Wooden under-rib questions....

[GANGGREEN]

I purchased a Jonathan Browning mountain rifle and it's missing the under-rib and pipes.  Now, if anyone happens to have the appropriate rib lying in a closet and they'd like to get rid of it, I'm your man.  I've considered just purchasing an after-market rib and pipes from one of the suppliers and soldering or screwing it on, but someone suggested a wood under-rib and I like the idea.  Obviously it won't be like the other Browning rifles that were made and I'm not too sure about historical accuracy, but I like the idea.

I looked for a tutorial here and can't find one.  I'm not really concerned about the job, it doesn't seem difficult but I want it to look right and I'm curious about a few things.  First of all, assuming the under-rib is square and the width of the bottom barrel flat, I'd either need to cut in dovetails perfectly (I'm not scared to do dovetails, but mine are rarely perfect) and re-blue the barrel or I'll need to stake the tenons in, which is also something I've not done before (still not scared to do it, I just want to make sure that I'm thinking clearly before I start drilling holes in the barrel).   Am I making sense or does the wooden rib actually go up the diagonal flats to cover the dovetails (which makes the rib itself a lot more difficult to make, at least for me).

Secondly, assuming that my assumption is true and that the rib is square all around (of the appropriate depth to accommodate the pipes and the entry thimble), is it safe to assume that it will really lie flat on the bottom barrel flat and that no gap will be visible underneath after it's pinned to the tenons?   Or, do you put something on the wood before clamping it and pinning it (I don't even know what, something gummy that hardens up like JB Weld, wood putty or something)?

I'm also considering doing a halfstock TN rifle one of these days and I'd like to do a wooden under-rib and poured pewter end cap on it, so I'd like to know the proper way to attack this.   I'm not even sure whose rifle this is, but I saw it online once and saved it to my computer because I liked it so well and wanted to refer to it later.  If anyone does know the builder or has other examples, I'd love to see them.   Here's the photo that I'm referring to.

[Pukka Bundook]

I once Thought about a wooden under-rib, but have never seen an original made that way, so steered clear.
I'd be interested to know if there ever was such an animal, but never seen one myself!

Best,
Richard.

PS, if you use a normal metal under-rib, hog it out on the inside if it's made solid.  They should not add much weight at all to a barrel.

[GANGGREEN]

I see that MBS sells a "hollow" under-rib, which I presume could be soldered on an octagonal barrel, but I'm not sure.

[Hungry Horse]

 The Gun Works in Springfield Oregon sells solid underribs.

  Hungry Horse

[Hungry Horse]

Most of the wooden underribs I’ve seen are on rifles that began life as a full stock but suffered some forearm damage in later life. I do seem to remember examining a 3/4 stocked Tennessee mountain rifle years ago that appeared to have been built with a wooden underrib.

Hungry Horse

[smokinbuck]

Over the years I have seen a few wooden under ribs. Few and far between.

[GANGGREEN]

I'm not bothered by the fact that a wood under-rib may have been uncommon.  The fact that it was done is good enough for me.  I'm more curious if my presumption about the rib being square and of the same width as the bottom barrel flat is accurate.   As I said, I'm inclined to do it on this Browning mountain rifle because it needs repaired, but I also have a couple of really nice curly ash and curly maple halfstock blanks that I may do it on as well.

[Kevin Houlihan]

  Wooden under ribs were not uncommon in New England.  I've seen quite a few half stock percussion rifles with wood ribs and at least one flint half stock with a wood rib.  The ones I've seen had dovetailed underlugs and the rib was pinned.  It sort of looks like a full stock with the sides missing. Look close at the rib on the rifle in the link and you can see the rib pinned just like you'ld pin a full stock.
http://contemporarymakers.blogspot.com/2009/03/worcester-countynew-england-antique.html
Kevin

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

I doubt that a wooden rib was ever added to a plains/mountain rifle, always leaning toward the hollow sheet metal rib.  But don't let that slow you down...the Browning Mt. rifle is not historically correct anyway, so the sky's the limit.

The Browning rifles have faily heavy barrels so a staked tenon system would work out fine...no visible dovetails and no need to re-finish the barrel.  Use fur or five tenons so that the rib gets lots of support, sucking it up to the barrel and avoiding gaps.  I've only made a couple of these, and have always made them the same shape as a metal rib, ie, tapered from the barrel to the rod groove.  I used curly maple so the figure amplified the fact that the rib was wooden.  Set the rod pipes into the rib just like you'd do them in a fullstocked rifle.

When drilling the barrel for the feet of the tenons, be sure to set up your drill press with a stop on the quill...don't want to make a flute out of that barrel.

[T*O*F]

Original smoothbored, wood rib.

[GANGGREEN]

Thanks for all of the help and good point regarding the Browning mountain rifle not being HC as is.   The one thing I didn't account for was 4 or 5 staked tenons, but that certainly makes sense.  I laid in bed last night wondering how to avoid a small gap at spots along that length and I'm sure this would accomplish that.   I'll also have to think on this to decide how to taper the rib from barrel to rod groove, but I'm sure there are several options for that. 

