Guys please help me decide on a new Cooper varmint rifle, laminated vs walnut stock. According to specs both guns weigh the same.

Pros and cons for both...

I like laminated, but they seem very heavy compared to walnut.

I like the looks of walnut, but on a varmint rifle I would go with the laminate for the extra stability. The only exception would be if it is going to be a walking rifle where the lighter weight of walnut might be preferable.

I like everything about laminates except the weight. If weight isn't going to be an issue and the handles have checkering, give me the laminate. Like orion said, they are more stable. I will add that I have grown to dislike the stocks that lack checkering. Hot summers, sweaty mitts, and slick stocks are not the best combo.

Cooper says the laminate and walnut are the same weight.

Likely due to the vent holes under the barrel.

Is laminate less prone to scratches?

i dunno about that, laminates I believe are often of hardwood.... which really aint all that hard, ya know?

Go with the one you like the best apearance wise.

Being a stock maker I will take Walnut...Properly dried and cured European walnut is as stable as titanium..But factory wood is seldom cured and dried properly as that process takes too long and its too time consuming and expensive so in your case Laminate would probably be best or a good full length glass bed with I-beam aluminum stabilizers would work fine and give you the warmth and beauty of walnut..

Nothing beats a good looking piece of walnut but if you plan on it being a working rifle, I doubt the piece of wood is gonna be something that would have Ray drooling so I'd opt for the laminate. Especially if the weight is equal. The finish is just about impervious.

There is no reason to take a perfectly good piece of wood, cut it up, and glue it back together. A good piece of wood is dimensionally stable, and adding glue only adds weight.

So, what type of wood is cut up and glued together to make laminate? Wood that isn't perfectly good to start out with. The entire reason to laminate wood is so you can take wood that is somewhere between less than ideal, and borderline garbage, and make it useful as a stock, or a pen, or knife scales or whatever.

But, good wood is expensive. So laminating is a way to make stocks more affordable. But given the choice, go for the real deal.

just my opinion here:

pros of laminate
all things considered, less likely to "move" than walnut; usually has a "sturdier" finish than walnut

cons of laminate
looks are obvious; usually heavier than walnut

pro of walnut
usually quite better looking when compared to other stock types, clearly more of a "classic" stock; when properly bedded/sealed barrel channel, etc. does well enough in all climates

cons of walnut
does show dents and scratches (but may don't mind this), chips and splits are more likely than in other stock types

given a choice, i'd take walnut every time.

Anytime you want to debate the finer points of drying veneer compared to drying boards, let me know, I've done both profesionally for 5 years.

you are correct in stating that properly cured and dried walnut is rare. I've never dried it, but Larch 2x4's take forever in a kiln and even then you leave the outsides overdry and the inside 9% moisture at least... Walnut is denser, it would suck worse. I would imagine that if you wanted to properly kiln dry walnut 2x8's you'd need to run about 150 degrees in your kiln for about 10 days. You'd want to pull all the wood out every other day and switch the bottoms with the tops too.

Now Larch veneer is a whole nuther animal, you could consider it a 'soft hardwood' or 'hard softwood' (provided you're not mixing dry logs with logs fresh off a truck, and your green end made an effort to vat soak the logs for the same amount of time) denser veneers always dry more consistantly, with less warpage and shrinkage. I don't care how long and how "carefully" a chuck of walnut is dried, it will NEVER be as stable as Birch plywood.

But then I only dried 250,000 3/8% veneer 6 days a week for 3 years

If you really want to start an argument you'd lose we'll talk about the structural advantages of 3/4" Fir plywood compared to 3/4" Fir boards of equal size. You can't make grain in a tree run 90 degrees perpendicular every other fraction of an inch...

Dan
Having patented a drying process used in mills West of you for decades... and having a little more experience consulting on dry kilns for many times more board feet of hardwood than you have seen... You have some glaring gaps in your understanding of stock woods.

I have a number of sticks of walnut right here at the house which birch plywood cannot touch for strength, stability, toughness, hardness, nor especially, pretty.

But they never saw the inside of a kiln. Kilns do not make better wood, ever. They make acceptable wood with an acceptable level of degrade. You can screw up wood air drying or kiln drying. Speeding it up in a kiln is guaranteed to ruin some of it. Your comment on the difficulties in drying larch get right to the heart of the issue.

If laminates weigh less than walnut they have little advantage over typical kiln-dried factory walnut. Laminates usually weigh more than solid walnut because they are impregnated with a lot of glue during laminating. Glue prevents the exchange of water in use as the pores are already filled with plastic...

