Now that we are over my mushy stuff, back to building our rifle. Once the pattern is finally layed out the diamonds have to be deepened untill they come to points. For this I use a single line cutter and again reverse the direction of the cut after every four or five lines. Once you have done a checkering job a few times you can slack off some times and only change direction every ten lines or so. Make sure you do not go too far back on the back stroke with the checkering tool, this whole process is sort of a scrubbing opperation. As the cutter nears the border of the pattern go easy and edge the cutter up to the border and rock it forward then drag it back so you can cut cleanly up to the edge. Here you need a bit of pressure but be careful as it is very easy to jump into either a line yet not cut or the one prevously cut. Before the diamonds are mostly pointed the pattern will have to be gone over five or more times to be nice and clean. Well cut checkering will never hide the grain of the wood, tone it down a bit yes but not hide it. It is for this reason anong others that I will not use an electric checkering tool. I think this picture will show what I mean about checkering not covering the grain. By the way, this is a good way to hide that ugly screw hole for the forearm screw on a Ruger # 1

Please forgive the way the two screws look in the picture!!!!! I think it was the flash as they are North and Sout as are all the screws on the rifle and they are not buggered up!