Stock Refinishing and Recheckering

My client had bought this very colorful used Claro Walnut stock, which someone else had originally fitted and glass bedded to fit a standard barreled action.  They did not do a very good job of shaping and finishing it and never had it checkered.  My client wanted it fitted to a feather weight barreled action he had that needed a stock.  All of the old unsightly glass bedding was completely removed down to bare wood, and the action inletting was checked and relieved as needed for good strain-free fit.  The forearm was shortened by several inches to a more normal length.  The stock's inletting was then prepped and the entire action and the complete barrel channel were glass bedded into it.

After the glass bedding had cured, the metal work was removed, and excess material was trimmed up on the inside.  All of the clay pressed into recesses of the metal work was removed, and then cleaned with a solvent to remove the release agent, then oiled and reassembled.  A shadow line was cut around the cheek piece, and then the stock was dry-sanded to remove the usual dents/dings, to sharpen up some rounded over edges and to deepen the flutes in the comb.   A new pad was fitted and "keyed" in place, and the stock was then sealed and wet-sanded with an oil finish.

The client favored multi-point borderless (single "V" line)checkering , and wanted a  wrap-around forend pattern with an open diamond on the bottom of the forearm and two grip panels.  Since this was Claro Walnut, the checkering was cut 20 lpi.  Once the checkering was completed, a few hand rubbed top coats of oil were applied to the stock and the rifle was fully assembled. The time devoted to this project totaled just under 40 hours.