If I am going to use something as ugly as laminate I would rather go all the way and use a frigging plastic stock. Laminates make mopeds look cool...
art

Art, Admittedly I spent much less time drying wood on the kilns than I did drying veneer. Kilns are a piss poor way to dry anything, they both lack in production and quality (Probably why veneer isn't kiln dried)

However I'm straight up calling bullschitt on the fact that any board has a greater strength and stability than a wood of similar density that has been laminated. It is straight up impossible. You can't grow a tree where every other layer (lets say 1/12" thick) runs the grain 90 degrees to itself and is glued and pressed at 300PSI.

I can prove it... Take a karate geek... They can punch clean through four 1/2" Fir boards. If you gave them the exact same test with ONE 5 ply 1/2" Fir plywood, they'd break knuckles on it...

Now, I'll make your next argument for you... A piece of half inch 12x12" plywood weighs more than a Fir board the same size... BUT, the rifle manufacturers are still using walnut patterns to make laminated stocks. You can go a helluva lot skinnier all over a stock using a chunk of Birch plywood. Schitt, if they drilled out about half the buttstock before they put the pad on, the lamimated stock would break even... Oh, and be stiffer, and more stable

You clearly have never seen a good Turkish stick...

I can hand you a piece of crossgrain walnut less than 1/4" thick, 2"x6", and you cannot break it with your hands, nor even bend it. There is a reason good Turkish sells for thousands...

Your argument uses kiln-dried walnut against laminate and that is not any part of my argument.
art

The laminates were 'in' back in the 60's when I made up my target rifles. I selected the laminate walnut. Thinking back over it perhaps I was more confident in the laminate theory wise.

For sure I am glad I never asked Floyd Butler to make a stock from a laminate. He made such beautiful stocks.

Walnut stocks here; no plywood.
Plywood=fugly

I can't speak to walnut; the only wood-stocked guns I have are a Citori and a BLR.

I've generally avoided wood stocks because I see no practical advantage over laminate, in my climate (rain) especially, and my guns are practical tools. Not showpieces. If I wanted showpieces, however, I'd use walnut all the way as it is undeniably beautiful.

I own a few laminate stocked rifles. In our rainy climate it's that or synthetic (for me) because I have enough to worry about in my life already. I can get home from a day in the drizzle with a SOAKED rifle, lean it in the corner by the woodstove, and go to bed without a worry. Get up the next day and do it again.

Laminate does have a couple clear advantages over synthethics, and they are sound and smell. A lammie stock is much quieter in the thick stuff. And at least some synth stocks are really smelly.

I like the heft of laminate too. Solid. If shootin' the deer doesn't work, I can club them to death.

In a dryer climate and/or if I wanted purty guns I'd go walnut. It shares most of the advantages over plastic/synth that I mention above.

Art, please don't.

I have yet to see a wood stock as strong or as light and strong as the better synthetics. Try 18-19 ozs. ready to bolt up to the rifle. Full size classic patterns. Kevlar reinforced. Never have any of mine been noisy or smelled.
As far as laminates go, I'd prefer a stock, factory wood stock over the heavier laminates. By free floating the barrel, there are very few stability issues with plain walnut.
I wouldn't suggest you put that wet rifle up against that wood stove and ignore it very often. Even stainlees will rust if neglected enough. E

Too late E. There are already two threads by JO lamenting rusting stainless!

Folks talk about highly select walnut and it is some beautiful stuff but if you get the rifle too pretty, you wouldn't want to hunt with it.

Dan
Apples to oranges arguments will not cut it... "However I'm straight up calling bullschitt on the fact that any board has a greater strength and stability than a wood of similar density that has been laminated."

A couple points you missed: STock laminations are not 90% to each other. Even if they did, there are woods tough enough to compete on strength. There are others able to compete on hardness. Yet others competing on stability. A few spank them on all counts.

Mesquite, some walnut, mountain mahoghany are three laminate cannot match in any of the categories.

The comparisons between lighter woods laminated are not valid because they are not woods used in building stocks and they do nothing to address the issue of density... Dense woods have more "wood" in the wood and less air. Wood is much stronger than air...

For your fir plywood vs. fir boards comparison it is obvious the glue holding the laminations in place makes all the difference. Also, the fact those karate geeks are breaking cross-grain boards, not long grain.

