Repair/Replace?

[armabill]

I have read the info on repairing the Ishy screw but is there an alternative?

I mean, replacing the Ishy screw with something that isn't so ugly or obvious. Has anyone done it?

Information

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[limpetmine]

It gets done often enough. Drill it out, pound in a hardwood dowel covered in glue, let dry, cut off, and sand to fit. Being the minimalist, I have to ask why? It's part of the rifles history, was there for a reason, and removing it serves what purpose? But it's yours, in the final tally.

[armabill]

I don't have one, just asking. I saw one at the gun show and, couldn't they find a bigger screw? It was huge!

It was a Long Branch with matching numbers on the receiver, bolt and mag. Import mark on the right rear receiver side.

[Parashooter]

If you have the tools and skill, fit a wooden plug where the screw was removed, then incise a shallow, sloped-edge cavity at the plug ends and fit a grain-matched feather-edge veneer, using hot hide glue for minimum joint visibility. Matching wood for small veneers can be cut from the sides of interior mortises in the forestock.

Below is a semi-professional example of this type of work on a US M1903 stock - visible, but not obvious without close inspection. Virtually invisible wood repairs using this principle are normally executed on high-value stringed instruments but seldom applied to low-value gunstocks because the techniques require significant study, experience, and time.

[tbonesmith]

I've done one in a thread in The Restorers Corner, titled No 4 wood WIP

[bearhunter]

It's your rifle but why are you going to replace it. It is correct for what it is. It is also accepted as a standard repair. From some of the information in other threads on the same subject, the stocks with the repair were discarded and replace with new stocks, rather than repair the original.

The patched and repaired stock would no longer be correct and deduct from the value of your rifle. Not to mention, it may also create some bedding, inaccuracy, issues.

The Indians added the screw to make the fore end stronger. It was common practise for them to do this to new rifles at the factory and during refurbisment, even if the fore ends were OK. It was their rule of thumb and probably saved them a lot of grief.

[armabill]

Good points bearhunter. Real good points.

[Peter Laidler]

If you want to do a repair how UK Military Armourers would reinforce a fore-end - as opposed to how the Indians did it - then I wrote a short photographic example. But we don't hide anything, we fix it like it needs fixing and they don't break afterwards after.

If you want an Indian repair, use a screw. If you want a proper UK Military repair, use a hard, oak peg. These pegs held ships together so they'll probably work on your No4 and there won't be any bedding probs that I've ever encountered

[RJW NZ]

And I'll just toss in the other answer, carefully clean up the surface area of the ishy screw head and where the stock wood is visible around it, dig around in your scrap bin for a piece of broken gun stock, find something with similar grain. Shape it as a thin cap for that screw and epoxy in place. Use wood stain to get color the same. Now it looks like you have a dowel repair with a not perfect but more subtle appearance, and all without disturbing the function of the screw. The screw BTW stops the stock splitting lengthways if other problems get started, and it slightly stiffens the stock transversely, although you're talking about that from folks shooting in competition who care about very minute issues.
Been there, done that on a sportered ishy, worked fine and looked good. I found the pics, 1st is the covered screw head, the second shows what two dowels come out like.
.

[jmoore]

I never saw what the big drama w/ Indian service indications were anyway. I mean, the rifles were still in service, the screw is just one way of telling you where it's been. It's like getting all upset that your "pristine" WWI SMLE was rebarreled (and had a whole lot of other work done) in Australia in 1951...

Now if Bubba has had his sweaty paws on it, that's different!