I received mine today. I just had to trim a little off the back of the hand guard. Fit is great but not as tight as the hackberry wood. We'll see how it shoots. I really liked the hackberry wood stock, but I noticed when I put it together that the front hand guard was crooked. I would have had to find a new front hand guard and have it color matched with the rest of the stock. I decided to go with a Minelli from Stocky's. $170; close to $200 with shipping.











I'd say it took me about 30 to 45 minutes to fit the stock and transfer the stock metal from the hackberry stock to my Minelli walnut.

Tony.

Beautiful. Never heard of Minelli's, but it looks like they turn out a fine product.

benny - how do the Minelli stocks compare to the Dupage stocks?

I've never handled a Dupage, so I can't say. I can say that the stock looks like it was custom fit to the receiver. All the contours around the front of the receiver on both sides fit seamlessly around the front of the receiver. The step just in front of the op-rod dismount notch was a perfect fit. No gap at the heel and the whole receiver fits flush all around.

Minelli is an Italian company, so these should be Italian imports. They also said they've ordered M14 stocks as well and should be available in a month or two. Brownell's used to carry them years ago and I kicked myself for not getting one when I could.

The only issue I really had was that my Les Tam NM sling was so thick that I couldn't get the frog (phrog?) through the rear sling swivel. It was denting up my stock just in front of the cutout. I decided to remove the lower buttplate screw and slide the swivel out, then insert the frog through the swivel, and reinstall the screw.

Quote from Stocky's website regarding Minelli...

We're now stocking some of the OEM (original equipment from the manufacturer) walnut stocks many modern reproductions use on their new rifles from an Italian supplier, Minelli. In case you don't know who Minelli is, they make approximately 600,000 stocks per year ranging from the military wood you see here to some of the fanciest wood factory stocks you can imagine for names like Weatherby, Beretta and Krieghoff to name a few. I believe they are the biggest stockmaker in the world.
They'd be great on any rifle, new or old!

Italian manufactured military walnut stocks

Faithful reproduction of original military stocks
Built with great attention to detail, especially in the inletting
Finished with an oil finish, replicating a traditional military stock finish
Ready for fitment of metal hardware and installation, may require minor fitting



Tony.

Nice looking stock.

quote:

Originally posted by benny6:
I've never handled a Dupage, so I can't say.

The CMP Hackberry stocks were/are made by DuPage Trading. I'm not aware of another vendor making Hackberry Garand stocks other than DuPage.

quote:

Originally posted by M1Garandy:

quote:

Originally posted by benny6:
I've never handled a Dupage, so I can't say.

The CMP Hackberry stocks were/are made by DuPage Trading. I'm not aware of another vendor making Hackberry Garand stocks other than DuPage.

If that's the case, then this one fits way better than the hackberry wood stock. DuPage doesn't list hackberry on their site anymore which is why I couldn't figure out who made them.

Here's the misalignment of the front handguard which prompted me to buy another stock...




Other than replacing it I really wouldn't know how to go about fixing it. I wanted to match condition the stock, but with that misalignment, I don't think I'd be able to do it.

The hackberry first required me to hammer the stock in with a mallet and the trigger group locked in really tight. For someone looking for a GI fit, that would have been unacceptable. For me, it just meant that the tight fit means better accuracy.

Since this will be bedded eventually, I don't mind that the Minelli slips in easily. I just care that everything is geometrically correct for bedding and match conditioning.

Here's some images of the hackberry. The machining isn't as nice and you can see where my receiver legs pushed wood out of the way when I fit it...




Looks like my bolt was hitting the stock as well...


Minelli heel as a comparison...


The hackberry has a solid buttstock with no holes for a GI cleaning kit...


The Minelli does...


The front receiver contour was perfect...


The back of the receiver area has a relief step cut into it, as it should for a Garand to allow the receiver heel to flex under recoil. You can see light from the area just forward of the heel to the step down just behind the clip release button.


Here you can see the machined step-down on the top of the stock...


Minelli inletting...


Heel area with properly machined steps...




Enjoy...

Tony.

IIRC, when DuPage was selling Hackberry, I want to say they were less than $75 new.

I've never had a Hackberry stock in hand, but I can say that the couple couple of CMP/DuPage Walnut stocks I've worked with fit nice and tight. The old worn out GI stocks that fall off when you unlatch the trigger guard are no comparison.

To get the wood to metal fit you are showing with your Minelli stock with the DuPage wood I've had required a couple of hours per stock sanding.

I'm in the middle of refinishing another CMP/DuPage right now in fact.

That said, I'd like to see a Minelli in person, they look quite nice out of the box.

Looks like they are on sale for $160 at present.