wow precarves are a bargain

[fusil de chase]

Not sure if it is the thinking or the cutting but after 8 hours I can't help but think precarve stocks are a bargain. LOL.

Mistakes galore but it mounts and points like a dream even without any cast.

10% shaped:

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[jamesthomas]

Its looking good so far :thumbsup: . The people who work from a blank have always had my utmost admiration :bow: .

 

[kaintuck]

carving from a blank is a sickness....and there's NO 10 step cure :youcrazy:
it's begins with "I just want to make one for myself"....then a friend says..."hey, i'd like one of those, I'll pay you!"...then you see a couple of shows and the bug bites deep....you want to make these beautiful sweeping long guns, with all the patch boxes, and carvings...then a iron southern riffle is a nice contrast...then again, the octagon to round with the wedding bands....and on and on.....

and i call my kat crazy..... :youcrazy:

 

[kaintuck]

and the muscles you get from 10,000 strokes of the rasps and files!!!! :grin:

 

[tenngun]

Done more then one from a blank, with channel and ramrod grove cut and more then one from a precarved. You get less stock shape choice from a precarved, but it saves you 20-40 hour grunt work. The precarved still gives you lots of do it your self satisfaction. I cant say I'm pouder of my blanks then I am of my precarved, nor can I say one or the other had more or less mistakes or "should have dones",Yours is looking good...BE PROUD

 

[duelist1954]

It really looks good. I don't have the skill or the equipment to work from a blank...mostly it's the skill I don't have. :bow:

 

[Terry Fairchild]

I was bitten by the " blackpowder sickness" a year ago and have gone from 1 used CVA perc. Hawken to 21 of the stinkin things!
I just recently bought two unfinished Kentuckys and have finished one and am currently working on the other.
I have been thinking about making a stock from some air dried, 2" cherry planks that I have. I have a fully equipped wood shop( hobby) with a 17" band saw that I would use to rough the blank out.
Two questions:1) Is cherry OK for a stock?
2) I have a Bridgeport mill, would that work for the barrel, trigger and lock in letting? I'm thinking it would, but what methods are used by folks that don't have this equipment?

 

[kaintuck]

Cherry can be very nice.....or a nightmare, done 2. Sometimes they have soft areas....take chance....go for it!

And for all us other guys...w/o a lot of shop equipment?
LOTS of rasps and files.....chisels, a few different saws....planes, and my Shinto rasp...! :grin:

And a smart shop kat.... :youcrazy:

 

[fusil de chase]

Just thought I 'd add a note that I learned about rasps. Don't buy cheap ones! I bought a middle of the road new one to do this shaping with and after 10 mins threw it in the bottom drawer and dug out my Lee valley tools rasp that has built 3 boats, 6 oars and cut more then it's share of stuff rasps aint suppose to. Still cuts clean and efficient.

Band saw and a milling machine! oh boy do I ever wish I had a BP interested nieghbour with that tooling LOL. Skies the limit for you.

It is worth doing at least one blank, despite all the reading and hand holding on here I did not fully understand how these things are suppose to go togther and why untill I started trying to get the wood behind the barrel flats and the wrist etc to flow. Sure wish I had taken the advice I got on here (flehto) and lowered my lock a hair

 

[MSW]

a Bridgeport?! I wanna hang with you!

don't really a mill for ML work (IMHO) but it would be a cool tool to have handy ...