Stocking Up
Hunter choices in rifle stocks – material, style, shape, lines – prove that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. But appreciation for beauty changes with fashion.
Fifty years ago the trend was to take an old military rifle and “sporterize” it. We did things like cut back the long barrels, remove the wood heat shield over the top of the barrel (they’d call it a handguard today), Bend the bolt handle, and add a scope.
American hunters didn’t appreciate the “extras” found on the military surplus rifles they bought after WWI and WWII, so we removed all the parts that didn’t contribute to hunting success. The opposite seems the fashion today.
Today we are militarizing sporting rifles, pulling off their slim hunting stocks and replacing them with synthetic stocks or all metal chassis stocks WITH hand guards. Throw in M-lock rails, enough Picatinny rails to open a railroad line, adjustable cheek piece, adjustable length-of-pull, straight grip, drop out magazines and maybe a folding butt stock and you are styling! -- unless you like the sleek, simple, functional lines of a classic hunting rifle ala the M70 Featherweight Winchester, Ruger M77, Remington M700 BLD, or Rigby Highland Stalker.
Multi-adjustable, all metal stocks have become the hot sellers in recent years, but users are discovering the functional value in lighter, slimmer, more traditional stock styles, fueling interests in after-market drop-in stocks.
Because many of us still do find beauty and functionality in those “antique” stock styles, after-market stock makers build and sell drop-in stocks for your tricked out chassis rifle!
Pick your poison. Cheap molded plastic. Expensive handlaid fiberglass/Kevlar. More expensive carbon fiber. Laminated (and often parti-colored) wood. Affordable, straight-grain American walnut. And even higher grade, nicely figured English walnut. You can find it all.
The only drawback to fancy walnut stocks these days is cost. Blanks like these sell for more than many complete rifles. Pillar bed a finished stock of such wood and you get the best of both worlds.
One Italian firm with the odd name of WOOX has been throwing a curveball into this mix, a hybrid walnut/synthetic and even walnut/aluminum stock layup. The idea, I think, is to appeal to hunters and shooters who like the look and feel of wood, but appreciate the durability and consistency of synthetics or aluminum where those materials matter – in the bedding flats.
Where and how a stock is mated to a barreled action plays a significant role in accuracy and consistency. Traditionally this has been a challenge for wood because it changes with humidity, sometimes swelling, sometimes shrinking, and sometimes altering pressure or tension against metal parts. During development of synthetic stocks, emphasis was building an extra tight fit between the recoil lug protruding below the barrel/front receiver ring and its recess within the stock. In addition stock makers strove to match the bottom metal lines and levels of receivers precisely so there was no “bending” pressures regardless how many inch pounds of torque were applied to tighten things.
The WOOX Elegante Hybrid stock includes an aluminum bedding block within the fancy walnut.
These efforts reached the point of epoxying aluminum or steel tubes or pillars into the stocks. The rifle’s bedding screws were then slipped through to pull the barreled action tightly against the tops of the pillars, leaving the action basically “floating”, free of any changing pressures in the stock itself. Later entire aluminum bedding blocks stretching from tang through the recoil lug were set within the synthetic stock. To top it off, barrel channels were usually cut wide enough that barrels free-floated.
This worked beautifully most of the time. A few barrels shot better with some stock contact, and this could be (and still can be) applied by epoxy bedding the barrel to the full channel or a front contact point. Trial and error found the perfect fit. After that, consistency was and is the rule.
Free-floating barrels that don’t shoot well can be stiffened with a layer of epoxy running the full length of the stock from receiver ring platforms forward and hugging the barrel tightly the whole way.
WOOX, it seems to me, is striving to duplicate that bedding consistency in a more traditional walnut stock. With the emphasis on the walnut stock. After all, the brand began with wood working back in 1937 when an Italian, Francesco Minelli (no relation to Liza, as far as I know), set up shop to build fine things out of walnut. Four generations of that family have maintained that business, their most recent expansion being the WOOX manufacturing facility in, of all places, Hickory, North Carolina. There, in WOOX’s exclusive wood working facility, the Minelli woodworking tradition is carried on by a cadre of U.S. craftsmen with an emphasis on the beauty and heirloom quality of walnut rifle stocks – with a twist.
The “twist” you’ve likely seen. If you’re the modern type, you may have swooned over the Furiosa model pictured below.
WOOX’s best seller reflects today’s “stock fashion” a look that makes many new shooters swoon and traditionalists blanch.
It’s an aluminum stock with walnut highlights. And WOOX’s best seller! I can’t say I’m shocked by that, but a bit surprised because to me it’s not attractive. That’s OK because WOOX makes something for everyone. I much prefer their latest, the Elegante.
WOOX’s more traditionally shaped, high-grade walnut Elegante Sporter stock reflects the classic look or traditional hunting stocks from the mid-20th century.
It, too, sports an aluminum bedding block, but said metal is almost totally hidden with the walnut. It comes in a classic stock style called the Sporter as well as the more Precision rifle shape of the Elegante Hybrid. If you’re a traditionalist you probably blanched. No problem. Something from everyone at WOOX. The functional amalgamation of metal and wood. Metal-to-metal bedding. Walnut look and feel.
Whether a new stock of any material and any style will make your rifle shoot more accurately depends on how well it fits and how poorly your old stock did not fit. Accuracy could improve from 2 MOA to sub-MOA or not improve at all. Either way, you’re appreciation for the look, feel, and handling of your old rifle should match your desires.
If you’re interested in swapping your current stock for something different and like supporting American craftsmen, check out WOOX stocks at https://wooxstore.com/.