Siler Lock Mortice

[Pete G.]

The stock I am looking at is only available as inlet, and that only for the Siler large lock, but I want to use the Chambers early Ketland. It looks to be a little longer fore and aft and about the same in height. The sear arm is a little further to the rear also, which may cause other problems with trigger, guard, etc.  Does anyone know if the Siler Mortice can be modified to fit? I don't mind inletting for a lock, but I absolutely detest inleting a swamped barrel, hence the pre-carve stock. The actual job isn't so bad, but the least little gap shows up every single time the rifle is handled, and that part is hard to live with.

[deano]

Get a barrel  and find someone to inlet it for you without the lock mortice, that will eliminate the nasty barrel inletting task and give you the design freedom you want.  You can probably get the heavy work done to get the butt shaped in the deal too. There have been a number of names mentioned that can do that task on this list in the past.

Ken

[T*O*F]

Pete,
Find out who carves the stocks.  Then call them and request one to your specs.  Whose precarve are you looking to buy?

For instance, if it's a stock offered by TOTW, chances are that it was carved by Pecatonica.  You could then call Pecatonica direct and have them carve you one, and probably avoid the TOTW upcharge in the process.  They carve stocks for a lot of people offering kits.

Same applies to those who only sell gunstocks......Jack Garner, Tiger Hunt, etc.  Call them direct.

[Pete G.]

Thanks for the idea, Dave. I've got Pecatonica's catalog and they state that they cannot do a swamped barrell, but I suspect that the printing is several years old. I guess in the internet age we sometimes forget that we can just pick up the phone and actually talk with a real live person, sometimes, even the guy doing the work

[G-Man]

Pecatonica will do swamped barrels on many of their patterns - or at least they did as of about a year or so ago, for an additional fee.  The lock may be another story - you can have them leave the mortice non-inlet and leave as much wood as possible around the lock mortice. They are good about working with you on that stuff.

The Early Ketland will move your sear back a bit from where it would sit if you use a Siler - I don't know exactly how much but think it is at least 1/4 inch, maybe even 3/8.   So you you would want to have them leave the triggers, guard, and sideplate uninlet as well if that is the way you want to go.

Keep in mind - when you start moving things around, the stock needs to be adjusted.  If you move a lock back, the triggers move back, and thus the pull becomes shorter; the cheekpiece ends up moving a bit, etc. So the more wood you can have them leave for you to work with, the better.

On the other hand, if your stock is already set up with inlets, you can do some cosmetic things to a Siler to change the look a bit without changing the plate shape. 

Good luck

Guy

[flehto]

Buy a blank, send it  and the swamped bbl to Fred miller or David Rase or others that do bbl and RR inletting and inlet the lock of your choice. Seems the simple way to eliminate your problem....Fred