Dressing up your grips with inlays

[GunnyUSMC]

Inlays are an easy way to dress up a set of grips and are not hard to do, but you must take your time.
The inlays on my grips are German Silver, Man in the Moon. Inlays can be done with metal, wood, bone or just about anything else..




The hardest part is shaping the inlay to the curvature of the grip. I did this by tapeing the inlay to the grip and tapping it with a small rawhide mallet.
Once the inlay was bent to shape I used a razor knife to trace the shape on the grips.
Then I used small wood chisels to remove the wood. You will need to keep a tight fit so, don't go wild with the chisels and remove too much wood.






Once I had the grip inleted I used Acraglas to secure the inlay in the grip.
You can also use Devcon 2 Ton epoxy.
You will then need to file and sand the inlay smooth if you want a flush fit and refinish the grips.
Sorry that I don't have any pic's of the work being done, I did the ones on my grips back in 1999.

 

[Sam1911]

Purrrdy!

I once quizzed a gunsmith at a historic reenactment about how he got so good with his inlay work. He said, "I'm a dentist. Inlay is inlaw & overlay is overlay."

 

[Ultravox]

Those are beautiful. Inlay is another thing to add to my list of skills to try.

 

[788Ham]

You're one amazing man Gunny, I've looked at all of your posts in THR, ain't much you cain't do! Seriously, those grips are awesome.

 

[GunnyUSMC]

Thanks for the kind words.
I've been doing stock work for over 20 years. Working on stocks is more of a hobby then anything else. It is also a hobby I love to do. I also love to show others that stock work really is not that hard to learn.

 

[Jim K]

I once watched the late Bill Moran do silver inlay work on a knife handle. That was amazing. The technique is not hard to learn; what is hard is learning to be an artist, something I am not and probably will never be.

Jim

 

[1SOW]

Gunny, I do some woodwork; but doing that inlay on an already shaped grip takes a LOT of patience and care. Nice job, especially for a Marine.

IS HE SMILING? IS HE SMILING?

 

[GunnyUSMC]

When I was working on the inlays I kept telling myself, "If you screw up it will cost you $30 to replace the grip." I'm glad I didn't screw up.