Rifle Stand
Posted: Sun Nov 25, 2018 1:34 pm
Having not done any real “woodworking” since Jr. High woodshop, it may not have been the best plan to start a new project with hundred-year-old chunks of barnwood, but I’ve been getting my head wrapped around a rifle display stand since purchasing my first Henry this summer. Barnwood seemed right, but with its charm and good looks come warpage, splits, cracks, nail holes and lots of other irregularities.
My son offered up a couple planks of barnwood (as he has “access” to such things), which I set aside in the garage while I researched DIY projects, unbelievably detailed drawings, YouTube vids, etc. Unfortunately, not many of them inspired me (except for a great idea I got from a guy in the UK, but more on that later). As weeks turned into months, all I figured out was that I wanted something to accommodate any Henry in the stable, and I got stuck on the idea of something that the rifle would not just sit on, but sit “in.”
So, just make it longer, right? Longer than the rifle, so it’s more like a couch than a chair for the firearm. Which led to yesterday’s first decision: just go with the random length of the (long) piece of barn-stock that my son gave me. No cutting! But, the next (small) issue was figuring which side was up (literally) with this plank of wood, but, since it was so warped and cupped. As it turned out, there was really only ONE way that it would come close to sitting flat. Not flat as in “flush,” but just “sort of flat.” So, “this side up” was easy.
The bigger challenge (which I’d been working on for a while) was figuring out the uprights that support the butt and barrel so that: a) the rifle sits level (more or less) ; b) it’s not too top-heavy (overall, so it doesn’t come toppling off the mantel) ; and c) the uprights can be somehow secured to the base-board, since none of these surfaces are even close to being “true” in any sense of the word. My reloading bench project found me in Hobby Lobby looking at shelf brackets, and a seed was planted. Rustic looking, cheap and sturdy, a couple of the small ones seemed to fit the bill.
Then, my English-major brain had to figure out how to notch the uprights, while ending up with something a bit more “finished” than just a standard V-cut. How wide? How deep? How much longer did the barrel support need to be than the butt support? Using my trashcan as a workbench (!), some paddle drill bits and a borrowed circular saw, I translated my rough sketch to some rough uprights.
The butt-support bracket is offset from center to accommodate the depth of the notch/length of the upright issue, and there are brass screws all around, in a nod to Henry. The end of each bracket is about 8” from the end of the base board (if that helps with scale).
The final touch, stolen from the YouTuber in the UK, is belting leather (harvested from an actual belt in my closet) to line the notches, glued and clamped in the most amateurish ways imaginable, but the end result works, visually and functionally. Protects the rifle and finishes the look and feel. Decent looking sausage, in other words, but be glad you didn’t have to watch it being made.
The pics are definitely better taken from a distance, as words like “hand-made” and “rustic” are WAY too generous, and true craftsmen like BrokenolMarine are likely just wincing in pain looking at this, but, as the kids say, “it is what it is,” which is a labor of love for my newfound hobby (hobbies?) and something that is both functional and “at home” with my farm-house-ish décor.
My son offered up a couple planks of barnwood (as he has “access” to such things), which I set aside in the garage while I researched DIY projects, unbelievably detailed drawings, YouTube vids, etc. Unfortunately, not many of them inspired me (except for a great idea I got from a guy in the UK, but more on that later). As weeks turned into months, all I figured out was that I wanted something to accommodate any Henry in the stable, and I got stuck on the idea of something that the rifle would not just sit on, but sit “in.”
So, just make it longer, right? Longer than the rifle, so it’s more like a couch than a chair for the firearm. Which led to yesterday’s first decision: just go with the random length of the (long) piece of barn-stock that my son gave me. No cutting! But, the next (small) issue was figuring which side was up (literally) with this plank of wood, but, since it was so warped and cupped. As it turned out, there was really only ONE way that it would come close to sitting flat. Not flat as in “flush,” but just “sort of flat.” So, “this side up” was easy.
The bigger challenge (which I’d been working on for a while) was figuring out the uprights that support the butt and barrel so that: a) the rifle sits level (more or less) ; b) it’s not too top-heavy (overall, so it doesn’t come toppling off the mantel) ; and c) the uprights can be somehow secured to the base-board, since none of these surfaces are even close to being “true” in any sense of the word. My reloading bench project found me in Hobby Lobby looking at shelf brackets, and a seed was planted. Rustic looking, cheap and sturdy, a couple of the small ones seemed to fit the bill.
Then, my English-major brain had to figure out how to notch the uprights, while ending up with something a bit more “finished” than just a standard V-cut. How wide? How deep? How much longer did the barrel support need to be than the butt support? Using my trashcan as a workbench (!), some paddle drill bits and a borrowed circular saw, I translated my rough sketch to some rough uprights.
The butt-support bracket is offset from center to accommodate the depth of the notch/length of the upright issue, and there are brass screws all around, in a nod to Henry. The end of each bracket is about 8” from the end of the base board (if that helps with scale).
The final touch, stolen from the YouTuber in the UK, is belting leather (harvested from an actual belt in my closet) to line the notches, glued and clamped in the most amateurish ways imaginable, but the end result works, visually and functionally. Protects the rifle and finishes the look and feel. Decent looking sausage, in other words, but be glad you didn’t have to watch it being made.
The pics are definitely better taken from a distance, as words like “hand-made” and “rustic” are WAY too generous, and true craftsmen like BrokenolMarine are likely just wincing in pain looking at this, but, as the kids say, “it is what it is,” which is a labor of love for my newfound hobby (hobbies?) and something that is both functional and “at home” with my farm-house-ish décor.