Guys, I just had another case of FAIL.

You know this child hood sorrow every wanabe Engineer encounters? You
know the one where you spend a ton of time designing something only to
find out that the bicycle was invented by some French guy?

So here it is, My invention and contribution to the opening of this Collapsible/Folding Stocks topic.












Pretty kick ass stock ey?...that's what I kept telling myself when designing it, only with "It's going to be..." in the beginning of the phrase.

Perhaps you guys might know of a few more cool folding stock designs that I'm inventing?

Let me know please...I was in the dumps all day today because of this.

Ivo

That really is a neat design. I have over looked it in the past, to simple, but looking at it again. I like it smooth and simple and clean.

Good for you Ivo on inventing it. Yeah I know the feeling of creating something only to find it has been done already. It gets worse if the other design is better

I have always been partial to the HK MP5 collapsible stock http://www.hkparts.net/shop/pc/MP5-Stocks-Fixed-Stocks-and-Retractable-Stocks-c83.htm



Another snazzy design http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:MP_40_Schmeisser_Machine_pistol-_randolf_museum.jpg



Everything else I looked at was pretty much run of the mill folding stocks.

Sorry it took me so long to get back to this topic. Once again I'm caught up in work.

The H&K stock is a sweeet, I actually tried replicating it and learned about a few interesting details in the process.

My inspiration were a bit different though...

Saw CheTac M200 and fell in love with it.



Looks like it even uses a cam lever to lock the stock in place.



And the platform chosen for the mod was one of those Taiwanese folding crossbows...chose the platform after seeing this crossbow made by Zaoshi (some company in Taiwan that's notorious for cloning a variaty sports equipment...a nock off manufacturer of sorts).

http://www.teraasekeskus.com/tuotteet.asp?osasto=zhaoshi&lan=eng



...still the folding bow they made actually showed some interesting features(like the unique folding limbs that are locked by swinging the stirrup in place) and I moved on with the mod.



Now the issues I was talking about is that this wire stock was flexing left and right on me, I used a 3/8" rod and the butt still tilted to the right when I shouldered it. It was comfortable and all since it shifted to contour the shoulder anatomy, but I abandoned the project since it didn't instill in me much confidence. Might pick it up again though and try to reinforce it somehow...perhaps do a molded hollow butt/cheekpiece part similar to CheTac and use thicker rods(probably even tubes or slides). Any suggestions welcome.

I got more on the Uzi stock, but I'm out of time now and most of it will have to wait till tomorrow(ok, I know it's already 4 hours into tomorrow, so tonight actually )

OK, Last thing, since I just can't not mention it...

Good for you Ivo on inventing it.
Yeah I know the feeling of creating something only to find it has
been done already. It gets worse if the other design is better

Yeh, it really sucks, but thinking about it now....at least we don't have to work out all the bugs.
What makes me happy is this...I would have spent more money building my half ass prototype when in reality that stock goes for only $15 on this site: Link
*don't know what I'm going to do with the slide cover that comes with it, but I'm getting the stock to use with the project that I was designing it for...hey saves me some time, so why not? *

Ivo

$15 for a collapsible stock? I just might order one of those to have on hand till I can figure out what to do with it.

As for the bending issues. A tube would be more resistant to bending than a similar diameter solid bar. I did get a couple of ideas for crossbow collapsible stock. Not sure how buildable they are. I'll try to get some drawings up soon.

The nice thing about a crossbow stock is that it can be lighter since it doesn't have to take the strong recoil shock of a rifle.

It seems to me that using steel with a square cross section might flex less than a piece of round stock same diameter. At least you could control the direction of flex?

Found another interesting folding stock on Izhmash (weapons manufacturer) website.



Couldn't find a good video showing the over the receiver folding stock in action, kinda lame, but what can you do...the thing is still pretty cool with it's cylinder mag and good for show.



I think it's very similar to the stock on this little prop crossbow, not sure if it was copied off of Bizon or the builder had the same fortune/misfortune that I had with the Uzi stock.




Still hunting out these cool little ideas.

Ivo