Oak-For wood stock

[smoky]

This may be a dumb question, but why don't you ever see stocks, custom or production, made from oak.   I keep thinking that if it can be used for nice furniture, etc. then why couldn't I make a gunstock from it?

Thanks for any and all responses.

Smoky

[PaulS]

smoky,

Oak is too brittle to use for a rifle stock. It would break and cause real damage.

PaulS

[coopershooter]

i love oak furniture, but it,s not a pretty piece of walnut!

[Yukon Jack]

I don't think oak is too brittle, gunstocks have been made of maple and maple tends to be as hard or harder wood than oak.

I suspect that weight has a lot to do with it and oak being difficult to work with for stability and cutting.

[Plibby]

This may be a dumb question, but why don't you ever see stocks, custom or production, made from oak.   I keep thinking that if it can be used for nice furniture, etc. then why couldn't I make a gunstock from it?

Thanks for any and all responses.

Smoky

If you want to try oak, try white oak, red oak is not good for exterior uses.  I think you will find that it is very difficult to machine compared to walnut (hard on cutting tools).  Just keep in mind that if it was really good wood for rifle stock, it would be used for that purpose by the industry or custom makers.

[Graybeard]

Long ago Ladobe posted some photos of his oak stock and fore end made by Bullberry for a TC Contender. Beautiful grain. He sure seemed to like it. I think he posted it on the TC Handgun Forum but might have been TC Rifle or both.

If you'd like to see it you might search for posts by him and something on the order of custom bullberry stock or oak as key words.

GB

[Judson]

Some of the reasons oak is not used for gun stocks are as follows.

1.   Oak is very opened grain.    This is important for several reasons, first open grained woods have pores which are hard to fill.    Due to this it is difficult to get a smooth, even finish but more important is that open grained woods tend to suck up moisture.

2.   Open grained woods do not have the compression strength of "tight grained" woods like maple and walnut.   Compression strength is important because it is what keeps the action from being beaten back into the inletting causing split stocks.     However Glass bedding will take care of this problem.

3.    Woods like Oak will not take checkering or other ornamentation well at all.    In all oak is great for some things but gun stocks are not one of them.

[Graybeard]

Here is the one Bullberry did for Ladobe.



GB