I have been unwell this week, so most of this week’s progress happened today!

Main project is a “new to me” Weihrauch HW35 in very poor cosmetic shape, but mechanically fine except for the common “galling” issue that affects these rifles, that I have developed a remedy for.

The stock was an awful shade of orange, protected by a roughly applied, thick coat of varnish. The action had been very rusty at some point, roughly sanded to get rid of some of the corrosion, then painted with thick black paint. Removing these finishes has been challenging, but the stock is done and looking spot on, metalwork is most of the way there, with some more bluing/corrosion to be removed before re-bluing next week.

Outside of that, I have been kicking about ideas to inlet the trigger guard on the HW stocks into the underside of the stock as my main router won’t fit and the table has insufficient reach at max travel. I have tried a palm router with guide and practised on an offcut today. A few more practices and I will be happy to use this.

HW trigger guard inlet trial

HW35 from Clacton. Complete with Essex tan!

Flaking paint over rust

Horrible colour stain and nastier varnish!

Galling mod

Delrin slipper plate installed in cocking link

Scraping varnish off after using stripper

Finished stock after sanding, staining and oiling

Finished stock#2

Scraping off paint

Metalwork with paint removed and corrosion evident

Nearly ready for re-bluing!