I have a walnut stocked M77 Hawkeye that has been bedded and pillars added. The stock has been lightly coated with Tru Oil and I intend to place a very thin layer of epoxy in the barrel channel. Looking to get an idea of how well that would likely handle a week or so long hunting trip if the weather were bad. Bad meaning rain and or wet snow on a daily basis such as can occur in the rockies or possibly cascades. Assume no special treatment such as wrapping in plastic while carrying. Would the exposure to moisture damage the stock and or significantly impact accuracy? Want to get a better idea of where to draw the line with a wood stock and moisture vs. a stainless/synthetic which I presume whould not be impacted.

I'd give all the wood that isn't sealed under epoxy a good waxing, tape the muzzle and go hunting. You could also run lengths of tape along the barrel channel if you want but if it's well sealed with epoxy underneath I probably wouldn't.....................DJ

Also take off the recoil pad and seal the butt. Check the bedding for any areas that are not coated with epoxy

I have followed JB's suggestions and used marine spar varnish to seal all exposed areas,all inletting included,magazine well, trigger mortise, everything.

So sealed,and if the wood is stable to begin with,it can take a good soaking and hold POI well.

Wood will never be as moisture resistant a synthetic, but that does not mean it cannot work well under lots of conditions.

Canoe paddles, snowshoes, ax handles and millions of wood rifle stocks have delt with water and rough treatment for centuries and continue to work as designed.
A week or so of a little weather is not going to hurt your rifle.

Yes, one must seal every surface inside and out. Rest assured the factory has not done an adequate job in that area. Many many thin layes are much better than a couple of thick ones, and wax is your friend. Do a good job and go hunting. I worry more about rust than wood. The oars for my 30+ year old drift boat are doing fine, and every year someone asks where I found those nice new wooden oars.

Exactly!

I agree with Phil that wood can take more weather than we generally give it credit for, but have also seen some weird things happen.

In 1992 I went on a caribou hunt in northern Quebec with a dozen other guys. This was one of those cheapo hunts where there's a "camp manager" who makes sure nobody burns down their tent, but the hunters do all their own cooking, hunting and game packing.

Many of the companies who ran those hunts added little costs here and there, so a hunt booked for a supposed price of $1500 could end up costing several hundred bucks more. In this instance they charged $50 for gun cases, so we got around that by taking our rifles out of their stocks, then putting the stocks and barreled actions inside our duffles.

This worked fine until we had to go home. One of the guys brought a walnut-stocked Ruger 77, and after a week in near-constant rain the barreled action would NOT come out of the stock. He lived in Minnesota, and it took a couple weeks at home in a dry room before the stock came loose--and by then the barreled action was really rusted.

Which is why I find it cheap insurance to spar-varnish the inside of any walnut stock.

Hmmm, thanks, I think.

I was assuming this whole discussion would support my "need" to get a new 84M Montana. Sounds like with some spar-varnish & wax I can make the M77 suitable for likely conditions. Kind of disappointing... Guess I'll have to look for another reason I "need" another rifle. ...or, just spend the $$ on another hunt instead!

Need =

.30-06

4x Leupold

.375 H&H

2,5x Leupold


Want -

read the campfire...

Definitely one of the most intelligent postings.

JW

Agreed...

The fact that I don't follow it demonstrates serious character flaws..............


But I'm close...

Heck, Bob - you know, that I preach water drinking wine as well.

Appreciate the tips form all. I now have some spar-varnish and wax and will weatherize the stock. I also need to recoat the barrel. Now would be a good time to get that done. It's a chrome moly barrel and I just need to decide which finish I want on it. With some help from photoshop here are the alternatives. Will get it blasted to clean it up real well this week, then coat it.

Something just doesn't seem right to me about trying to make a chrome moly barrel look like stainless.



But that's just me, its your rifle.

I live in a dry area, so my wood stocks tend to react to dampness. In times past, my wooden stocks would absorb H2O from the air or rain, as shown by the change of the point of impact. I liked the finish from the oil finishes when I spent the time on them, but they were not sealed well. I started using spray on spar finish everywhere and the stocks are sealed. They are much more stable now.

Modern spar varnishes are usually a combination of organic oil (usually either tung or linseed) and a urethane. They seal against moisture a lot better than straight oils, but can be made to look much the same.

I know a LOT of top-notch professional stockmakers who use spar varnish, or something very similar.

I have a can of spar varnish waiting for me to apply to the inside of the stock. Wasn't planning on doing the outside. Not sure how to properly prepare it now that it has some oil on it.

Go ahead and apply the spar varnish.

The reason spar varnish is a combination of oil and urethane is even if the previous layer of oil is really cured, fresh oil will still stick to the old oil. But if urethane cures a little too long (which is not much at all) then another layer won't stick to the first layer.

The great virtue of modern spar varnish is that due to the oil content, it will combine with an earlier layer even after a lot of curing time. So applying it to cured oil will work fine.

One custom gunmaking friend once told me that he saw no reason to slather a bunch of "crap" inside the stock since, if the stock was well fitted, the barreled action sealed it off. A novel concept but one with which I had to disagree. In actual fact, his stocks were so well fitted that moisture was, indeed, mostly excluded but a good sealant would have made them even better. GD

if they re in separate glasses ...

greydog,

That is indeed and interesting concept--but I have seen water get into some very interesting places on a rifle, especially after spending a week or more in a really wet and windy place like coastal Alaska or northern Quebec.

I love wood stocks and all my rifles sport them. But I did see the result of what could happen if it got submerged.

Not pretty at all.

I have a couple of hardy rifles that I have a pair of stocks for. Plastic is for lousy weather and works. Wood feels better, looks better, doesn't jar your noggin as much under recoil and applies more value to the firearms if you like that sort of thing.

Has a great deal to do with your attitude to rifles, that being, are they things or beauty or tools to get it done? If they are both, sometimes you have to choose where you will use them based on the weather likely to be present.

JW

It is a nice concept, but in my case kind of hard to be free floated and sealed. The two are mutually exclusive.

JB,

Is there anything you would recommend in addition to using urethane spar finish to seal stocks? I have finished two stocks using urethane, one using gloss and the other with a mat finish. One was an old marlin A-1 rifle that I was given (the owner was throwing it away)that had white mold growing on it and some rust on the exterior from dampness when I was in West Washington State. I did spend some time on it, but the walnut stock cleaned up well and the finish did come out pretty good. I did metal work as well and the former owner did not believe it was the same rifle.

It seems to me that sealing a stock well will help with accuracy.

Wood is for flavoring smokeshacks.

Interestingly enough,warped/shifted canoe paddles,snowshoes or axe handles...won't shift POI from POA.

That'd be facts..............