I love the look and feel of wood, but to me synthetics are far more practical. Where I live, it is either cold and wet, or cold and dry. When it's not cold then the humidity climbs up to 100%, and there have been days here where you could get heat stroke at lunch time, and have snow by mid afternoon. Therefore, the first advantage of the synthetic stock is that it is not prone to warping and suffering the shifting POI this causes. Some say that synthetic stocks are ugly, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder. All sorts of patterns can be painted onto a synthetic stock, and this only detracts from a stock’s appearance when one tries to make a synthetic stock look like wood. I have not found synthetics to be lighter. Interestingly enough all of my rifles got heavier with the addition of glass (not cheap plastic) stocks. The synthetic stock is far more resilient than wood. If solvent or oil runs into the inletting of a wood stock, it becomes soft and punky. When I bring a synthetic stocked rifle inside on a cold day, and it begins to sweat and ice up, I can spray it down with WD-40 without undue concern. Some wood is very strong and stable, but as it ages it will split and crack. Any wood stock can be damaged from the impact of being dropped. It is much easier to repair minor blemishes from bangs and dings on a synthetic stock than on a wood stock, although wood compressions can be easily ironed out. The fact that you are considering spending $500.00 on a synthetic stock means that you are interested in owning a high quality product. While $500.00 is not an inconsiderable amount, it will no longer buy you a high quality wood stock, in fact you could pay that for just the blank. Therefore not only are synthetic stocks stable, handsome, and tough they are also affordable. If this isn't enough, while a wood stock can be reduced in size quite easily for custom purposes, it is not so easy to add material to it and keep the wood’s good looks. Where as with a synthetic stock, if you wished to raise the comb of your stock to say accommodate large optics, a bit of bondo, some shaping and finishing and you're good to go.
There are some rifles which I believe would be out of place with synthetic furniture - such as lever action carbines and rifles from Winchester and Marlin, Ruger #1's should have wood stocks, and historical pieces should not be modernized. But the modern hunting rifle benefits from a modern stock.
Thanks!
