PM sent drcook. Thanks

Get hold of Doug Carpenter. He fixed the stock on my father's old Model 17 Remington made in 1928. It was in pretty bad shape with a lot of cracks, oil soaked wood, etc,. The gun I sent him had the checkered stock and the checkering was basically worn smooth from all the years of use. He recut the checkering and the stock looks great.

Alleycat - way to dive in head first on this project! It may not end up perfect, but you'll get a lot of satisfaction from the process.

I'm super curious to hear how this project is advancing and details on the steps you've taken if you care to keep us posted. This thread is inspiring me to finally work on an old project stock with chips and cracks too, so would like to 'follow along'.

As important - hats off to this great community - drcook, in particular - for jumping in to give a hand. Forgot to post this in the thread below, but sorry to hear about your injury!

I’m with Halwg on this. Doug Carpenter is great at repairing cracks, refinishing and recutting checkering. Unless you have considerable skill, you’d be better off having him do the work.

Per drcook advice I soaked stock in acetone bath for 4 days, pulled it and sanded lightly with 320 grit sandpaper. I'm going to repair 2 sizable cracks with Gorilla Glue (as done in Midway video) clamp and clean up glue areas (Goriilla glue is sandable). Plan is to use tinted Acraglass bedding compound to build damaged areas back up and sand. Going with several coats of true oil with a 0000 Steel wool buffing between coats. I appreciate the tips on the talented stock guys. If this was the stock on one of my finer guns I would certainly send it their way for professional repair but I think I can handle the repair on this gun and maintain the field gun pedigree that it has. I'm not striving for perfection here, only trying to learn and give something that was is very old and cool, another lease on life. I'll post some pics after the Holiday when I return home.

I have a beautiful 1935 Ithaca NID 20 gauge that I may send to that fellow. No cracks thank goodness but I do want to have refinished, checking recut and the recoil pad replaced with a period sunburst reproduction one I just ordered from Connecticut Shotgun.

Do you have a belt sander? I shutter to think of Acraglass on the exterior. Replacing with wood is just as easy if you have a sander. I would be more then happy to send you the little bit of wood you would need if you don't have access to walnut.

I would love to go the walnut route but I don't have a grasp on how to configure the bottom of the walnut piece (the side that mates with the damaged area) so that it fits the contour of the exposed damaged wood surface. I can certainly handle knocking down the top (surface) of the new walnut piece to match contour of stock after its glued in.

You just make it flat. So that you are gluing a flat piece to a flat piece. The 2 pieces will have to have an absolutely tight joint surface otherwise you will be left with a not so nice looking line all around the new piece.

That is why sometimes (depending on the value of the gun, how bad the stock is, etc) it works just to fix it with Acraglas that is dyed to the same color that you will stain the gun.

The correct way to fix a stock is not always the best way. It doesn't make sense to send a stock to someone to get repaired when that repair will cost more than the gun ever can be sold for and for a gun that has no family/sentimental connections.

Unless you are very skilled at inletting it in, the grain is always going to mismatch.

I have one here that I fixed with Acraglas as well as others that I glued the chips back on (I had the chips).

In order to match the grain you are going to have to go to either use a bigger piece which ends up intruding into the cutout (which you will have to restore) or use a couple small pieces very carefully fit together.

Get the crack fixed first and the rest of the oil leached out before committing on a way to go.

here are some videos to help you make a decision

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AH4Akq1tUUU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77u1e2SsUQU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HiQxACLWIyQ