Our Victim will be a 03A3 Walnut stock, I just love working on these old girls.
I like to clean with Denatured Alcohol because, it removes dirt and oil and will dry very quick. But if there is a crack the Alcohol will get into it and not dry as fast and allow you to see the crack.
Here in Photo #1 you can see the crack very good.
In photo #2 the crack is a little harder to see. If the repair is not done on the stock it will continue to crack until the stock comes apart.
First You will need to drill down into the wrist so that you will be able to insert a large dowel to secure it. I used a 3/8 inch wood bit to drill this hole. To get the right depth, lay the bit on the side of the grip and mark it with tape. This will be your stop point when drilling.
Be sure to keep your angle right as you drill and grip the wrist as you drill. If the bit starts to cut too close to the sides you will feel a hot spot and you will need to stop and check your angle.
Now for the crack. A lot of times you will find that you will be unable to get resin down into the crack or not all the way into the crack. You will need to drill a hole into the crack. This will allow you to get resin into the crack. The depth of the holes will need to be a little deeper than the crack. You can pick up extra long drill bits from Harbor Freight, they don't cost much. As you can see I drilled 3 holes into the crack. This will help get more resin into the crack. Now fill the holes with Denatured Alcohol to remove any oil that may be in the area. Allow the stock to dry before you move on with the repair.
Pick out some dowels that are a little smaller than the holes you drilled. When I drill large holes I like to wrap the dowel with fiberglass cloth. This will give you a stronger repair.
Now is the time to mask off the areas that you dont want any over run resin to get on. You can just use paste wax on the stock but be sure not to get the wax too close to the cracks. You can use clay to fill the rear action screw hole but if you drilled through the hole you will have to fill the hole and redrill.
Fill the holes with resin and do your best to flex the stock to work resin into the cracks. Then insert your dowels and clamp everything up tight.
After about two hours you can remove the clamps and check out your handy work.
Use a dremel tool with a milling bit to clean up the repairs. Be careful and don't go wild, just take your time, this is the easy part.
Now just allow the Acraglas to cure for 24 hours before you clean with Denatured Alcohol and apply any type of finish. And as always I hope that this helps you with your repairs. If you have any questions, just post them.
