Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Sticky, gummy stock?

I only use one or two guns for hunting and the rest remain in the safe. i have not pulled these guns out in several years and tonight i was looking for one in particular to check the scope. when i grabbed a remington, i found it to be very gummy and sticky - so much so, that my fingerprints were left on it. this is a remington model 700 titanium with the fluted stainless barrel. this is the original stock that came with the gun; possibly purchased around 2009 (not sure). about seven years ago, i sent it to remington because the butt plate had "melted" to the carpet in the safe. you guys know much more about this than i do. is there a way to clean the stock and remove the stickiness, or do i need to find a replacement stock? also, it's hard to wash the sticky stuff off my hands, even with dawn dishwashing soap.

not that pictures will help but maybe:

Honestly I have never seen anything like it and can only assume you have some Deet derivative stored in with the rifle.

no sir, nothing in there but guns and knives, a little ammo and a couple of pistol cases. i'm thinking it must be some type of chemical reaction with the carpet on the floor of the safe, since there was a reaction with the butt plate. i just put on a pair of gloves to move it from the table to stand it against a wall and the residue showed on the gloves.

Remove the action and the recoil pad, and immerse the stock in a wallpaper tank of Mineral Spirits for a few hours. Dry it off with a a heat gun or a hair dryer and grab a rattle can of Krylon in whatever color you prefer. You might have to do a little sanding once the sticky stuff is gone.

I’ve seen it, especially with the early b&c maxxguard stocks such as yours. The first generation ti suffered the sticky pads as well - but they changed the stock on the second generation Alaskan ti when they went to the bdl and added the rubbery coating. I’m not sure if it’s a function of time or too many wipes with a rag containing a cleaner or oil that doesn’t mesh well.

The easiest solution is to simply rid yourself of that nasty thing and be done with it - I’ll take it off your hands for an appropriate disposal fee. If that isn’t in the cards, a replacement stock is an easy fix. Lastly, if you enjoy a mess, discovering new expletives, and playing with reactions which will definitely cause cancer in the communist state of CA, HRL’s approach above will work.

That would piss me off to find that. I’d get a new stock, be hard to sell like it is.

Ya, that appears to be a flaw in the mix design of the original first few batches of material. I have seen this sort of mess in injection moulding procedures, though I am certainly no expert on it! A new stock should be in the offing!

Wouldn't hurt to contact Remington.
All they can say is "Sorry, we can't help you."

Were those HS Precision stocks?

May reach out to them. Not for warranty, but for advice.

I had the recoil pad on a Remington LVSF 17 Rem get all sticky. They sent me a new stock with a phone call. I still have it in the box and ended up ordering a sporter style from Stockys which I prefer over the LVSF stock.

I also had the soles on a pair of leather Rocky boots turn to sticky mush. They refused to replace them so they lost me as a customer for life

Everyone I knew that had rocky boots had the dreaded sole rot.

6 weeks ago I sent pics of 2 sticky pads via email to limbsaver. One for an lvsf and the other for an old slip on pad. They sent 2 replacements pronto. For free.

The recoil pad on my Remington 11-87 did the same thing.

Yep, Rocky Boots are one of the worst products ever made. One would think by now people would have stopped buying their crap products after all these years of complaints.

I had a pad smooge my carpet. I can't say that it was the carpet or whether it was just where the problem manifested itself. I suspected insect repellent but cannot recollect having used it and I am always very careful when I do for this very reason. I've noticed this problem on other items of similar material, most recently on the handle of my Oregon chain sharpener. It seems too that the problem does not limit itself and instead continues as if by some catalyzed reaction. I wish I knew what causes this so that I could do something to prevent it.

I also had a pair of Rockys deteriorate until only the midsole remained.

B&C.

And yes, reaching out to them might not be a horrible idea.

My Limbsaver pad did the same thing last year. It was ~20 years old so I just assumed that it was normal rubber rot.

I've experienced that same problem before ... I know exactly what has transpired.

Something outgassed in your closed environment. In my case, in my safe, it was batteries in a battery powered automatic light/dehumidifier that I had in that safe, one that the light turned-on when the door opened and the dehumidifier ran for 30 minutes after it shut.

It had been years aince I thought to change the batteries because the light kept coming on .... unbeknownst to me the batteries had deteriorated and were outgassing and two of my polymer stocks did just what yours are doing ... along with a couple of flashlights I had in there with the same type of rubberized polymer cases.

I'll bet your carpet either outgassed the formaldehyde used to make carpet or you had so,ething battery powered in there that's gone bad.

Usually, and the Liberty Safe people told me about this ... a battery in a flashlight goes bad in a safe and that's a bad thing for everything in there. Most safe manufacturers now have electricity routed into the interior of the safe so batteries are no longer needed to run lights and dehumidifiers.

Foam in the gun safe gassing off

Melted several buttpads of mine before

Only tossing out a hypothesis