F class stock at 3lb with nearly 4 meters of carbon on it. At $85 a meter it's not worthwhile except if you want the very best.
You definately need to have a go in timber, end grain is so stiff and strong. If I were to get back into building with timber I'd laminate 3/16 thick sheets end grain vertically through the timber laminate. Just a thought to get you thinking outside the box. I really like to see new ideas which brings me to the guy who thought of making a block of unidirectional carbon and milling it to shape. Sounds like a good idea but fails my test because joining two pieces of cured epoxy composite together never bonds well.

mushroom

wally289
wally289's picture
satisfaction making your own

Ozeboy thanks for the encouragement and you are right you get something out of doing for yourself if you take your time it can be done I have made one out of fiber glass and have been told that carbon fiber is similar to work with the glass one I made a skeleton out of foam shaping it the way I wanted it then shaved some more off to allow for the glass I first covered it with a matting called tissue paper this made it ridged ready for the glass matting I managed to get it fairly good with no air bubbles was not sure what to do around the action area so I in let this again shaving more out then used the tissue paper to strengthen this up as I was only putting a 22 into it this was not a big issue but the finished product could have held a baby howitzer but looked the part and made weight with the carbon you say use a timber skeleton would this be of the balsa type as this would keep weight down
Again thank for the advice and I will give it a go sometime soon I’ll let you know then how I get on with it as lots to do at moment

Wally

Wombat

ozeboy
ozeboy's picture
It's that time again

My post was a bit jumbled up as I was looking after two of my daughters 5 month old dogs trying to eat the furniture etc while typing. The point I wanted to make was there are commercial products and the over the top ones you make yourself. Commercially appearance is everything if it looks like crap then it is crap. However when checking a new mould the first two pulls usually produce far less than perfect results. By #3 pull I'm getting as good a finish as 4 and 5 layers of Uni Directional will allow. The first two stocks are given away to people who I consider worthwhile as there is nothing wrong with with the inner construction. They just have to have the inner fortitude to finish them. I have seen the look on faces when I show these stocks, shooters think I've lost it. You know what, "I don't care" , by #3 pull they are just about as good as can be made with all the layers of Unidirectional carbon. Wally to help you a little more try for a resin to carbon ratio of around 50 50 by weight, any drier they will be weak and wetter they will be heavy. Try to keep away from crimped carbon fibre, I won't use it because it's not stiff enough. It's used a lot where appearance is paramount and the system used just won't handle Unidirectional, just about every stock is made this way.
How good is carbon! Its the stiffest strongest lightest composite known, best used without other inclusions like timber and aluminium.
Take a look on Google at "Steel tail shaft verses Carbon tail shaft". This is only one test of the many we used to do in the Lab where I worked over years.

mushroom

Log in or register to post comments