[Daryl]

Couple wooden under ribs.



Seems to me I used a piece of oak on this one, iirc.

[Gaeckle]

I have an old antique barrel with a wooden underrib on it

[galudwig]

I picked up this little rifle from an online auction back in June of this year.  It was billed as a half stock "Tennessee Style" rifle. However, the simple iron trigger guard was real similar to that found on a full stock rifle built by David Sheets of Miami Co., Ohio. I thought the gun was pretty cool overall, so I bid on it and won it.

When I picked up the rifle, I was surprised to find that it had a wooden under rib. The rib was very well made; complete with a groove on the bottom for the ramrod to lie in and two simple iron pipes to hold it. These are inletted flush with and pinned into the under rib. The under rib is in turn pinned to barrel tenons that are dovetailed into the bottom of the barrel. No attempt was made to move the tenons to equidistant spots on the barrel to accommodate the under rib. The barrel is slightly swamped, so it is possible that it had been shortened at some point and the rib was attach to whatever tenons were still available.

I had a very knowledgeable gun maker look at this rifle and he believes that the rifle was once full stocked. The under rib does not appear to be recent restoration attempt either. It has been in place for quite some time and has aged along with the rifle. I'm not sure what wood was used for the rib. It looks like it  was painted a dark color though to approximate the color of the barrel, instead of stained and finished to match the stock. I like to think that this was a period gunsmith repair to a damaged, but otherwise sound rifle owned by a man of modest means. Who knows when the wooden under rib was added, but whoever did it did a pretty decent job of it.

[Robby]

Pukka, Where I live, half stocks are about fifty fifty, steel or wood under ribbed, all original.
Robby

[PrairieD]

Sometime in the past couple of years, Cades Cove Fiddler posted some shots of a wood rib half stock rifle-- complete with splits where the pins went thru the rib...
I believe the consensus was the rib was a piece of Hickory...
Mike C.

[Pukka Bundook]

Robby,

Thank you for that!

I had never seen one anywhere.

[alacran]

I put one a Hawken spare barrel to save weight. I made it out of hickory, put a slight taper on the sides and rounded the  groove. pinned the thimbles. Attached to barrel with 4 5/40 machine screws. The barrel was already browned so I sanded the browning off that flat and also epoxied the rib to barrel. I figured that the epoxy would keep it tight against barrel, and keep junk from getting under it.
The wood rib and thimbles weighed a total of two ounces, which was eight ounces lighter than the solid under rib that was on it.
All together it worked rather well.
Now I've decided to build a whole rifle around that barrel, and will replace it with a hollow under rib from MLBS.

[satwel]

  Wooden under ribs were not uncommon in New England.  I've seen quite a few half stock percussion rifles with wood ribs and at least one flint half stock with a wood rib.  The ones I've seen had dovetailed underlugs and the rib was pinned.

Kevin is right on the money. A friend of mine was commissioned by the museum at Old Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts to build a classic New England style half stock flintlock rifle to use for live fire demos. He stopped by my house with the finished rifle before he delivered it to the museum. He used a straight-grained piece of ash for the rib and stained it to match the cherry stock. The top of the wooden rib was the width of the bottom flat of the barrel (a straight sided 15/16" Green Mountain in .54) and tapered slightly along the bottom edge. It was pinned to dovetailed underlugs just as a full stock would be. The tabs of the ramrod thimbles were inlet into the wooden rib and pinned as on a full stock rifle.

I had seen custom-made halfstock rifles with wooden ribs at NMLRA territorial matches but I never had the opportunity to examine one up close to see how the rib and thimbles were attached. My friend did a masterful job. He added some silver wire inlay around the tang and checkered the wrist. It looked like it had just come out of Silas Allen's workshop. 

[okieboy]

Galudwig, not certain, but that gun looks very similar to one that I put a wooden under-rib on in the late 1970s.

[GANGGREEN]

Probably a dumb question, but how do you put the radius on the ramrod side, with a rat-tail file?   Would be nice if I had one that was offset slightly, but I don't.

[okieboy]

 I took a 3/8" diameter round file, ground away the tang end up to where the teeth were, then heated the small end with a torch and bent it 90 degrees to make a handle. I wrapped the handle part to make it easier on my hands. Makes a useful tool.

[Gaeckle]

Probably a dumb question, but how do you put the radius on the ramrod side, with a rat-tail file?   Would be nice if I had one that was offset slightly, but I don't.

Easier to use a small radius molding plane. Cut the groove in a piece of square stock, then shape the sides, that's what I would think

[GANGGREEN]

Unfortunately, I don't have a radius moulding plane, but yeah, that does sound like a simpler operation.

[ScottH]

If I was going to try and make a wood under rib. I think I would build a jig for my router and use a round bottom groove bit and cut a blank with a groove for the ramrod, and them trim away the excess from the blank using a table saw until I got pretty close to dimension I wanted then finish it up with hand tools.