I've had these two for decades. Pretty much the last of my Mauser collection aside from some K98's. 

 

 

Interesting, and extensive, patchwork on the Gew.98 stock.  

 

 

Nice pieces.  Rich A. in Pa.

The G98 stock is a repaired repair I guess you would say. The two side patches where done before I got it but the one on the side of the butt had fallen out and I lost the patch by the trigger while shooting when I was a teenager and couldn't find it. So back when I was learning woodworking I made replacement patches for those two. The original patches had been held in place by brass pins with no glue at all. Not sure if it was a field repair or post war. The patches by the butt plate are all me. When I got it there was a lot of chipping there where someone had slammed it down. Normally I wouldn't bother with it but I figured why not patch them while I was at it as the butt plate had a tendency to snag stuff and drive me nuts. I know it's not very professional looking but I'm pretty happy with it. It's actually very difficult to cut end grain to match up with the plate like that. I used wood from a sporterized G98 stock I had so although it doesn't match color wise it is wood from a WW1 G98 stock. 

 

The Kar98 was lightly sporterized when I got it. Someone had cut the sling loop off the barrel band and cut the stacking bar off. They also cut the tip off the firing pin for reasons I don't understand. So it has a replacement barrel band, stacking bar and firing pin. It was all matching which makes it a real shame someone did that to it but at least they didn't drill and tap it or chop the stock. Maybe one day I'll repair the original parts and put them back on, well if I can figure out where I put them that is. 

Aha!  I thought I smelled wood shop in that stock.  

 

I took two years of shop in Junior High and refurbished a Kar.98k stock of mine as a project.  That was when you could bring a gun to school and everyone with a long arm in their pickup truck gun rack in the parking lot thought it was interesting.  I still have my pig cutting board that I made for a project that my wife uses daily in the kitchen.  I still have the Kar.98k as well.

 

Times they are a changing.

 

 

They definitely are and not always for the better, my kids say they don't offer any shop classes at their school. Apparently even home economics got cut but for some reason band is mandatory much to the disdain of my 15 year old. This is why nobody knows how to actually do anything anymore.