doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DIY Gunsmithing @ doublegunshop.com Glue suitable for stock repairs

It looks like an in the wood, oil type of finish. That makes hiding it tough. If you do a built up, on top of the wood finish you can make it disappear completely. I have played around with blending the two types of finish with the built up area being over the repair. It works reasonably well. You end up adding a lighter color pigment to your finish and applying it heavier in the area of repair than the other areas. Many coats of finish and not getting the pigment too thick helps. Pro-custom works well in this type of repair. I have started using an air brush for this process. A lacquer carries the pigment and is sealed in place by the Pro-custom. It takes quite a bit of playing with but I am very encouraged that an extremely high quality repair can be accomplished. I am currently in the final stages of a stock repair where I inlet a 5" piece of wood to the comb of a rifle in order to remove an old leather cheek piece. Almost done and it looks great so far. Tons of work involved in that process though. Hopes that helps.
Steve

Obviously, I would have no qualms about using Titebond II. It is a proven performer in clean walnut. In some circumstances, I would choose a good epoxy, such as if there was any amount of gap filling or if I needed to glue in reinforcing pins. I have never used cyanoacrylate glue to repair a gunstock. They may have their place to stabilize rotted punky wood that had been oil soaked, but it is not strong in a shear condition, which is the type of stress that breaks toes or knocks off a piece of wood behind an action or tang. Certainly not for a broken wrist.

This opinion may change when I get a chance to try Titebond III.

Stan, what kind of glue was used for that behind the tang repair?

That's kind of why I did my experiment to find out which adhesive would give me the most undetectable glue joint. Of course, that's only half the battle. You also need a perfectly fitted piece of wood that matches as closely as possible, and then you need to clamp correctly and control glue squeeze out as much as possible, cleaning most of it as you clamp and before the glue sets.

That was a big problem I saw with the polyurethane glue. Unless it would be possible to sand deep enough to remove the glue stain, it acted like a sealer and the joint was very visible under stock finish.

At this point, your options would likely be hiding the joint with a faux grain, which is ridiculously expensive unless you can learn to do it yourself. Or you could patch over the patch with another thin veneer of matching walnut that extended just beyond the current repair. But even with a perfect grain match, you still have a cross grain section at the rear that is harder to conceal under the best of circumstances. Of course, the perfect place to hide that part of the glue joint would be about an inch further back in the vee of checkering border.

I think I can help a little. First, you might consider staining the stock pretty dark. I would then try to hide it with oil paint from an art store. You cannot use artist acrylic paint because it has a different look when you are done and apply an oil finish. I have tried and came real close but after the finish it looks like you painted it. Art type oil paint will look fine but your oil finish will dissolve it and it seems to disappear. I put a thin coat of lacquer over the oil and then oil finished it. That worked.

The really difficult part is the painting. I found the best way was to camouflage it for lack of a better word. Extending the right arm and left arm of your "U" toward the butt and maybe one or two down the middle so it looks like you have mineral streaks. That was an example. I don't see any figure in this stock so I am not sure how you would fool the eye. Unless you are an artist then this will be very difficult. Mark Larson did one for me and it was not detectable when he was finished. My work not so much. I hope someone with more experience will come along and help you more.

Thanks for all the replies. To address the questions and comment in order, somewhat ....... there is no finish on the stock Steve. It was de-oiled before the repair was done, and all finish is gone.

keith, that was Loctite brand 2-Ton clear epoxy. Sure didn't dry clear did it? And that pic was taken after it was dressed down and sanded a little.

Milt, thank you for that mini-tutorial on hiding it with oil paint. That may be the route I travel with it. I've got a pretty good eye for colors and matching stuff. At least I've had success with doing that with stains. This may be entirely different, but when I get a chance to go by an art store I will look at the paints available. You pegged the problem ......... there is no streaking in this stock. It is very plain, but is solid and in excellent condition.

I'm determined to get this right, and time is not an issue.

Thanks all, SRH

Steve, I'm interested in learning more about the built-up finish, if possible...............the type pigment, lacquer, etc.

Thanks again, SRH

Pm sent.

The stock makers and repairers that I know all use epoxy. It can be easily tinted with a drop or two of oil based paint pigment. I have even used it to repair a 70 year old steering wheel.