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Posted: 5/17/2013 11:35:14 AM EDT
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I took a friend and his two teenage boys to the range yesterday, and one of the boys managed to drop my CZ455 onto the concrete bench, and it continued to slide down the edge of the bench until it landed on the concrete floor with a sickening THUD. It got a scuff on my scope, which didn't bother me too much because the scope already had plenty of scuffs on it as it was, but my nice wood.................ugh. It slid down the edged of the bench and hias a nice pattern of skip marks where it looks like it kind of bounced it's way down the edge. They somehow managed to go straight down the stock for nearly it's entire length from butt to forend. None of the dents ever cut into the wood or finish, but there are definitey dents.
I've heard of steaming dents out of wood, and that it can do a good job of fluffing the wood fibers back out to nearly how they were in the first place, as long as the fibers aren't cut. Any of you guys ever done this? How hard is it? Is it something I can likely handle without wrecking my stock further? Any other methods that may be better for repairing small dents? |
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Quoted:
An iron over a damp cloth may help raise some dents. Damp not wet. +1 However, this can also do a few things to the finish and wood. The heat can possibly turn the sheen of the finish into something other than what it looked like originally, it has a tendency to dull it if your finish has a shine to it. Secondly, it will raise the dents to some extent depending upon how deep they are. However, it can also raise the grain of the wood and make it rough. Usually when something like this is done you would just strip/sand and refinish the stock. Doing this may hurt the value of the rifle if you are a purist or want to sell it at a maximum value later on down the road. Then again you may not care. It would be nice to see some pics so we know the extent of the damage, words never express exactly how much damage has been done. |
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I agree with the above that you would need to do it as part of a complete refinish. I have had some very good success straightening out dinged up milsurps. I have even had some luck raising dings that the grain was cut on. It raised it all up to the same level and the small "cut" was barely visible and I was able to fill it as part of the refinishing process. the first one I did was with a damp washcloth size towel and a clothes iron. It doesn't take much to see very good results. YMMV
advntrjnky ETA: I'm not sure how you 455 is, but my 452 has nice wood yet kinda thin production line looking finish. a quality refinish might just bring out the true character of the wood. |
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Quoted:
I'm not sure how you 455 is, but my 452 has nice wood yet kinda thin production line looking finish. a quality refinish might just bring out the true character of the wood. My 455 wood is not quite as nice as my 527 wood, but it definitely has nice figure and some interesting grain features that I'd like to see brought out some. I know a lot of CZs have great looking stocks, but the finish hides a lot of the character on many of them. I may try to do a strip and refinish eventually. I'll try the steam iron and rag for now and hope it comes out OK. It is a shooter after all, so maybe I'll just steam it best as I can and drive on. |
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In order to steam out dents, you will have to remove any and all surface coatings on the wooden stock in the area of the dent.
Reason for this removal is to allow the steam to penetrate the affected wood, and surface coatings, such as polyurethane, will prevent this. If the stock is oiled with linseed oil, repeated applications of acetone or even alcohol will remove the oil, and allow the wood to accept the steam. You are almost certainly looking at a complete sanding, steaming, and then bleaching the original stain from the stock (if stained), and then a re-staining and re-finish. The de-stained/de-oiled steamed spots will always be detectable if the entire stock is not bleached (removed of stain), sanded, and then re-finished. I'd start with the smallest, least observable dents first, as steaming out dents in wood is something of an art. You might also consider obtaining a section of the same species of wood, and practicing on that before you begin on your stock. Do yourself a big favor, and read the last sentence again. For my loaner/trainer guns, I learned long ago to buy a separate, stainless steel, plastic stocked gun for such purposes. I loan out firearms a lot, because I want to help increase the number of new shooters. Newbies make mistakes, but not on my valuable firearms. YMMV |
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What rag said
However, before you went to the trouble of stripping it try to inject a small amount of water in e dings with a hyperthermia needle. Then take a damp cloth, cover the dent and apply your iron at its highest setting. Check repeatedly that you don't burn the wood. Take your time and don't rush it. Wood is essentially like a bundle of straws. Your dents are collapsed sections of these straws. The water and steam work to expand the straws back to their original position. (See website in sig line.). |
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