Here is a typical karate "feat" and it takes remarkably little to break boards... The holder MUST provide resistance equal to the energy required to break the board, no?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xp0wz4d2ls

Had a guy show up at a mill I was working in looking for 10" long pieces of 2x16 pine for a karate demonstration... They had to be clear... but small cracks were okay...
art

I wouldn't call laminates inferior in quality either. Relative to the species of wood being used, laminates tend to be high grades of the same, IOW, virtually clear, perfect wood is used for the veneers used in stock-making. (The same is obviously not true for some of the construction grades of plywood.) And it could easily be argued that the wood commonly used in gun stock laminates: birch, is inferior to the commonly used walnuts used in nicer wood stocks. That would be true.

And, while laminated birch is quite stiff and hard, it is also more prone to chipping as it (and the glues most often used) can be very brittle.

I would also argue that it is not impossible to make a very attractive laminate stock. I never have cared for the relative clubs which Ruger uses for their laminated stocks - even though it is basically the same pattern which I find okay in walnut also on their M77s. However, a laminated stock like the one used on the Remington Mountain rifle is one I find quite appealing. I suppose that comes in part because of how it feels in the hand. A laminated stock (which is generally stronger than solid wood) can be made equally and plenty strong (as solid wood) by reducing its weight and lines somewhat.

As a practical matter, if the wolves -whatever form wolves may take- were right outside the door, if I could choose to arm myself with a bat made from the usual walnut or the usual birch laminate found in rifle stocks, the question would be a no-brainer.

But since I don't need to brain any wolves with clubs and I can still make aesthetic choices which also reflect whatever level of practicality I desire:

A beat-up peice of walnut looks better than a brand new laminate or synthetic and properly sealed, they wont move. With a good oil finish walnut will take some serious abuse. I rub down with BLO will keep the stock good looking and servicable for years to come. Make my vote...walnut

Art,



Plywood is stronger than its component woods because of the cross grain laminations. What if you laminated the above woods in a cross grain fashion?

If you laminate wood cross grain, you gain overall strength - in some ways- but you lose some of the properties of stiffness. Cross lapped laminates (plywood) is much more flexible than parallel lapped. And parallel laminated woods are stronger than the same solid woods. It's because the wood grain doesn't run through the wood but is variable in spite of the fact that the grain generally follows the same direction. And by alternating the ring pattern in alternating layers you also even out the way the wood wants to move which makes the glued up piece very stabile. A properly made laminated stock can be a very practical, and arguably pleasing way to stock a rifle.

A laminate stock (or walnut I suppose) is far, far quieter than fiberglass or plastic when branches are rubbing against the stock... the butt in particular is a noisy area in a plastic or glass stock.

Can't say my only fiberglass stock (Kimber) smells, but plastic ones usually do, especially the first couple years.

While stainless will rust, that just is what it is. I'm not taking my main rifle out of it's stock in hunting season anyway, so.... The reason I sleep easy with my (laminate) M7 leaned up in the corner by the woodstove is that I know the stock isn't going to warp, split, twist, or whatever... the POI won't move on me.

... let me add, for Klikitarik, that I share his love of the M700 Mountain Rifle stock. I have two, both laminate; one, on a re-barreled 30-06 with a little heavier profile barrel than the MR has... the other is a stock 7-08 M700 LSS. Anyway... I LOVE how that stock feels in the hands!

Only negative is the butt-heavy aspect. On my '06, the heavier barrel takes care of that. On my 7-08, some aggressive drilling of material out of the butt cured it.

Blaine
Stock laminates are run in the same direction mostly for looks. Plywood will never make a decent-looking stock. There are some plywoods with laminates arranged at various angles, but mostly pointed in the same general direction. They still look very ugly IMO.

Growth ring instabilities mentioned by Klik are really a non-issue with quality laminations. Juvenile wood from near the center of trees has the issues he mentions and in plywood mills it is a real concern, but stock laminates are not made from that type of lamination.

For your use in bench guns the weight is critical and laminates geared toward strength have enough resin injected under pressure to add enough weight to eliminate them as an option for you.

Wood is anything but consistent in each direction... In endgrain compression wood is really strong. In long grain tension it is ridiculously strong. Cross grain tension and compression is not great though. If you need strength in those directions it may not be there.
art

Klik
"And parallel laminated woods are stronger than the same solid woods."

Apples to oranges... Adding the glue adds tremendous weight to the wood. Pick a wood with specific gravity equal to the laminate and reasonable fiber length and the laminate will lose again...
art

I'll take Walnut every day over laminated stocks.
A well figured Walnut stock is a thing of beauty, where-as a laminate is lifeless, fugly, lacking character.

