Building a Muzzleloader - Sanding the Stock - Initial Sanding

More of this Course • Page One: Intro • Page Two: Fitting the Buttplate • Page Three: Fitting the Lock • Page Four: Fitting Barrel to Tang • Page Five: Fitting Barrel and Tang to Stock • Page Six: Installing Trigger Assembly • Page Seven: Polishing and Fitting the Nose Cap • Page Eight: Polishing and Fitting the Trigger Guard • Page Nine: Fitting the Sights • Page Ten: Inletting for Wedge Pin Plates • Page Eleven: Sanding the Stock - Initial Sanding • Page Twelve: Final Sanding & Patchbox • Page Thirteen: Staining the Stock • Page Fourteen: Polishing and Bluing • Page Fifteen: Finishing the Stock • Page Sixteen: The Tools I Used • Page Seventeen: Conclusion

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I'll tell much of the story with photographs, so each page may be a bit slow to load. Click on any photo for a larger image.

Sanding the stock for this muzzleloading rifle was tedious to say the least, but it was necessary and I found the results to be quite rewarding. One advantage of starting with a rough chunk of wood is that you can shape it as you wish, avoiding what I consider to be flaws in the methods of many gun manufacturers.

While sharp wood edges are desirable in most cases where wood meets metal, they have no place anywhere else on a gun stock. Sharp outside edges don't look good to me, and they are the first places to show wear or to get dinged. Plus, they just don't feel right. Rounded edges create smooth, warm lines on a stock, rather than the harsh lines that sharp edges produce.

I started the sanding with the buttplate, nose cap, and tang in place. I would have liked to have had the patchbox installed also, but since I was missing the lid and CVA's service left a lot to be desired, I didn't receive a replacement patchbox until a full two weeks after starting this project (and I had to order the parts from another company -- CVA doesn't even stock parts for their own guns).

I had to place the original patchbox, sans lid, in the inlet when sanding the butt of that side of the stock, to keep from rounding the edge of the inlet, and I had to put off sanding the right side of the buttstock, except for the pistol grip area and the butt, until the patchbox arrived.

Initial shaping and sanding was done with a four-in-hand rasp and 100 grit sandpaper. Sanding on all flat surfaces was done with wood blocks, to prevent low spots and to keep things even when working in areas where metal and wood meet. All sanding was done with the grain, of course.

Here's the stock as it came from the factory. Clicking through to the larger image will give you a better idea of what I had to work with.

This shows how much wood I needed to remove from the butt area after installing the buttplate, and the fit after initial sanding. The different coloration is due to varied lighting conditions.

This illustrates how much wood needed to be removed in the area of the nose cap.

The rasp was especially handy for taking out high spots much more quickly than sandpaper could have, but a light touch is necessary -- it's easy to gouge the wood deeply if you're not careful. Though the four-in-hand design provides both coarse and extra-coarse rasps in both flat and half-round, I didn't use the extra-coarse at all. The coarse did just fine, and the rougher surface would have been too much for the minor shaping I had to do.

Here's the cheekrest before I did much work on it. Notice that the flutes haven't been cut.

After initial shaping and sanding with 100 and 120 grit sandpaper. Still no flutes. Notice that by now I have the wood worked down to the buttplate, so the sandpaper's working on that, too.

After cutting flutes and sanding with 220 grit paper.

I also used the rasp in forming the flutes at the wrist of the stock. I made these fairly shallow, just deep enough to fit my hand properly. I took my time as always, and made sure that the right and left flutes were as even as I could make them. I didn't want to make them too deep or exaggerated, because I dislike overdone stocks as much as I do sharp corners. Plus I didn't want to cut into the cheekrest unnecessarily and thus spoil the looks of the stock.

This shows the bottom of the stock before working it.

After initial sanding, I've rounded the sharp edges. Getting rid of the high and low spots left by the rough shaping equipment was a challenge throughout the initial sanding.

Left side of stock before working it...

...And after sanding was complete.

Right side before sanding.

Right side after all sanding.

Top of stock before any sanding.

Closer view of top, before sanding.

After initial sanding with 100 and 120 grit paper.

Next Page - Final Sanding & Patchbox

- Russ Chastain

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