doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Hiding major cracks and breaks in checkered areas

Where do I begin? Well, having read Steves' books, articles, and having had the privelege to examine one gun he did, I can assure you he is more than a "tradesman". A tradesman can cut 2x4 studs over and over to plus or minus a fat pencil line and neatly toenail it to the top and bottom plate. A CRAFTSMAN and ARTIST can sculpt steel and wood. He can see a perfect gunstock inside of a rough block of walnut, and knowing his client may have spent a grand or more on that chunk of walnut, he can remove everything that does not look like a perfect( and functional and structurally sound) gunstock. His inletting, checkering, and finishing can and will withstand the most critical scrutiny.

Mark Larson, as one amateur gunsmith to another, I feel you, at least, understand that. I think you realize that some of our best lessons come from the toughest teachers. I think you were more intelligent than many amateur gunsmiths in that you chose a subject that was not very valuable to begin with. The world is littered with high quality guns that were literally butchered by complete hacks and well meaning, but uneducated hands.

My personal approach to each project is taken from the Hippocratic oath that doctors take... "First, do no harm." I have a few project guns that I haven't yet touched because I don't feel I'm qualified yet. You did fairly well for a first attempt at checkering. I blew up the pictures and could see the mistakes. I will not point them out, as you know they're there. I am my own worst critic. I know, and never forget, any runover, chipped diamond, mis-spacing, runout, etc., even if anyone else thinks it looks great. But that's why we mere mortals should practice on scraps of walnut or broken gunstocks as you did. I recently passed on an otherwise decent Colt 10 ga. because the pistol grip checkering was crudely recut, and much too deep to ever reclaim.

I understand your intent was to see if you could camoflage a nasty repair. That is a worthy pursuit in the right place. I've seen some outstanding re-graining jobs done to cover non-matching buttstock extensions where the cost of a new stock would be more than the gun was worth. I can understand Steve's concern with merely covering up a bad repair in a critical area. Whoever did that before you acquired the gun didn't even come close to fitting the break neatly back together. They may have been equally as inept in the ratio and mixing of the epoxy or degreasing the break. Simply filling in and smoothing voids and bumps won't help much. An analogy would be using Bondo and paint to cover up a rust hole in your truck fender vs. using Bondo and undercoating to patch a rusted frame. One is like putting lipstick on a pig and the other could be dangerous. Maybe you can drill though the grip from inside the receiver inletting and epoxy a few good reinforcing pins in place to prevent it from breaking should anyone ever attempt to fire it. This can also be done from under a pistol grip cap on a full grip gun.

I, for one, would sorely miss the excellent and free advice we get here from Steve and many others like him. If they should question, correct, or otherwise admonish me and it makes me better... that's great. I became a pretty good pool player by intentionally playing guys I knew could beat me.

I went back and read Steve's post again. No where did I read about any help or even constructive criticism. Maybe I missed it.

I'm just starting out the learning curve, sure hope that isnt the kind of help I should look forward to. Acutally some on here have already given me plenty of help.

Looks great, Mark! Decent looking hammergun, as well. I didn't see anywhere, that you intended to hide the details of this repair from a possible future owner. SDH was a bit rude, IMO. (I probably know "a bit rude"). Well done!

Mark....looks great!
I've got a project i need to send pics and see what you think. Theres no cracks or breaks just some cosmetic stuff i'm hoping maybe you can improve on. If not, it's off to the stocker.

I'll try and take some pics and send you today.

Sorry for the insensitivity of the internet, I very rarely use emoticons :>).

Mark is the artist, IIRC, not I. I am a craftsman who seldom repairs guns, but did professionally for years. I've also done quite of bit of restoration on genuine antique firearms (more than 100 years old). When I do repairs I try to discover why the gun broke in the first place, repair it so that doesn't reoccur and there is little evidence of my work. And above all else, I do my best to insure that the gun will be safe to handle and shoot for generations to come.

Mark's approach to the grip work sounded entirely cosmetic to me. In an early post about Daryl's butt extension I praised the work which was purely cosmetic in nature with no structural concerns.

I've been seeing busted doubles glued back together with checkering camouflage for 30+ years, mostly by, or for dealers looking to make a good profit. I've also seen these stock re-break because the original concern was not addressed. Usually terrible wood layout. The gun shown above might have been one of them!?!

I just don't see this as an art form.

Anyone familiar with DT's/crossedchisel repairs will note that he adds a major wood mortice to the repaired area to insure strength and stability. David is a pro and hugely concerned with the longevity and safety of his work. He is fully aware of the cosmetic aspects as well.

One of our members had a valuable double restored a few years ago and is now aware of the possibility that some one in the future might want shoot it because it looks great? A very good thing to consider, IMO.

I wonder about the future of all my work, as I'm sure David does. I also wonder what would happen to one of these glued-together repairs, two owners down the road, when it got soaked in an acetone bath in a turkey broiler?

Basically I think a gun with cosmetic-only repairs should have holes drilled in the breeches so no one could ever shoot it again. But then someone with a micro-TIG would just weld it up and call it good, any way...

Whether anyone agrees, understands or not, I get to express my opinion just like everyone else. I apologize for sounding rude, but maybe a wake-up call was in order. Or maybe not...
Best,
Steve

This one has been use by two different student to practice checkering and by me to practice chiseling arcaded fences -- and yes, it is signed W. Richards! It is, and will remain, broken... and rendered inert.

I, for one, am glad you decided to explain your earlier post, and feel better about you for it. You're right, sometimes guns need to be retired. Your earlier post seemed over critical and cruel (and somewhat snobbish)because you had no more idea than the rest of us whether the broken stock had been adequately and safely repaired prior to the cosmetic work or not. The point of the thread was to share some nice cosmetic work, even if it was done by a mere amateur...Geo

Many "mere amateurs" actually do professional-level repair or restoration work, but they spend so much time on the repair that they'd never make any money if they did the work for someone else. You have to be pretty efficient to be able to do work that someone else is willing to pay for. But you have to do it well enough that your reputation won't suffer. I'm sure that the person working for someone else makes compromises in order to make a living. Over the years I've become more appreciative of amateurs who do high level work just for the joy or the challenge of the work. The real advantage that the amateur has is that he doesn't have to work for pay and he can take all the time he needs to do the job right. I applaud the thread starter on the quality of his work... and I wonder how many hours he put in it.

I too, am glad Steve took the time to explain his brief initial critism of this work. But as one of "the rest of us", I could easily see that this was in all liklihood a very shoddy repair job done prior to Mark buying it. The gap in the gray epoxy glue joint approaches or exceeds 1/8" in many places. At least we can say it wasn't clamped together so tightly as to get excess squeeze out and starve the glue joint. The work looked more like someone was repointing mortar joints in bricks than properly preparing, fitting and gluing a break in walnut.

Lacking an x-ray of the repair, I suppose it is possible that a tough hickory spline or dowel was morticed and glued in. Heck, maybe there's a 5 inch long piece of 1" rebar Acraglassed inside that broken wrist. It might hold together if you packed the barrels with nitroglycerin. But I doubt it. Given the circumstantial evidence of shoddy fit and improper materials, it would take a humongous leap of faith to suppose that repair is structurally sound. This is bubble gum and baling wire without the baling wire.

If any of us bought a gun at a gunshow that had such a hideous repair expertly concealed, and it became evident after breaking upon firing, we would be justifiably pissed and hopefully not injured. As I advised Mark earlier, this type of work has its' place, but this ain't it.