Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Gunsmithing stock crack

Art is, of course, correct in his estimation. There is no way you are going to clamp that crack closed without damage to the stock. Best you can hope for is to stop the crack from spreading by some of the methods mentioned above and try to hide the crack on the outside.

Not sure if this would work in this case as the crack radiates across the grain quite a bit, but I've tried this several times and it works most of the time. Cut a very thing piece of walnut that matches the color and grain as closely as you can and long enough to go into the entire crack. Sand one edge so the edge is a wedge but the piece is wide enough to leave wood sticking out of the crack when you're done. It should look about like a popsicle sized piece of wood with the edge like a knife edge. Heat the stock and work as much epoxy into the crack as you can by Art's method, then drive the knife edge of the walnut wedge into the crack lightly with a small mallet or something. Not enough force to open the crack more, just enough to get the edge of the wood into the crack and fill the crack. Let it dry over night or however long the epoxy takes to cure. (in some conditions, epoxy may take a little longer to cure- usually extremely high humidity). Once dry, cut the piece down close to the surface and sand flush with the surface.
This will leave a bit of raw wood exposed and also a bit of the surround wood should be exposed down to raw wood. At this time, if the match isn't as good as you would like, use a small artist's brush and apply some stain to try to match up to the surrounding wood to create an invisible patch. Let it cure for several days and apply your finish of choice. Sealing with Shellac would be a good idea to be sure your chosen finish will take without any problems.
I've done this a few times and you literally had to look very closely to see there was a repair. All depends on how well you can match the grain and color of the wood. Anything would be better than the situation you have now- short of a new stock...

Bob

It's posts like this that I'm glad I consider MY gun stocks to be handles..... . and yes , they pretty much look it after several decades of use/abuse.

Not to say I don't appreciate fancy wood (I have a couple), or good craftsmanship,
but if that was my stock, I'd epoxy fill that crack with Art's method and forget it. A high end gun would justifynthe extra effort - I'd just send it to Sheister....

Those "grain cracks" can be a real PITA!

2 part epoxy and brass srews if you can hide them. Epoxy can be wrked into a crack with uncoated dental floss.