Cheap and easy DIY Atlas Bipod leg extensions

[Langford]

I occasionally hunt from a seated position on the ground, but it's not always easy for me to get a steady shot while doing so. I love my Atlas bipods, but they are nowhere near long enough to use while sitting on the ground.

So a few weeks back, I was browsing Facebook and saw B&T industries (Atlas) posted a link to their leg extensions, which look very nice...but they also mentioned that the inside diameter of their bipod leg is .5" (with the feet removed) and a wood dowel makes a perfect DIY leg extension. Wow, what a great idea...so credit goes to B&T industries for this project.



This past weekend, I ran to Lowes to get a few home improvement items, and the wood dowel leg extension project popped back into my head. So I took a detour to the lumber section and grabbed two oak 1/2" diameter dowels.





After getting home and measuring, I figured that a 20" extension would be ideal to allow me to shoot comfortably while seated. A few quick minutes of work with a hand saw, I had the dowels cut to length. They took a bit of sanding to make them fit inside of the Atlas legs, but nothing major.






after I got them finished, I wanted to dress them up a bit. After rummaging around in my garage, I dug out a few pieces of 1/2" heat shrink tube I had leftover from the service change I did on my house last year. Perfect fit, and it looked damn good once installed and shrunk over the dowels.




Well, I wasn't happy leaving them that way...I wanted a way to run the factory bipod feet. Simple and cheap fix was two 1/2" coupler nuts from Home Depot. I drilled the threads out with a 1/2" bit, and did a little more light sanding on the dowels to make them fit nice and snugly. There was just enough thread left inside of the nuts to grab the detent on the factory feet, so they hold in place perfectly...takes a few pounds of pressure to pull them out. And to cover up that shiny metal, a few inch piece of 3/4" heat shrink tube did the trick.










Im very happy with how these turned out, after doing a little testing...they seem like they'll be perfect. Total cost for this project, under $10 and about an hour of my time.









I didn't mention it, but while at Home Depot grabbing those coupler nuts, I saw 1/2"x36" aluminum rods ($7.xx).Perfect, no worries about snapping the legs like the possibility with the oak (although that's very unlikely in itself, the oak ones are very strong). I ended up cutting the aluminum legs to 17", that way I could get 2 legs from one piece of stock and I could use some of the factory extension on the atlas bipods without making them too tall for me to use comfortably.
Just finished these up with the same process for the feet holders and heat shrink tube. Same as the wood dowels, the aluminum tool a little sanding to make them fit inside of the Atlas legs, but nothing major. Can't wait to get these out in the field to test out.

 

[afd77]

Awesome work! Let us know how they hold up.

 

[MTSLW]

Great idea, thanks for the share

 

[Badfinger]

Tag

 

[kill_zone67]

Nice! Thank you for sharing!

 

[Covertnoob5]

Damn! I've been looking for a way to get leg extensions on my 5H Atlas. This might do the trick.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[mark5pt56]

Pretty cool! I wonder how well the Stoney Point shooting sticks would adapt to the legs?

 

[Engine 22]

Thanks for sharing!

 

[hollowoutadime]

Bookmarked, what a great idea. Thanks!

 

[paxamus]

That is a great idea! I know what I am dong this weekend!!

 

[KUSA]

Now you need to do this with the monopod in the rear.

 

[Safety_3rd]

Sweet

 

[Trx498r]

Nicely done ??

 

[pell1203]

Anybody know what happened to the OP's pictures on this thread? Anyone make a copy they could share?

 

[dave300]

No pics viewable here either

 

[bjay]

Same here no photos showing

 

[pell1203]

I wonder if @Langford would care to chime in on this. He was the OP and is a frequent visitor to the forum.

 

[Langford]

Hmm...not sure what happened, they were uploaded here to the forum. I’ll work on editing and updating the images this evening on the original post.

 

[SRSDriver]

I did the same thing, in a pinch, using the bottom half of some trekking poles that were 0.48" +/-. I wrapped a little bit of aluminum can shim around the pole, put it in there, and used heat shrink.

Much cheaper than the pricey factory made extensions that nobody ever has in stock, and mine are lighter.

 

[Langford]

Can’t edit the original post, so I just quoted it and added the photos again...hopefully this works.


I occasionally hunt from a seated position on the ground, but it's not always easy for me to get a steady shot while doing so. I love my Atlas bipods, but they are nowhere near long enough to use while sitting on the ground.

So a few weeks back, I was browsing Facebook and saw B&T industries (Atlas) posted a link to their leg extensions, which look very nice...but they also mentioned that the inside diameter of their bipod leg is .5" (with the feet removed) and a wood dowel makes a perfect DIY leg extension. Wow, what a great idea...so credit goes to B&T industries for this project.



This past weekend, I ran to Lowes to get a few home improvement items, and the wood dowel leg extension project popped back into my head. So I took a detour to the lumber section and grabbed two oak 1/2" diameter dowels.





