Cut down a stock?

[wtilenw]

A friend of mine has a nice custom .54 caliber percussion gun but the length of pull is 14 1/4" and he needs 13 1/2". The gun has a brass buttplate that wraps around on the top, as well as the bottom (bottom piece is a seperate piece). He has asked several people to help him with it and no one will touch it, they say they dont want to screw up such a nice gun. His opinion is, " If I cant shoot it comfortably, what difference does it make if it is pretty". I have agreed to undertake the project since I have many years woodworking experience and am meticulous about my work I however, have never built a gun. I'm sure I can pull it off to his satisfaction but would welcome any suggestions before I start. It also has a raised cheekrest. With the amount of wood that I need to take off to get the correct length of pull for him, the brass trim will run into the raised cheekrest. I was just going to shorten the brass on the top and bottom so when I remove the wood from the butt of the gun, the brass buttplate wont advance as far as the wood removal. That, I think will work and still leave the integrity of the stock symmetry. My question is, What Should I use to make the original cut, since the stock is no longer a flat plane, like a blank starts? I was just gonna lay out my projected lines, cut with a bandsaw, or jigsaw and use the front of a beltsander to fit the brass back to the buttplate. Any help?
Thanks, Idaho PRB :hmm:

 

Ya may want to check some catalogs to see if another butt plate will work. TOTW is online but their hardcopy catalog has fullsize pictures in it. You might mess up the symitry some but if he isn't comfortable with it, I would say cut it

 

[rich pierce]

I'd not cut a custom gun up. I'd rather sell it and get another. This is not a job for a first-timer, but for the original maker if possible.

If it is not really such a fine custom gun, there are two solutions I'd prefer if forced to cut it.
1) There are plenty of originals cut shorter, even fine longrifles where part of the carving was removed. I'd trim this buttplate down (width and length) or get or make another buttplate and cut the stock and inlet it. This approach is a "period repair" approach (what they would have done then). The downside of this approach is that the cheekpiece will look too close to the buttplate.
2)If it's a plain rifle, strip the stock, cut, refit the buttplate and re-shape the cheekpiece, then re-stain and re-finish.