Recently, someone reached out and motivated me to produce a stock for them by making a surprising offer. When I started making these I initially decided not to take on commissions for fear that I would feel pressure to complete something quickly or fight against unreachable expectations, but in this specific situation both of those things weren’t true. With my daughter heading to college next year, I decided it was worth it to take up this generous offer and see if I could make someone happy.

I’ve finally finished it, but before reaching that point I sent the following email to the customer to detail the steps it took to create the stock.

Email (edited for a better blog experience)

---

I think I’m done, but I also don’t think this is a $(redacted amount) stock. That’s holding me back from actually calling this thing finished. I want to be totally transparent so you can decide if you want this at all. My feelings won’t be hurt if you don’t, in fact it would probably make me feel better that someone else sees the flaws as well. The following list is really for me to mentally work through this, but also for you to understand where I’m at. Stock is cut from the slab and looks good.

Resin is poured in mold

In order to improve, I decided to upgrade my resin to something that is stronger by the numbers. I never had a failure previously, but I just wanted to crank up to what I thought was a more professional resin.

Resin dries and is then fused to the wood stock.

Stock is sanded to final shape.

Stock is stained and sealed

Finish doesn’t look good enough. I attempt a fix it but sand through the stain to the bare wood and ruin it.

Sand finish off and start all over with second stain and second finish.

Finish looks great. Happy with it.

Although resin is black, paint with a high heat flat paint for a better look.

Go to the range to test-fire with plans of shipping it upon my return.

Range test shows that this resin will snap/break in thinner sections. Resin blows out at the mag release where the mag release bolt runs through the center of the stock.

Not happy as I return feeling a failure. Ticked that I went to all this trouble when I should have tested the new resin on a basic stock before putting all the effort into it.

Research better resin with impact properties that also include some flexibility in the material to absorb the recoil.

Buy new resin and wait for it to arrive.

Cut off defective resin.

Re-drill mounting hole in stock.

Test new resin for flexibility and toughness.

Perfect. Wish I would have done this step earlier.

Pour new resin in mold.

Take a long time prepping the finished stock with the new resin. Make sure not to damage the stock in any way.

Based on the time and materials, this was a loser. Based on what I learned, it was worth it.

Pour resin to attach the two pieces.

New resin is bright white instead of black. It can be colored but black feels impossible as it just goes grey. I can only use so much pigment before the resin chemistry would be affected.

Paint the new stock with high heat black paint. 

Load up 90 rounds and head to range during lunch. Blast as fast as possible in order to heat up everything as well as get back to work.

Gun is smoking but no failures.

Break the gun down to review how the shooting went.

Functioned perfectly without any damage.

I had painted inside the resin mold. Paint started flaking off on the inside, but not on the outside.

Research and find that I should have specifically washed off the mold release. My sanding on the outside did the job but the inside wasn’t sanded.

Clean off interior paint. Not as clean as it would have been without painting but luckily isn’t seen with the receiver mounted in it.

Wash resin

Paint stock again, leaving the inside not painted. It won’t see the light of day and I shouldn’t have painted it in the first place.

The wood looks great and the resin functions perfectly but one thing after another keeps popping up and I keep staring at flaws. At best this is a $500 stock based on the beauty of the wood, but there’s absolutely no way I’m selling this for any more than that.

---

And that’s the story of this stock. More than anything it’s a battle with myself trying to finish a project so that the customer is happy and I don’t go insane during the process.

I don’t charge the original price but feel so much better sending it out the door for the right price.