Oak stock?
- Thread starter glockgrouptherapy
- Start date
SR, that chart is great.
Unless you start with a bone dry stock and seal/finish it properly, it won't matter where on the chart the wood of choice lies.
A properly cured and sealed stock will be stable, no matter which wood it is formed from.
Unless you start with a bone dry stock and seal/finish it properly, it won't matter where on the chart the wood of choice lies.
A properly cured and sealed stock will be stable, no matter which wood it is formed from.
Great stuff. If a guy wants to make a stock from oak then fill your boots! It's all part of education. I just finished a walnut stock which was a bugger to fill. Have a look around at all the guys that sell walnut blanks and make your choices of this and all the other species. There is no right or wrong as long as you learn something from it!! All stocks will change with moisture content and there is absolutely no way to totally seal a stock, it just can not be done with any finish. Wood moves, live with it.
If you browse some of the sites that sell stock blanks, NONE of them offer oak blanks. Lots of gunmakers have resorted to using birch and beech in "economy" gunstocks, but I can't think of any major manufacturer that used oak in their stocks. That should tell you something right there.
I don't know how many times it needs to be said - but oak is a lousy choice for a gun stock. Too straight grained, to open grained, too brittle, too plain, too heavy, too hard to inlet, too hard to shape. Commercial stock makers have never offered oak. For many reasons.
Wood can be sealed quite well but all natural wood stocks can move with humidity and temperature changes. Quarter sawn blanks are the best. Laminated wood is better. Fiberglass is best.
Wood can be sealed quite well but all natural wood stocks can move with humidity and temperature changes. Quarter sawn blanks are the best. Laminated wood is better. Fiberglass is best.
Blastattack
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Winnipeg MB
Oak or Elm you decide . here are two WWII German stocks from my personal collection, as you will see they chip out behind the action. not a good choice.
All your pics are dead.
New Camper
CGN frequent flyer
- Location
- Lurking in the woods near SFRC.
Yes, I'd like to see them as well.
I'm surprised that someone would use any Elm, particularly American Elm (Ulmus americana) as most of this genus are very stringy, flexible and predisposed toward bending... but strong as iron.
Having perused the chart provided by SandRoad (thank you) the differences of measured shrinkage from green is minute between all the species listed: As a percentile, there is significant change however this is from green (off the stump) to "oven dry". While wood will expand again with increased humidity, is the actual expansion going to rival "green" as the tree can no longer achieve "green" only "wet"? Repeat wetting cycles of non-living wood result in rot...
