A new/old rifle is finished.

Well, I built the original rifle in about 1980 or so.  It would shoot but I was never happy with the feel,  looks, or my work on it.  I killed a deer with it and put it away.  Fast forward to 2017.  I finally took a look at it and decided to restock it.   

   I decided to go with the shotgun buttplate and curved grip rail guard.  I took the barrel to a machine shop and had them turn it octagon  to round.  The man at the shop quoted me $25 to do the work.  I don't think he understood how long it would take.  The machinist even crowned the barrel for me.  I expect it was to allow him to use the live center on the lathe, but it worked nicely for a crown.   Then I got a well curled stock from Nate Stephenson that was already inlet octagon to round 15/16 octagon to  7/8" round and bandsawed to shape for $20.  The channel had to be enlarged to 1 by 15/16", but it was a start.  Tim Cosby furnished the buttplate and trigger guard from his goody box and helped me drill the ramrod hole.    The barrel(after turning O/R), lock, triggers, ramrod, and pipes were recycled from the original rifle.  A Bosch hand router was purchased to enlarge the barrel channel, cut the ramrod channel, and trim the stock.  It was messy but worked well.  That was the biggest expense.

Here is the final result.  A good usable work rifle.  No particular style, but it feels good and shoots well.  The barrel is an old Green River choke bored .50 barrel and the lock and triggers are from Ron Long.