Earthquake

I am thinking about making a Kydex cheek riser for another stock I have and was wondering if any body out there had done it? I bought a piece of 1/8" thick Dark Earth Kydex off of EBay to try it with, I have a couple of cheap fiberglass stocks I got from Numrich that I'm going to do it to. How well do the bolts tighten up? I was thinking since the stocks are not parallel they would not pull up evenly, I was thinking about embedding a couple of pieces of aluminum thick wall tube that stick past the out side of the stock so it will pull up flat against the ends of the tube and that way I can tighten them down tighter and the riser wont shift, make sense? If you have any pictures it would help me figure out my design, thanks.

Casey

str8shooter

There is a thread here somewhere, search it

slayer6769

I made one and I think it looks as nice as any I've seen in stores.
When you drill the holes in the stock, mark the drill location using the cheekrest as a template. Place marks on both sides of the stock. Insure each side is in the same place. Drill a hole in each mark on one side, but only drill about halfway into the stock. Flip the stock over and drill a hole in each of those marks. Don't worry if your slightly off.
I bought all the hardware needed at Lowes. I installed J nuts on one side and used knobbed bolts on the other to secure my cheekrest. I made my cheekrest with slots, so its completely adjustable.
I do think 1/8" Kydex may be to thin and have a little flex to it. I would use either 3/16" or 1/4".

slayer6769

http://pbckt.com/p2.NiF4vI
http://pbckt.com/p2.NiFpgN
http://pbckt.com/p2.NiFvU8

See if this helps.

Earthquake

Well I have been doing a little work on this, I cut out a paper pattern...

I roughed out the basic shape on my metal cutting band saw and sanded it to shape and drilled the holes at the end of the slots...[It looks a lot darker in person]

I dug out my coping saw and "V" block and cut the slots and finished them with a file and x acto knife...

They did not come out as clean as I would have liked so the next one I do I'm going to make a DFX file and get my old boss to have it done on the water jet machine...

I'm debating on how I'm going to heat and shape it, I may heat the whole thing and just form it over a stock or I may just heat the center and shape it over a piece of tubing.
I have seen guys cut them oversize and trim them after they form them, that seems like a lot more work to me.
Stand by for phase II " The Search for Shape"

Casey

Earthquake

Well since I am still unemployed I dont have a whole lot to do I went ahead and shaped my cheek riser around a birch stock I'm fixing up [missing some wood at the top of the butt plate], I marked the stock where my center line are and put the riser flat in the oven, I put it in before I turned it on.
I put it on the bottom of a baking sheet on some foil and turned the oven on to 300°. I kept checking it by lifting the foil to see how flexible it was, when it got pretty soft I pulled it out and wrapped it around the stock and compressed it to the sides with a towel. I held it in place for a few minuets untill it cooled and kept its shape. It fit the side of the stock pretty tight, now I have to find some hardware, I am going to use 1/4"-20 carriage bolts that I am going to dip in muriatic acid to remove most of the zinc and sand the heads and blue them, for the nuts I am going to order some black oxide knurled round nuts that are used as jam nuts for something. [McMaster Carr has them]...


These things are easy to make I dont know why any body would spend $50.00 for one.
As soon as I get the hardware I will post a finished picutre.

Casey

str8shooter

Nice work. I bought the DWP riser some time ago. My only complaint was the weight. The hardware alone felt like a pound.

Earthquake

Final chapter,
Well I went and got some hardware today and mounted my Riser on a birch stock I'm toying with. I went with 1/4"-20 carriage bolts, I was hoping to find some that were black oxidised [yea right] so I found some that were zinc plated, I chucked them up in a drill and spun them up against the belt of my belt sander and ground off the letters on the heads and trimmed to lenght.
I soaked them in some cold blue to darken the heads and to my surprise it turn the whole bolt black, I did not know it would do it to zinc plated hardware. I found some 3/4"diameter knurled nuts while I was there and bought a couple to see if I would like them [there a little to small] then I drilled the stock and mounted the riser up, it will look a little better once I get some stain on the stock and a butt plate or recoil pad, I haven't decided which I'm going to use...


my pictures came out a little fuzzy. some body mentioned that 1/8" thick material might be to thin, it is very stiff and does not flex at all, I dont think it has to be that any thicker
This turned out to be a very easy job too do, I rate about 4 on a scale of 1 to 10. so if you are looking for one I would try to do it your self, it gives you a lot of satisfaction when you can say "Oh, That, I made it myself"

Casey
PS. I have about $20.00 total in this and I have enough Kydex to make at least 3 more.

BSalty

That looks as good as many I have seen on the market. Out of curiosity, what was your final cost to make that?

sjstill

I'd say ya done good!

Earthquake

BSalty
The piece of Kydex I got off of E-Bay cost $17.00 including shipping and it is big enough to make four riser out of it so that comes out to $4.25 for one and the hardware was $6.00 [those steel round nuts were $3.00 each, I had the carriage bolts] so that makes it cost a total of $10.25 plus my time
[about 2 hours] so I guess thats not bad, If I get them cut on a water jet I would only have about 15 minutes in one [heating and forming].
I should start selling them, I could probably sell them for $30.00 each and make money.

Casey

meterman

I've 30 bucks when you get ready ,you done a good looking job (really I've got 30 bucks when your ready

BSalty

Thanks! I used an old $25 toaster oven several years ago when I was making some custom kydex stuff for personal use. It worked really well.

I noticed you are still out of work. I am sorry for that. But maybe a try a few other things and start your own business? At least a few extra coins in your pocket.

Seriously that cheek pad looks as good as anything I have seen offered already.

Earthquake

Thanks for the kind words guys, I may make a few for sale.
I need to do a couple little mods to them first, when you hold the rifle in the firing position it touches the fleshy part of your thumb a bit so I'm going to re-shape it a bit on the belt sander and I would like to find bolts with a bigger heads.
I want to fill the holes I used to mount it on the stock I have and move then down a touch so when the nuts are tightened up the don't have to squeeze the riser so much, I need to get a 1/4" birch dowel to glue in the holes. this stock is going to be "Frankenstock" when I get done, see this post...

How far would you go to rescue a cracked stock?

I would hate to get rid of a stock just because it has a couple of flaws.

Casey