Making a 3D printed Oculus gun stock

As an /owner of a VR headset, you will most probably end up in an fps game at some point. Pretending to hold a rifle gets old pretty quickly, makes aiming quite hard and an overall not so entertaining experience.

The solution, a custom contraption for the Oculus touch controllers. Sure, there are commercial variants available, but being a maker, that’s really not the first option. I guess this is what 3D printers are made for...

Onto the web to see what’s out there design wise. I printed and tried a few ready made ones. Reconstructed, added to and changed them, but none really fit the bill.

Start over from scratch

First, I do not like to detach the controller from the holder when switching from two handed to one handed actions, the immersion really disappears when fiddling to reattach the controller again. So it has to be lightweight and most importantly, balanced.

Second, having the controller inserted from the top makes in-game interactions below the gun to hit the frame and in some instances not reach the model at all.

Third, when dual gripping, the front hand never seemed to align with the in-game model. All games have their own configurations and model setups, and to my knowledge (as of writing this 2019-02-01), only one game has tried implementing a gun stock setup option (kudos to Caveman Studios for this setting in Contractors)

Prototype top-mounted

So with that in mind, this is what we’re after:

Light weight
Should be able to wield with one hand
Fixed trigger handle
Adjustable front grip (height and side)
Comfortable grip
Adjustable shoulder stock.
Pipe based, e.g. fewer printed parts
No parts in the way of interacting with gun model;
- Change clip
- Reload movement

Getting Closer

Magnet based front grip

Prototype using an ordinary cabinet door magnet hot glued to front attachment. A bit flimsy, but works. Hard to align and reattach to base in VR.

Grip designs

Trying a few handle designs, pistol, revolver and rifle.

Sure, aesthetics are often important, but not so much when it comes to VR accessories. Lets face it, you look quite ridiculous dressed in your pyjamas, waving your hands in the air with a blacked out scuba mask on your face anyway..

MK I

Functionality is king… and I liked the "spoon" shape for the front grip, Therefore;

Quick height adjustment for front grip, with big knob.
Front grip attached to top of rear grip.
Stock from bottom of rear grip
Grip based on real rifle
Weight: 226 grams (385 with controller)

The height adjustment mechanism works surprisingly well...

This resulted in a working prototype. Rough and ugly, but works as intended.

But...
…when writing this post, I realized it could be one more iteration.

For those who’s not keen on “semi permanently” attaching stuff on the controller.
Making it compatible with the new Oculus Touch controllers..
Stability