I made an offer on a Parker VHE with an enormous bolt the the head. I know the proper way to repair a head split, but I don’t see any evidence of cracks in the wrist at the end of the tangs to indicate it needed the repair. Either way, if I get it, the giant stove bolt has to go, and the hole patched.

What’s the consensus on how to plug holes such as this?

Send it to TSD or Mark Larson

I did one of these by removing the bolt, a carriage bolt and square farmer's nut, in my case, and replacing that with a hardwood dowel that was epoxied in place. This was done after stripping the old finish and removing soaked in oil.

Then I evenly planed the stock cheeks off about 3/32" on each side. You could use a belt sander to do this, but both cheeks must be completely flat. Two pieces of black walnut veneer were then glued on using Titebond II wood glue, to completely cover the dowel repair. Clamp carefully to get a close fitting joint. I made my approx. 1/8" thick black walnut veneers by making a simple fixture to run them through my thickness planer. I've found that the Titebond II makes the most invisible glue joint so long as the joint is closely fitted. Then the new veneers on the cheeks were carefully sanded down to meet the action and stock. To further conceal the glue joint, you can make some artificial pores across the glue joint with the point of an X-Acto knife. Too few is better than too many here. The whole stock was refinished with a reddish dark Watco Danish Oil finish.

I was lucky in that the grain of the original wood in the bolted stock cheeks was relatively straight grain walnut. With a little time matching grain, a closely fitted glue joint, and the dark reddish walnut finish, you had to look hard to notice it had been repaired. For a field grade that isn't worth the cost or time of restocking, it was light-years better than the original Bubba repair.

A lot of Parkers have been repaired by dowels or screws or bolts through the stock cheeks, because the tangs are tapered like a wedge. While you have the stock removed, it is a good idea to do the "staple" repair in the head of the stock to prevent future problems. You can Google "Parker shotgun staple repair" to see what I mean.

Thanks. I’ve done the staple repair before. I was wondering about the dowel, but was certain the grain of one wouldn’t work on its own. The vaneer makes sense.

Got the gun. Too good of a price to pass on it, and I have a hard time leaving guns like this in their current pitiful state. Big ol' bolt in that head. Pictures here:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1-xeqBAsb-ZMgCOb_AgQhzdojFi3xKZMw

Build a hidden bolt set under the wood level, plug the holes with a wooden dowel with closely matching grain turned on a lathe, glue and fit. Hide your repairs in a built up, on top of the wood finish by adding color to the finish in the location of the repair. I just did a Parker with two bolts to hide. Pain in the rear but a very good solution.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1r86qpvGVQMx9rrWH9D-kOhcGpFam2RFA

Go here:
https://www.woodcraft.com/search?q=wood+plugs&button=search

There are also other suppliers that are similar for the hobbyist.

Get a plug cutter or buy plugs and a brad point drill to match. Much easier to hide. Maybe consider checkering the panels. Easier than the grip since it is flat.

After seeing photots of your VHE on the Parker board, the one side of the bolt head has to be 1/2” in diameter and the top of it falls way outside the border of the cheek panel. In my opinion the only option is to just replace the stock. Anything else would be throwing good money/effort after bad.

This one looked worse than the gun in question, two big ugly stove bolts through the head. The rear one half way through the spear point on the rear of the cheeks. Not my favorite type of finish but you need to have a on top of the wood finish to hide the repair.

Hey Steve, I think that's mine...Geo

I can dream anyway.

I'm so slow I can see how you might feel it is a dream Geo......

Steve's just being hard on himself. He's always done very competent and prompt work for me at a reasonable price. Then, I sent him a "family" Parker to see if he could indeed make a silk purse out of a sow's ear...Geo

It’s a shooter, and someone else down the road can replace the stock. I’ll just try to make it better; hard to make it worse.

I'd do what SKb suggests, plug and let the wood finish do most of the cover-up job afterwards.
Matching grain and color as closely as possible of course first but with a heavily used stock w/ plenty of 'patina' to work with, a pristine final finish isn't what's called for anyway. So much the better in this case.
Same goes with the toe repair.
Restoration isn't always about making them look like they just came from the factory. Quite the opposite actually.

Another way is to overlay the entire ear of the stock.
Make the suitable repair with existing bolt or other then leave it sunken from the surface.
Take the entire surface down enough to overlay an entire new thin piece of walnut onto the ear. Glue in place. Trim and shape to fit.
Veneer is fine for the one side where the hole is entirely within the panel. That can be as thin as 1/32 in or less. The edge can be shaped into the stock existing concave form.
The other side will need a thicker piece or a 2 piece inlay. Neither is hard to do. The joint betw a two piece will fall right where it's easiest to add darker grain lines and extra patina to the final finish to hide such things.

The gun is a great project for learning some skills on. Looks like it'll make a decent shooter too.
Ejector gun,,,#1 frame,, 12ga,,,not bad at all.

The orig butt plate and grip cap are fixable too. It's some work but again that's restoration,,saving what is original.
New casting of fiberglass are of course available for fitting. But then that's what you have on the orig gun,,brand new reproduction fiberglass castings of the originals.

JMO of course.