Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Wood stocks

I like wood stocks, so they usually get taken off and a McMillan handle put in their place (for obvious reasons).

A friend has a decent chunk on a Kimber 84M; very first time it went out it suffered a bruise....dat ain't fun.

Actually, one of my varmint rifles is stocked in ugly wood. It's a Remington 788 in .223, which in its former life was apparently a truck gun on a Montana ranch because it was beat to snot. I had it rebarreled because the barrel was toast too, and then decided rather than refinish the birch stock, I'd spray-paint it. Used black wrinkle-paint, which used to tbe standard for synthetic stocks before everybody went McSwirly. That worked fine, except whenever a photo of the rifle gets published, somebody contacts tha magazine to find out where I got the syn-stock for my 788.

A "faux-synthetic"....!

JB..you are on the cutting edge....

Ingwe

Love walnut but try spending 5 or 10 days in some places like Alaska or sheep & goat hunting....raining for days, or soaked with salt spray and you roll into camp after well after dark and do it again and again. Back packing hunts are especially hard on wood stocks as are 10 or 12 days in a scabbard. Pillar betting and glassing does help, but I have seen pillar bedded stocks move due to the entire stock swelling. One laminated stock on a bear hunt on the AK peninsula swelled to the point there was at least 1/8 inch of wood sticking out all around the recoil pad and the wood around the magazine well swelled to the point the follower bound up and we had to take the rifle apart and trim wood away to give clearence. The finish got all white looking and started flaking off.....no thanks!

For working rifles synthetic for me.


LC

Glad I saw this thread, since wood is about the only topic ever discussed here on the Campfire that I actually know something about. I grew up in the architectural millwork business, and as a result I honestly believe that there is no mistake involving wood selection, engineering, or construction that I haven't seen. And I have made most of those mistakes myself.

Here's the deal: wood lamination technology WORKS. It is well-understood, and not really subject to much debate. A laminated wood stck can be very beautiful, or not. Modern glues are actually better than the very good ones that were formerly used (including true horse glue...and yeah, I am that old). The problem with even the very best and finest walnut stocks, particularly for very powerful rifles, involves selection: translated, cracks. That selection takes very real expertise, and experience. And there's just not enough of that to go around.

Anything up to about .338, use what you like. .375 and up, go laminated. Double rifles excepted, of course...good sense doesn't often come into play in that arena. And there is such a thing as tradition.

My apologies t those who have noticed a recent, very similar stump speech on AR, where I post as Mauser93.

Happy New Year and good hunting to all.

Now that's a GOOD problem to have - having people mistake an ugly birch stock for a quality synthetic!

Laminated stocks are good in the strengh area, but they are heavier than I like to carry.

http://www.hamiltonspearguns.com/performance.html



There are simpler styles that are scary powerful and easy to build but it's technology from the 40s and 50s. Think door hinges, brass tube and surgical rubber. McMillan doesn't produce stocks for these things so I'll stick with wood.

I have been fortunate enough to do this in SE Alaska twice, so I know my experiences are negligible compared to a lot of folks. If I lived there, I'm sure that I wouldn't use anything but SS and synthetic stocks. Having said that, I've used walnut on both trips. I decided to do this because real walnut tends to be lighter than most laid-up stocks and it was on a gun that I absolutely trusted.

As a poster noted earlier, not all walnut is created equal, nor is the ability to seal the wood. I had used this set up for several years in the driving rain close to home. It is straight-grained, glass bedded through the action, tang and first couple of inches of barrel channel and has stock bolts through the lug area and the rear of the magazine area. It had multiple coats of 50/50 Linspeed/paint thinner and all interior surfaces were treated with polyurethane. After about 3 days, it did turn a lovely white and had several dents and scrapes. The lovely white was really only a surface problem where the water interacts with the coating. At the end of 10 days, it looked like hell, but when I got it home, I rubbed it down with a single coat of the 50/50 mix and looked like new (other than the dents, which I kept). It NEVER lost zero, nor did it wander. Maybe this is unusual.

I know walnut can and will swell. I've seen it happen. But there is much a guy can do to help make it work.