After getting home and measuring, I figured that a 20" extension would be ideal to allow me to shoot comfortably while seated. A few quick minutes of work with a hand saw, I had the dowels cut to length. They took a bit of sanding to make them fit inside of the Atlas legs, but nothing major.






after I got them finished, I wanted to dress them up a bit. After rummaging around in my garage, I dug out a few pieces of 1/2" heat shrink tube I had leftover from the service change I did on my house last year. Perfect fit, and it looked damn good once installed and shrunk over the dowels.




Well, I wasn't happy leaving them that way...I wanted a way to run the factory bipod feet. Simple and cheap fix was two 1/2" coupler nuts from Home Depot. I drilled the threads out with a 1/2" bit, and did a little more light sanding on the dowels to make them fit nice and snugly. There was just enough thread left inside of the nuts to grab the detent on the factory feet, so they hold in place perfectly...takes a few pounds of pressure to pull them out. And to cover up that shiny metal, a few inch piece of 3/4" heat shrink tube did the trick.










Im very happy with how these turned out, after doing a little testing...they seem like they'll be perfect. Total cost for this project, under $10 and about an hour of my time.









I didn't mention it, but while at Home Depot grabbing those coupler nuts, I saw 1/2"x36" aluminum rods ($7.xx).Perfect, no worries about snapping the legs like the possibility with the oak (although that's very unlikely in itself, the oak ones are very strong). I ended up cutting the aluminum legs to 17", that way I could get 2 legs from one piece of stock and I could use some of the factory extension on the atlas bipods without making them too tall for me to use comfortably.
Just finished these up with the same process for the feet holders and heat shrink tube. Same as the wood dowels, the aluminum tool a little sanding to make them fit inside of the Atlas legs, but nothing major. Can't wait to get these out in the field to test out.

 

[pell1203]

Thanks! Greatly appreciate the effort.

 

[shootnozeros]

Great way to improve on a great bipod! I was surfing looking for this exact thing!! It doesnt have to be competion perfect to shoot called in and stuck coyotes at 85-100
yards.

 

[shax2lex]

I saw this thread and I too thought it was a great idea. I needed longer bipod legs for sitting to hunt coyotes. I grabbed the 36" long dowels but they flexed so much. I think cutting the oak dowels down to 20" would reduce the flex but did you find that they still flexed too much?

Which legs did you like better? The Al or the oak dowels?

 

[VSki]

I am curious to hear how much flex is in the legs as well..that’s a fantastic idea

 

[pmclaine]

Awesome @Kasey would provide the hack to cut his own sales. Customer oriented in this day and age?

These are great threads.

"I used this instead of........" should be a topic section. The sport is expensive enough and anyway to save a buck to "BMA" is appreciated.

I have a similar project coming up soon to cut the cost of scoping a rifle.

Another week I'll have my raw material to start my project with a custom scope body.......

My wife won't let me just take the towels off and start now.....bitch.

 

[shax2lex]

24” is about as long as you want. There is too much flex for me at 36”.

I took my rifle pig/coyote hunting last night with the longer legs.

Never mind the double barreled zip tied Tasco flashlights. ?

 

[atepointer]

This is fantastic! Thanks for posting

 

[Torchy]

Nice work and write up OP

 

[VSki]

Nice work and write up OP

2nd↑

 

[short_mag]

Here is what I came up with. Heavy wall carbon fiber tube and I turned an adapter that snaps into the leg of the Atlas. Weighs a couple ounces and tough as nails.

 

[CaptNemo]

Here is what I came up with. Heavy wall carbon fiber tube and I turned an adapter that snaps into the leg of the Atlas. Weighs a couple ounces and tough as nails.View attachment 7238373View attachment 7238374

Where did you source the CF tubing ?

 

[Maelstrom]

Here is what I came up with. Heavy wall carbon fiber tube and I turned an adapter that snaps into the leg of the Atlas. Weighs a couple ounces and tough as nails.View attachment 7238373View attachment 7238374

Could these be made for the larger SCAL legs as well?

 

[short_mag]

Where did you source the CF tubing ?

...Amazon has tons of that sort of stuff. I used a 16mmOD by 12mm ID tube.

 

[short_mag]

Could these be made for the larger SCAL legs as well?

I am sure you could - I believe that they use the same feet therefore would probably have the same tenon dimensions. So one would likely work for both. I don’t own a SCAL so that is just a guess.

 

[1911Shootist]

Not as fancy as @short_mag extensions, but I was able to cobble these together with minimal tools. Turned some 1/2" Al stock in the drill press using a file and sandpaper, taking care to keep the cut even. Only needed to remove ~0.007". Drilled and tapped some 10-32 spring detents to match the stock feet. Drilled out the 16mm OD / 12mm ID carbon tubes with a 1/2" drill bit about an inch on each side, did some slight contouring with a Dremel and epoxied the Al bits in. Very stiff and strong. 5.6oz for the pair.

Parts:
1/2" Al stock ($1.70)
Spring detents x2 ($9.40)
16x12x500mm Carbon Tubes ($28)

 

[Craigmcwill]

Any of the guys on here ever thought about making a video of how they done these.

Just bought my first rifle and these would be unebelieveably helpful for my atlas.

Thankyou

 

[Steelhead]

Thanks for sharing. May need to try this.

 

[omnis]

tag