Anyone have a links they can post of video's showing installing an inlay on the stock of a MZ rifle from start to finish. Have searched here and on ALR forum and the web and haven't found one that is great in detail and/or length.
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Installing wood inlays
- Thread starter Crow Choker
- Start date
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These are probably worth a watch. The third is for guitars, but same/same.
Thank you 'Nav'. I'll have to sit and study em later. Did a fast hit and miss through each and look good. I did around 20 years ago add a brass inlay to the rear/top of the headstock of my Takamine 12 string guitar but that was fairly simple. Only had to follow the contours of the upper top of the headstock and pin. Had a local engraver do the engraving on it. Wish I had followed my thoughts back in the mid 70's to do wood and metal engraving but never did. Was in my mid 20's then, now after double cataract surgery and pushing 3/4 of a century age wise, well..........!
I have not watched any of the vids and they might have already said what I am about to but...I have done my fair share of inlaying both wood and metal into pistol grips and rifle stocks so I can relay a few pointers that help me do a clean job.
#1 file a slight taper, very slight, on the piece to be inlaid.
#2 use a very sharp Exacto blade to cut an outline of the area to be removed. Tracing around the piece to be inlaid. If need be, lightly adhere that piece to the stock if you are unable to hold it steady as you trace around it with the Exacto but still putting downward pressure so the inlay doesn't slide around while tracing.
#3 Cut toward the outline with your chisel once you have a nice outline, use your non-chisel holding hand in front of your chisel hand to control the chisel so you won't push too far. I use a narrow straight chisel, beveled side down, and from the inside of the design, about 1/16" inch away from your outline, cut out a chip of wood the width of your chisel. At this stage I am holding the chisel almost straight up, maybe 5 to 10 degree angle. Of course once you have this area cut around the inlay perimeter you will lower the remaining wood inside the perimeter and begin the fitting process in earnest.
#4 Use a transfer agent when putting the inlay into the stock to see where you have to remove wood. For metal I use a commercially available inletting black (you can make your own using grease and powdered marking chalk}. I have used red in the past but they also have blue chalk. For a wood inlay I just use a piece of blackboard chalk. You can get all kinds of colors in "sidewalk chalk" for children. Choose a color that will show up well on the stock.
#5, Keep your chisels extremely sharp. I never use (well OK rarely) scrapers but just chisels.
Hope this helps, I'm sure other have their own ways but this method has worked well for me.
#1 file a slight taper, very slight, on the piece to be inlaid.
#2 use a very sharp Exacto blade to cut an outline of the area to be removed. Tracing around the piece to be inlaid. If need be, lightly adhere that piece to the stock if you are unable to hold it steady as you trace around it with the Exacto but still putting downward pressure so the inlay doesn't slide around while tracing.
#3 Cut toward the outline with your chisel once you have a nice outline, use your non-chisel holding hand in front of your chisel hand to control the chisel so you won't push too far. I use a narrow straight chisel, beveled side down, and from the inside of the design, about 1/16" inch away from your outline, cut out a chip of wood the width of your chisel. At this stage I am holding the chisel almost straight up, maybe 5 to 10 degree angle. Of course once you have this area cut around the inlay perimeter you will lower the remaining wood inside the perimeter and begin the fitting process in earnest.
#4 Use a transfer agent when putting the inlay into the stock to see where you have to remove wood. For metal I use a commercially available inletting black (you can make your own using grease and powdered marking chalk}. I have used red in the past but they also have blue chalk. For a wood inlay I just use a piece of blackboard chalk. You can get all kinds of colors in "sidewalk chalk" for children. Choose a color that will show up well on the stock.
#5, Keep your chisels extremely sharp. I never use (well OK rarely) scrapers but just chisels.
Hope this helps, I'm sure other have their own ways but this method has worked well for me.
Good info Duckman. Question on step #1. Which way is the angle/taper. Visualizing it I can see plus's from doing so with both angles. Thank you.
Good video's Nav. The 1st one with Mike Brooks from NMLA was very informative and showed and answered alot of questions.
Good video's Nav. The 1st one with Mike Brooks from NMLA was very informative and showed and answered alot of questions.
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Crow, you want to make the bottom of the inlay smaller than the top sorta like putting a tapered cork in a test tube. But do keep the taper small, I’d eyeball it at about 5-ish degrees.
It should take a while, in other words, don’t rush it, take off only wood that shows indication of your inletting black or chalk. It the inlay gets tight and hard to get out as you are sinking it, lightly tapping the stock with a soft rubber mallet should cause enough vibration to get the inlay to pop out. Resist the temptation to mallet the inlay in…that could cause you fits getting it out.
Last night I was reading the forum and thought, Hey BillRaby has posted alot of MZ build video's and recalled some posts where he did inlays. Went to Bill's Maryland build post and on parts 59-69 did three inlays on that rifle build. Parts 61-63 even had him showing doing a star inlay on the cheek piece. Very informative. Thank you Bill, yer a scholar and a gentleman and wealth of information. Stayed up until 11:30 PM absorbing his inlay info, was in low gear this morning though getting up at an early hour.
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