Milling a Drop Port

[Badbob]

Hey folks

I'm inletting a stock for a Bat B, RB, LF, DP. I assumed the drop port slot needed to be the same shape as the case opening in the bottom of the Bat B. However, if I milled it straight down through my stock the Bat trigger guard would cover that opening. So either folks are using a special trigger guard or the drop port shaft is a different shape.

Anybody got any pics or help? I was fairly certain the Wheeler stock has an opening shaped like a case, not a circle.

It looks like if I mill out the entire distance for the trigger hanger (so I can drop the trigger without taking the action out of the stock), that there will be a very thin wall of material between the trigger hanger slot and the drop port slot. Don't really want to go in that direction.

Any help, suggestions, pics, or tips would be a huge help. Cheers! BB

 

[Dusty Stevens]

heres how i always do it

 

[Badbob]

Dusty . . . huge thanks for this! How do you mill the funnel slope? Chisel by hand? As I suspected there is a very thin wall of material between the trigger hanger and the back of the funnel. Humm, gunna have to think this through. Again many thanks!

 

[hpshooter]

"How do you mill the funnel slope?"

Tilt the head or make an angle plate to set the stock up on to save re-tramming the head would be my choices.

 

[Badbob]

TW . . . agreed . . . resetting the head is a pain! I also see the two major gun part retailers sell an insert "funnel". I guess you could over cut and bed in the funnel sleeve. Thx!

 

[Dusty Stevens]

Yes bed the funnel in there

 

[Alex Wheeler]

I cut the front of the port straight and angle the back of the port as to not cut into the trigger guard. I used to cut a funnel shape but what I found is that with a little bigger port you can still get a finger in there to push up a case that fell in or jammed up for any reason. So I no longer cut the funnel shape. This is a Bat B port.

 

[Badbob]

Thanks Alex . . . I guess I should have bought the one screw trigger guard . . . sigh. How do you go about cutting the back angle of the port? Tilt the head on your mill? Thanks BB

 

[Alex Wheeler]

No, I have tall jaws on my vise and tilt the stock.

 

[sdean]

Alex’s way is better than a funnel.

 

[wwbrown]

Alex has the way to go, I did my drop port by milling a funnel shaped cavity and it has worked flawlessly for the last 1,000 rounds. The first 500 rounds took a bit of tweaking to get it to work flawlessly.

That being said the drop port is amazingly slick, just place your ball cap under the action and ALL of your brass is laying there at the end of shooting. No searching around in the grass picking up the brass you have lovingly prepared.

 

[JFrank]

Could a Bat rblpre be converted to a DP

 

[drano38]

Yes, Bat will do it for you, and I'm sure gunsmiths will too.
But you'll need a new bolt since the extractor needs to be at 6 o'clock.

 

[Alex Wheeler]

You would be $$$ ahead to sell the action and have Bat make you a drop port. When I was doing Pandas and Borden (before he offered a drop port) I would order the bolt with no ejector and no extractor. Then cut the drop port and extractor in. I much prefer buying them from the factory