.... especially if you know they do good work!
So I'm puttering around today filing and sanding some epoxy from a couple of shotgun stocks I'm working on. Bad splits around the neck and one of them had a previous patch on the toe of the butt which had failed. Did the epoxy in the splits and glued on a new toe patch block yesterday. So today was clean them up and shape the block that extended most of the way to the pistol grip. All in all a pleasant day of tinkering around while it rains outside. Tunes going and all....
So the one stock had no butt plate. No problem. I'll modify and fit this big brass one I've got from some odd thing that showed up.... So fitting the plate to the stock I'm sooting up the brass and rubbing on the wood and shaving or filing away the marks. All nice and tidy and going well. Got it to where a piece of writing paper would not slide into any of the "gaps" and decided that was good enough. More than 80% soot showing around the edge and even the spots with no soot marks won't take a narrow slip of writing paper without binding. I'm happy and call that part done...
Then I realized that it was going really well. From watching YT videos I realize that I'm pretty much up to speed with doing this compared to a lot of the smiths in the videos. But it STILL has taken about four hours to prep and fix the splits in the wrist area, clean up the repairs, attach and shape that toe block and then to modify and fit the butt plate. And that doesn't include the time spent soaking the stocks then using oil absorbing mixtures to remove the massive amount of oil soaking in one of them. And I still have to apply and rub in a half dozen coats of BLO yet.
If I charged for doing this I'd easily have to charge about $300 for each stock to make a living at this. And this is just for some basic stuff! ! ! ! I don't know what a smith would actually charge. But I do know I've seen a few folks complain about the cost for basic work in a few cases. Well.... They just simply don't know how much work a lot of this stuff is ! ! ! !
You guys in this forum are likely smiling and nodding in agreement. Me? I just count myself and my bank account lucky that I can do this sort of thing for myself....
For the rest of you I'd think twice before I complain about the last quote you got for what seemed to you like it should be pretty basic work on one of your guns.
So I'm puttering around today filing and sanding some epoxy from a couple of shotgun stocks I'm working on. Bad splits around the neck and one of them had a previous patch on the toe of the butt which had failed. Did the epoxy in the splits and glued on a new toe patch block yesterday. So today was clean them up and shape the block that extended most of the way to the pistol grip. All in all a pleasant day of tinkering around while it rains outside. Tunes going and all....
So the one stock had no butt plate. No problem. I'll modify and fit this big brass one I've got from some odd thing that showed up.... So fitting the plate to the stock I'm sooting up the brass and rubbing on the wood and shaving or filing away the marks. All nice and tidy and going well. Got it to where a piece of writing paper would not slide into any of the "gaps" and decided that was good enough. More than 80% soot showing around the edge and even the spots with no soot marks won't take a narrow slip of writing paper without binding. I'm happy and call that part done...
Then I realized that it was going really well. From watching YT videos I realize that I'm pretty much up to speed with doing this compared to a lot of the smiths in the videos. But it STILL has taken about four hours to prep and fix the splits in the wrist area, clean up the repairs, attach and shape that toe block and then to modify and fit the butt plate. And that doesn't include the time spent soaking the stocks then using oil absorbing mixtures to remove the massive amount of oil soaking in one of them. And I still have to apply and rub in a half dozen coats of BLO yet.
If I charged for doing this I'd easily have to charge about $300 for each stock to make a living at this. And this is just for some basic stuff! ! ! ! I don't know what a smith would actually charge. But I do know I've seen a few folks complain about the cost for basic work in a few cases. Well.... They just simply don't know how much work a lot of this stuff is ! ! ! !
You guys in this forum are likely smiling and nodding in agreement. Me? I just count myself and my bank account lucky that I can do this sort of thing for myself....
For the rest of you I'd think twice before I complain about the last quote you got for what seemed to you like it should be pretty basic work on one of your guns.
