doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com New Stocker you should know about.

Dang! I know nothing about maple other than it seems to make fine furniture, but how often have I privately had the same sentiment?...Geo

About 35 years ago my father-in-law bought a pre-64 M-70 with a Mannlicher-style custom maple stock done by N.B.Fashingbauer. It's skip-line checkered, solid and clean, nothing fuzzy about it. Non-traditional looking, but a beautiful piece of wood and wonderfully executed craftsmanship.

I don't blame improved modified for being fed up at gratuitous rudeness.

Jay

"Fiddleback" maple adorns some of the most valuable musical instruments in the world, exquisitely crafted Strads that are more valuable and have blessed/enriched more people than any gun can or will. I consistently get grief for my loathing of checkering, and probably would cause some noses to turn up and backs to turn 'round should I dare to show up in certain circles with an antique ivory stocked wheel lock.

Also, a high gloss finish is at least appreciated, if not embraced, by knowledgable woodworkers, French polish for example bringing out the color and figure as perhaps no other finish can, and finding itself painstakingly applied to the most famous and valuable examples of the cabinet maker's art.

Walnut has been employed in gunmaking for centuries primarily due to function (density to tensile strength, insect and rot resistance, workability with tools, ability to take detail) more than form (appearance or beauty, an imperfect analogy perhaps being case colors the pleasing by-product (form) of a hardening process (function).

Whether violins or Vincis, from ebony and ivory to plastic and rubber, the "appropriateness" of material to application will no doubt provide surfeit fodder for the foreseeable future.

Mike

IM: I agree with you, there are some real jack ass folks on this forum, but when you post a photo of a gun on a public forum, no matter if it's an 870 or an Holland Royal, you are going to get some dissenters, just because. And you sort of asked for opinions by making your post. Frankly, I like 870's and I think for $700 your man did a nice job. But, it's not the quality Paul Hodgins would do, but we aren't talking a Holland Royal and a $7500 bill, either. BTW, when I was a kid learning to shoot skeet, a man had an 1100 custom stocked in Birdseye Maple. It was awesome and I'm sad to say, I used to covet that gun.

"I haven't given Dave a dime for years because he lets crap like this go on and on at his site"

You mean the free advertising ?

hey, the guy may be very talented,and goodness knows I think we all hope he does well but the comments-and you put a thread up like this your going to get them, were IMO constructive.
If he wants more work he should probably show something that appeals to wider customer base.The non checkered,tiger maple with high gloss finish has its fans but not near as much as those who prefer the opposite.
Your smart ass posts (and lack of ability to post pics) are not helping him either.

Just to show there is a place for maple,checkered maple gun stocks, looks ok on this;
Checkered Maple Gun Stock

Darn, I didn't even post a negative comment but I got lumped in with those that did. For the record, I own a stupendous Oberlies Model 1892 Winchester in checkered maple. I also own a maple stocked (checkered) 870 Skeet that "by itself" ran 100 straight in the 20 gauge event at a Maryland State NSSA Championship. I have an inletted set of maple for a 12 gauge Model 12 Winchester, just waiting for a gun at the right price. I'm leaning toward a solid rib field choked gun. I'm not against maple or 870s, or lack of checkering, but I do wonder about the "fuzzing" and the website comment that tiger maple is curly maple. I'm not much of a wood guy, but aren't tiger maple and curly maple two different styles of wood?

Not much of a wood guy either but most seem to consider it two names for the same thing,at least the furniture/antique guys around here do.
http://lumberjocks.com/topics/10172

"We do many board feet of Curly-Tiger Maple a year. We have one vendor that calls it Curly and another that calls it Tiger and I found out recently that they both get it from the same supplier. I cannot tell any difference, looks just alike, works the same, smells the same, the splinters hurt the same so I�ll tell you what I was told one time by an inspector. Call it what you want it�s the same thing some boards just have more profound curl than the other boards"

Hard and soft maple produce a lot of fiddleback,curly and tiger figure and western big leaf maple produces a lot of quilted,flame and burl figure. Sandy Pond Hardwoods in Pennsylvania had a lot of differently figured maples when I was there and finished their offices and woodwork in various figured maples and birch.

as with any wood- the amount of figure in maple varies within a species. the more figure - the more it costs- just like walnut

from my experience curly = tiger in the maple world-- hard/sugar or soft/red - some use one term some the other

this guy carries some great wood not just maple- and explains his grading system

http://www.dunlapwoodcrafts.com/Gunstocks.php

this is one of his his grade 4's

I like Maple, especially Birds eye. I bought a 16 gauge Fox Sterlingworth just because it had been restocked with it and I like it. It had been done up by Fagen a long time ago. It matched my factory original Savage 1899 A in Bird's eye to a "T". My 1899 is the only one to ever surface with the special order wood.

According to the Savage Historian and Bob Beach at G&H it was sold in Manhattan at the Von Lengerke & Detmold store at the turn of the century. So I guess I have a forced match pair for camp.

Neither one are checkered, by the way, and I like them like that way just fine.