doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com OT – Checkering Removal

Apologies for the non-doublegun post, however this site is the only place I know that has the knowledge and expertise to answer my questions.

The photo below shows a model 14 Remington in 25 Rem. that bubba has performed an amateur checkering job on. I want to get rid of the checkering. The checkering itself is fairly shallow, but the borders are deeper.

1. Can this checkering be removed and the repair blended in without refinishing the whole stock and subsequently the forearm to match?

2. Is this a job that can be done by an amateur handy with tools or is it best left to a professional?

Any suggestions on who does this sort of work would be most appreciated. Thanks in advance.

It makes you wonder if the guy responsible for that had ever seen checkering before. I'd have to remove it too. Kind of dyslexic or something...Geo

And looking at that doesn't answer your question?

To far gone ...

looks like an attempt at a flat top early English checkering .
I say this because ,I see no attempt what so ever to place nice angles / points on the diamonds .

Depending on how deep it is it could be repairable , well lets correct that to , be changed .
The problem will be that the checkering will be below the level of the stock . Now if your shooting for pure cosmetic that’s not an issue but it may not be to functional .
As to a beginner / amateur being able ? Ha if this is your gun ,go for it , everyone must start somewhere . Despite what some will want you to believe No one was born with this knowledge .
But do yourself a favor and do some reading , get some pointers , build you a stock vice and don’t tey to just hold it . If you do , your going to end up with something worse or only slightly better then what you have .
.
If this is a special gun and changing it yourself worries you , send it off
OR take the time to make a new stock , start learning the processes . you might just be suprised with what you can do

kinda looks like fish scales. If this is just a shooter...let it be.

I wouldn't call it hopeless. I'd say there's at least a slim chance the checkering could be obliterated by new 16 lpi checkering; appropriate enough for that gun. It might even be possible to make a mullered border and dress it up a bit. What does the forearm look like?

Griz; I gather you don't want any checkering at all, if so a fix is almost impossible. If I had this dilemma I would tape off the checkering along the borders and cover the rest of the stock with masking tape. Get some good paint remover and clean up the checkering to bare wood. Get some bedding compound & dye to a color same as the stock or close and fill the checkering flush, sand smooth, rechecker, dye and finish the area the same color as the bedding. It may be darker but the previous job will go away - plan B - find / make another stock. You can try the fix and then make up your mind as to a replacement. --- John Can.