I received the rough stock blank for my trade rifle project today.
Lots of wood to remove to turn it into a fine rifle.
The barrel channel is already cut to 95% and the ramrod hole is drilled.
There will be about 4 inches of drop from the top of the barrel to the top of the buttplate. The buttplate will be 4 and a half inches tall, so total drop from top of barrel to bottom of toe will be almost nine inches.

Time to chop away everything that isn't a trade rifle.....

Thats basically it, right? And drill some holes, cut some slots and inlet all the parts.

Hard to tell but is that maple? I imagine you’re going to give it lots of color?

Parallel walled barrel?

Looks like smooth sailing from there. I built a few stocks from boards and man, after the barrel and ramrod hole is done you can wipe a little sweat off the brow. Shaping is so fun.

Plain maple. It'll be stained pretty dark and then have faux curl painted on. Common on many trade rifles.
Its a lightly swamped barrel.

Nice. I have a swamped barrel on my Kibler and another gun. I really enjoy those.

Are you gonna scratch the wood or brass up at all?

Nice looking piece of wood.... did some wood duck carving but nothing like that, how do you go about shaping it.....

My first flinter was a Dixie poor boy, with a heavy straight barrel. I then picked up a Beck style rifle with a swamped barrel, and every rifle since has been swamped. They are a joy to shoot offhand, and make a nicer looking rifle, to my eyes.
There will be some basic engraving on the patchbox, sideplate and cheekpiece. A friend of mine that is really good at it will be doing that for me. No carving on the stock. Trade rifles were usually pretty utilitarian.



I start with a 1:1 top and profile drawing of the rifle, lay that out on the blank, then start with a band saw. Once I am close to the lines, I'll switch to hand planes, rasps and gouges. I am thinking of doing a scraped finish on this one. More period correct than sandpaper.

Thanks,.. yeah the band saw would be a huge help....used a hand saw on the wood blocks, not near as much fun, lol

What is “swamped?”

Swamped barrels are widest at the breech, then taper gradually to a waist, typically about 2/3 of the way down the barrel. They then flare back out slightly at the muzzle.
This reduces overall weight of the barrel, but leaves a little muzzle weight which helps with how the rifle "hangs" when shooting offhand.

Here's a drawing for one of the classic swamped barrel profiles used on many contemporary rifle.

I'm not interested in doing one but am interested in where you got the blank.?

Pecatonica River Longrifle Supply.

Never finished a stock before. I would be interested in seeing the process thru photos if you can share for us. I imagine some chiseling on the rough work then hand tools as you begin to fine tune things. I would think a fella would have to have a good eye for balance and lines to do a good job. No need to be perfect because they didn't have near the tooling advantages as we do today.

I will definitely make posts with pictures as the work progresses.

Having a good eye helps, but feel helps a lot also. Closing your eyes and running your fingers along the curves can tell you a lot about the shape.

Swamped barrels are widest at the breech, then taper gradually to a waist, typically about 2/3 of the way down the barrel. They then flare back out slightly at the muzzle.
This reduces overall weight of the barrel, but leaves a little muzzle weight which helps with how the rifle "hangs" when shooting offhand.

Here's a drawing for one of the classic swamped barrel profiles used on many contemporary rifle.


Thanks for the explanation…the diagram was helpful.