Cutting Stocks for the Right Length of Pull

[Sharps40]

I and my wife need our length of pull just under 13". Her at 12 3/4" and me at about 12 7/8". I trim all our rifles to a more suitable LOP so that it fits us, mounts quickly and smoothly and repeatedly and I never have to fiddle with extended rings to bring a scope back and we no longer have to crawl up the stock to use the highest power settings. It fits.

Measuring the Uberti High Wall Big Game rifle stock indicated it had parallel sides and so, chopping off 5/8" would give me a right length and only a need to refit the pad at the toe and heel. Don't often get that lucky.

But here we go. Total time invested is one hour.

Factory length of pull is just over 13 5/8" and thats 5/8 to 7/8 too long for me and GoodWife.



When finished, we'll be 12 15/16" and a totally gooder feel, faster more stable mount and no matter what the scope power setting, its there, no moving my head.

 

[Sharps40]

Remove the recoil pad.

Measure and mark the sprayed urethane finish on the stock. The line, along with a sharp fine blade, helps prevent chips.

 

[Sharps40]

Shim the stock up so the butt is parallel to the blade, shim the backbone of the stock so the blade follows the scribe line from top to bottom, grab it in hand, watch yer fingers, and cut the end off smooth and easy with a fine carbide blade. Cut real close to the line but not on it. You can still see the scribe line in the photo.

 

[Sharps40]

Over to the sanding belt and carefully sand the stock to the line, split the line.....half gone all the way around and you know its flat and true and your are done.

Seal the butt with some fast drying urethane or what ever finish you like.

 

[Sharps40]

You may need to redrill buttpad holes. As you cut off the stock and move the pad forward, you often find the pad needs to go up or down a bit. This one went up and i split the difference top and bottom to get the best fit of the pads sides to the stocks sides.

Mark new hole locations and drill one, mount the pad, mark the second hole and drill it. Run screws in with some Vasoline for lube to keep from splitting the wood and use a bit of Vasoline on the screw head and driver shank to keep from shredding the butt pad.

 

[J R Green]

Excellent. How did you determine what your ideal LOP was though?

 

[Sharps40]

With a sharp scribe, i use a fleshette (got more than a few laying around and they are plenty sharp), scribe a line on the buttpad that shows what you need to grind off.

Remove the butt pad and freehand grind slowly over on the bench sander. Finish polishing edges by hand and buff up with some 0000 steel wool.

 

[Sharps40]

Done is done. Ready to to be carried and used and even snapped up for shooting in the deer woods, and that it will!

 

[Sharps40]

Excellent. How did you determine what your ideal LOP was though?

Cut them off a bit longer than the common formulas called for, shot them a lot from all positions other than the bench cause there aint no bench in the woods, Trimmed then a touch, kept practicing mounting them on a snap-too for 50 yard shots offhand at a 4" steel. When I could snap that first one up eyes closed, open my eye and the crosshairs were right there and crisp/clear, I figured 12 7/8" was right for me. GoodWife likes hers a touch shorter, 12 3/4 gets her shooting straight.

 

[Sharps40]

Anyway, unless you are a big or tall person, 95% of rifles and shotguns on the market need to be trimmed in LOP to fit you. Somehow the world thinks that most men have monkey arms that drag knuckles on the ground and need a really long stock. Must be all men hating femals in the design department to figure the stock design for an average male has to be long enough for an ape..

 

[Schattenreiter]

That must be some blade to cut that smooth on a chop saw. Nice work.

 

[Sharps40]

Id have to check. Its from lowes. Don't think its a medium, not quite a fine. But good sharp carbide. I've not cut aluminum stock with it yet so it ain't dulled up!

 

[Schattenreiter]

I guess a chop saw works better than a band saw would. Gives a straight cut instead of a wavy one.

 

[Sharps40]

Got out on the range with round ball today. No recoil so easier to see changes in POI. As expected, a shift from dead on to elsewhere, in this case, slightly high and a touch right. No worries, I'll double check with the full power load and the project will be completed.