Dent and Gouge Repair

I want to repair some severe dents and gouges on a well abused type 99 stock. Is there a recipe for a stock filler made of sawdust or sanding dust that will take stain reasonably well that can be used as a filler vs, the plastics that are available on the shelf. The only advantage is the stock has not been cut so there is not much to lose on collect-ability. I have repaired the cracked wrist and pinned and doweled behind the recoil lug and action area with methods carried over from the site that turned out well enough for me to doctor the appearance to be completely satisfied. Thanks for the help.

Here's my opinion. Whatever steaming doesn't pop up and sanding doesn't remove is better left alone. No filler ever looks good, that's to say they don't blend well or hide anything. Wood fillers are for use with paint and just don't look good when used with stain or a straight top coat for that matter, In some cases one can make a defect appear as a knot with a mixture of stainable PVA wood glue, sanding dust and small chips of the work piece. One can get away with this in one small spot but not several. Another way to fill very small defects, say the center of an actual knot is to apply some Shellac to the defect and sand over it. May take two or three times but that fills small holes good.
Here's a tip on sanding Military stocks. After the first round of steaming and sanding steam it again. Using a Scotchbrite pad for wood go over the stock VERY lightly, we're just knocking any fuzz off we're not burnishing. The untrained eye will have a difficult time telling the stock was ever sanded.

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Originally Posted by WarPig1976

Whatever steaming doesn't pop up and sanding doesn't remove is better left alone. No filler ever looks good, that's to say they don't blend well or hide anything. Wood fillers are for use with paint and just don't look good when used with stain

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Agreed. Steam and sand and leave it alone.

Having experimented with a couple of rifles and various modern fill products, it is rather impossible to get them to match. You can get them close to where you won't notice it from 10 feet away but close inspection will reveal them all. I don't particularly like them but in the case of obviously missing wood, I will use them. I would not worry about dents and dings however. I had severe rot at the butt of a Belgian Mauser. About an inch of wood was missing from the upper portion of the butt and much of the rest was rotted. Wood petrifier worked extremely well at preserving the rotted area but did nothing for the missing wood. For that I did use a fill. I'm also in an experimental phase with a Ecuadorean 88 carbine stock. Rotted forend that I have as of yet been unable to stabilize with anything. Thought I had it until the entire thing just fell off the other day when I removed the end cap. Looks like I'm going to have to cut it off which I don't like and install new wood. I had hoped to keep all the repairs under the cap so they would be hidden. This stock has an incredible amount of oil in it which defies all removal attempts and I suspect that is part of the reason the end won't stabilize.

I owned a pre war LL M1 for many years and when I was young actually used it for hunting. I once took a substantial fall over a small waterfall and the rifle clattered to the rocks. There was only one notch at the toe and I tried to fill it with Brownell's microbed at the time. Although it was close it still didn't even come close, if you know what I mean. Once it was done though it couldn't be reversed. It bothered me more than the few dings the stock had before... Lack of experience at the time kept me from steaming it out to it's best effect. Sold it here in Canada for the paltry sum of $2800 CDN...

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Originally Posted by Aragorn243

This stock has an incredible amount of oil in it which defies all removal attempts and I suspect that is part of the reason the end won't stabilize.

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Try soaking the area in Acetone for a couple hours. Pull it and flash off with a heat gun or hair dryer then immediately apply the hardener. Keep heating after each coat,,you'll see why. If that don't get it forget it.......

I'm thinking I will drill into the stock and insert some dowels and build it up around them. It's only about 3/4 of an inch and nearly all will be under the cap. That's why I'd rather not cut it because if I cut it, it will be obvious. Son in law took the cap today and is leaving for a week shortly so not likely to do much with it for a couple of weeks. New project coming soon. IMA put those Nepalese rifles on sale with no shipping and I took the bait. No telling what horror story will be arriving. That is going to make three projects going on at the same time, two of which are probably going to be non-firing and the third ammo impossible.

Just be careful sanding Japanese rifle stocks. The coating or shellac they used on many of them is very irritating to the skin. I would also use a mask so not to breath in find particles of it.

Dents and gouges? You will never hide what was there, believe me. You could always do what generations of Armourers have done and chisel out the gouge/dent/divet to the depth of, say the marking disc and insert an accurately made wood insert of a close colour, grain and if possible, wood match. We used to get badly dinged woodwork all of the time and if it was repairable to a decent standard, we'd do it without a second thought. Mk2 Bren gun butts and pistol grips and No4 butts were notorious for it. If it's good enough for antique furniture repairs, then it should be good enough for your workhorse service rifle I say!

And a much more professional repair than wood putty.

So what I did was sanded against the grain and then with using a progressively finer grit backed by a steel block. Steamed and then re-steamed again using a concentrated blast with a commercially made home project device. Applied a light coat of stain to better identify the remaining low spots. Steamed again like what was recommended to further raise the dents. Mixed oil and stain and then applied allowing time to penetrate and dry then final sanded with some oil cut back with mineral spirits into a sloppy mess. The 99 stock has defined panels that are easy to square with a flat steel block once the radius on the underside of the wrist and the area right before the band juncture are cleaned up with sand-cloth wrapped around a 7/8 or 3/4 wood dowel because the curves are different at the front and rear of the stock. Cutting the grasping grooves lightly with a barrel bedding tool sharpened the grooves and allowed for improved appearance. The difficulty was allowing the sanding to occur while being able to maintain the in-letting for the nose cap, butt plate and magazine well and tangs to remain below the surface of the wood or as close to as possible. Wood dowels placed transversely needed to be set so the grain of the dowels follows the grain of the wood and can be further blended in with an electro pencil at one or more places around their circumference before sanding into the gooey mess and they they disappear. Im also starting to think that exposing the stock to sunlight, various temperature changes in between steaming and cooling while working the stock while introducing oils and stain allowed it to be worked better. Once the wood was allowed some oil to absorb and dressed it really doesn't look that bad especially considering the alternative which would have been being lost to the old stock barrel never to see the light of day again.

Sounds like it all worked out fine. Takes lots to finish it up doesn't it? As you say though better to resurrect than gashbin.