Stock Options

Stock Options, not the ones traded on Wall Street (although shares in Firearms companies is a great idea for a Blog Post), we are talking about Gun Stocks today, specifically Ruger 10-22 Stocks.

The Ruger 10-22 is perhaps the most customized gun in history and the easiest part to add or modify is the stock. Thus it would stand to reason that their are hundreds of options when it comes to 10-22 stocks.

I wanted my 10-22 to have a tactical look, I do not own many tactical rifles and I thought it would be fun to "tacticool" my little Ruger, if for no other reason than to piss off the hoplophobes (see my post: Something for the Hoplophobes).

I originally chose the Butler Creek folding pistol grip stock, I really liked the look and feel of the Butler Creek stock, but they have a design flaw that I was not aware of:
 The area surrounding the trigger group does not fit snugly against the trigger group housing and under certain conditions, the trigger pin can "walk" out of its hole, causing the trigger to fail to reset. (the trigger pin is item #4 in the picture below)

So I went on a quest to find a new "tacticool" stock for my 10-22, here are just some of the options out there:
The Butler Creek:

Choate makes a similar stock, although not easy to find:

As does Black Warrior (I believe these are sold under the "John Masen" moniker now)

 Ramline, makers of cheap accessories for .22 rifles, made this abortion of a stock. It was flimsy and fragile. I owned own, not the best design or quality...

Tapco offers their Intrafuse Stock system in a 10-22 variant. They are affordable and plentiful, just not quite what I was looking for.

Here is one offered by a company called "Christies", I was not impressed with this one

ATI offers their StikeForce Stock for the 10-22, again these are affordable and easy to find:

Ruger actually used the ATI stock on a 10-22 model as well as their Mini-14 Rifle. 
Ruger recently produced a new version of the 10-22 called the SR-22 Rifle, it mimics the look and feel of the AR rifle with 10-22 innards

Another tactical stock with a unique feature is this one from Lyman & TacStar, it has the adjustable butt stock as well as storage for spare 10 round factory magazines.

The stock has an optional mono-pod in the grip, and it comes in camo as well

Here are a couple of Bullpup styles, these are obivously designed to resemble the FN PS90:
This one is from High Tower

 This one is from the clowns at Red Jacket - neva been dun before- Firearms. I have it on good authority these are over-priced and not of very good quality, plus there is a long lead time. They do look cool though and come in colors...

Another bullpup, this one, called the "Raptor" is from the guys at Center Balance Systems

 

 

How about  an underfolder, this one designed like an AK stock (from underfoldstocks.com)

There is also the "Krinker Plinker" designed to look like the Krinkov SBR

Rhineland Arms makes this stock, called the "Leopard", it has a Euro- German Schützen look to it, I'm not sure what my opinion is of it. The price is reasonable at $140, see it here

On the higher end of quality/cost spectrum is the Troy T22, very good quality, but like most things, you have to pay good money for this kind of quality

 
Archangel has some really neat stocks for a variety of rifles, their most popular is this one for the 10-22, it looks very similar to the Ruger SR-22 shown above

Archangel also offers these stocks for our favorite rimfire rifle

Of course you could go with more of a sniper style stock

Perhaps something a little more traditional like the Hogue over-molded?

There are also dozens of wood stock designs available

Another option worth considering is the M-1 Carbine stock, some crafty stock makers have a kit to transform your 10-22 into a WWII battle carbine, you'll have people taking double takes at the range

Here is a side by side comparison with the real thing

  Following the same idea you can make your 10-22 look like a Thompson Sub-Machine gun, 10-22fun.com has the kits in "Chicago" & "Squad Leader" styles

In the end I chose to go with the ATI StrikeForce. The ATI had a few things going for it:
1. Ruger used these stocks as a factory offering, which is good as any review in my book
2. I didn't need to read them, but the reviews for this stock are very good
3. The stock has both LOP adjustments as well as a folding option for storage
4. Price was affordable, less than $100 shipped to my door.
5. Availability
6. Made in the USA!

Here is the stock and the parts that came with it

The stock came with multiple options on the pictatinny rails and two different butt stock mounts, one for open sights and one for scopes. It also came with an adjustable check rest along with some 3M covering. The covering offers a softer, smoother place to weld your check which is also warmer to the touch.

After removing the hand guard, this is what the inside of the barrel channel looks like. Pretty well designed.
I did run into one issue, since I was going to use the hand guard that came with the stock, I gave up my UTG quad rail. So I was going to install a Williams picatinney rail/scope mount. When I lined up the holes to screw it on, it wouldn't fit. The hand guard mounts so that it fits tight against the receiver. So rather than cut my nice Williams mount (that also featured a built in peep sight, I decided  to buy a cheap one at the gun show. 

I cut the new picatinney rail down so it would fit and all 4 screws could be used. I'll cover the bare aluminum with paint or a sharpie

Finished! Now I need to go out and shoot it!

I'll provide a range report as soon as I have time to shoot it.