Cedar sideing vs. manufactured clapboards - Your choice. There is no substitute for real wood.

'nuff said.......



Ya sure can't get a nice as straight, recoil split with walnut.......

I have seen a laminate on the mighty, heavy recoiling 308 split.Most are pretty ugly,and I like fir plywood.But I picked up a Boyds laminate that they do for the Remington M-798,it ain't too bad looking.I do have nice blank waiting for some projects to get finished.

huntsman - just wondering - did the factory replace that split stock?

Nah, they had to replace the whole gun........

looks like a ruger mk2. did anything else "split" besides the stock?

SD,
Strength does favor the grain variations in a laminate since the grain, while generally parallel, is still going to run at varied biases in adjoining sheets - assuming the laminates aren't sliced from a flitch and layered in order. You are probably correct about the juvenile wood detail though since most wood used in gunstock laminates is probably rotary sliced and doesn't include the center of the log.

As for what is beautiful, that is so very subjective in nature as to be impossible to define. Certainly, in my view anyway, some expensive and beautiful solid stock blanks become so gaudy in their finished form as to be ugly, though they may exhibit high levels of technical craftsmanship. And some people even rave about resin and cloth stocks which aren't even remotely attractive to my eye. So we all have to decide and live with those choices - if we care.

Yeah, they said it was an 'over-pressure' situation......

blew the bolt stop spring...


the extractor and band went flying...


Bottom metal was bowed a little...



The end of the case was kinda blown...


Company policy was to not let the rifle back out their door....

One of those hotshot new Gizmo cartridges (204) ruining a gun Kidding.

Art, I was on the college Karate team, that demo was ok, but the guy did miss that last board a few times.

I only broke one board in my life, the instructors son had a leftover board after a demo in a mall, and I wanted to break one just because I never had before, so I did. Board breaking is a stunt, no real karate skill needed, but follow through with a strong technique is ...just to say that some can break boards w/o karate skill.

The most impressive was a club member black belt, I believe it was 6 people total holding the boards he broke (4 behind the two w/hands on - to back up). 5 boards in total, all together, about all any of the holders could get their hands around. The black belt did a side thrust kick and I was stunned when he broke all 5 on the first try, it was a solid SNAP. It was as much a feat for him, as it was for those who held those 5 boards rigid enough to take the impact w/o absorbing the impact which would disallow breakage, but holding tight against the force needed to break them. That was one strong kick let me tell you.

I like the benefits of a lam stock, and its looks if done right compared to lackluster wood. BUT, they usually are heavy. Money aside, properly cured quality wood is all the more pleasing to the eye and should be fine afield esp. when sealed well.

Not sure if they are still made but a friend had several Sako customs, armor alloy action coating w/ synthetics that looked like wood. They looked nice and were functional. McMillan Fibergrain comes to mind....

I still like nice wood, Don you always have some nice ones to show. My father's fancy walnut model 12s always mesmerized me.

I always wondered, just how does one know if a blank is 'properly cured' other than the trust of who you get it from? Really. Can you determine how well it's dried naturally? There must be some equipment that can measure moisture per above specs.

Walnut.

65br
Dry is not the only measure, nor even a particularly good one for gauging how good a blank is. Wood gets more stable with each passing dry cycle around 6%MC. A series of cycles over 10 years gets most of the good out of seasoning a blank...

Feeling it, looking at it and listening to it are three big ones for deciding how good a blank is...
art

Don't you just love the "science" of wood? (Those are really objective determinations.)

But I really think the trailer sums it up pretty well, the fact that it also ends with your name notwithstanding, and the pun not intended... perhaps:

Never made the connection before.

But actually the selection processes based on feel, sight and sound are mostly measurable, but not by the average guy (meaning guy without a lab).

Blanks with "collapse" can often be picked up by ear, even if the wood pimp planed them to hide it. The holes inside will make different sounds when struck in different places and muddy the sound. A clear ringing dense blank is harder to tell than a lightweight... But far less inclined to collapse.

Depth in a finished piece of wood could likely be measured by any number of devices looking at changes in reflected light... But "Looking into the well" tells it all without numbers.

Feel I would have to cheat a bit by by expansion to include feeling a chisel run through it; what many call "tasting" a blank. And just the oils are often enough to scream Not Steamed... or worse, steamed heavy.

The chisel can taste a fissile or brash blank better than any way I know.

Adding scent and actual taste is a good way to tell if the blank is truly what is claimed. My father used to claim claro had a warm puke taste to him... He could not explain how he knew the difference between puke temperature tastes...
art