Couple summers ago I was in Alaska fishing the Kenai, my guide had a boat paddle SS Ruger hanging on the boat house wall with a complete trashed Leupold scope attached. Being a loony I had to have its story. It seems Bob the guide had turned a small boat over trying to cross a river on a spring hunt. The Ruger was lost to the river, where it stayed until the following fall when Bob found it. The stock was in very good condition, the sling swivels were gone though. The barrel and action still looked good, but the smaller springs(trigger etc.) were all rusted away. None the less, I believe the rifle was repairable. The scope was total loss. Yeah, some rifles are tough.

Agree completely, I've purged my modest crowd of rifles with synthetic stocks. In spite of the practical benefits of the "syns", I found growing unhappiness with using them. Conversely, I find I enjoy the wood stocked guns out of proportion to their practical use. Here are a few (and a dog-earred shotgun to boot):

Two Biesens and a buddy


Ruger 338


Browning Safari 30-06


Piotti 16


Wood brings a song to the heart, a joy to the field. Never hunt with an ugly gun...

GF1, fine rifles all, but the Biesen near the dog is great!

They are all great but wood wise - I am a sucker for darker wood, like the ones on the others.

Huntaria,

dont want to give the impression I dont like or appreciate walnut stocks and I agree with a little TLC they will do just fine. Even like the patina of few bumps and dents. Nothing like a fine blue steel and wood rifle with a few battle scars...just says hey I have hunted!


Cheers,

LC

That is NICE!!! Mine is just a JBL 38special.....I guess it's kind of like the Mossburg rifle of the speargun world.

We can only shoot carp and suckers here so I've never bought a really nice one.

Some like laminated stocks, and some like synthetic stocks. I'm reminded of my barhopping days, when my motto was "go ugly early." I think it bears pointing out that you can get a very good looking wood stock for what you'd pay for a very good synthetic.

It's a generational thing as well as a practical thing. But mainly I originally was talking about the practicality of wood in a well-made stock. I think it's just fine, material-wise.

As was pointed out, not everyone goes kayaking with a gunstock, and most of us don't live in Alaska. I really like the warmth and depth of good wood. I can't afford it, usually, but it's nice. And some of the no-grain woods are more than fine for gunstocks...beech and whatever Remington used on their "hardwood stocks."

I know a little about glue. ONE of the big advantages of modern glue is it withstand weather. "Horse glue" or hide glue is very strong, probalby as stong is modern stuff. You can let a bit of hide glue dry on a pyrex dish and it will peel off a spall of glass as it dries. But it won't take wet. Casein glue will take wet, but it deteriorates. It was strong enough to glue together WW I airplanes, which is pretty strong.

Both of these old glues require a prepared surface while epoxy doesn't require much...it fills gaps, which casein and hide glue don't, another biggie reccomendation. Also, epoxy doesn't shrink like hide glue.

Mule Deer reminded me of a 788 I had with a battered stock. I also painted it flat black with Rustoleum. It was a fine rifle, wish I had it back.

Now, that is funny. A look in my gun safe sees no plastic and only one laminated (10/22T). No master plan, just worked out that way. I'm old enough that the M14 with a wooden stock was my issue weapon in the Army and that's what's on my M1A NM. Ironically, I like the looks and the feel of the Realtree plastic on the M1A.

As far as I'm concerned the synthetic vs wood thing is why they make gun cases that carry 2 rifles. I'll take a stainless/synthetic rifle for when it's raining or I'm going to be dragging it through heavy briars and nasty stuff. Then I'll have a wood stocked rifle to enjoy for it's warmth and feel when I'll be in a stand or maybe hunting in more open spaces on nicer days.

Why choose just one or the other? They both have their places.................DJ

Yep, they both have their places.

dat is a good point and why I bought my first Kimber montana! I have wood/blue guns for "blue bird" days and now am working on their duplicates in SS/synthetic. Next up a dupe .257 Roberts in SS/synthetic.

I just cannot get over how light that 84M is. If I did not pxss all my money away on 2 hunt clubs, dozens of tree stands, 4 wheelers, camping trailers, food plots, I might be able to buy a NULA and a hunt or two somewhere else in the world