Help with Stock Prep Help Please

[Jungle George]

This is the first time I have ever looked to sand down and re finish a stock and I am not sure on what is best at this point. The previous owner of the gun must have dipped the stock in a vat of varnish judging by the quantity of the stuff that I have removed, this same person also spray painted all the metal work with gloss paint but that is a job for another day. Anyway, I have removed most of the varnish and am left with some stubborn spots on the gun where I assume the varnish has just soaked in a little deeper, the stained spots can be seen on the pic's. Is there any advice anyone can give which would make removal of these stained patches easier or is it just a case of good old fashioned elbow grease and lots of sanding required.
http://s1079.photobucket.com/user/ge...tml?sort=3&o=2
http://s1079.photobucket.com/user/ge...tml?sort=3&o=5

[vbull]

I had exactly the same issue end of last year. I ended up having to scrape it off. Prior to that I even used an industrial paint/varnish stripper with no luck, it was patchy, just like yours. One thing I did learn from posting my problems with this stock on here was not to leave the wood too smooth, a slightly rougher finish is best. Good luck.

[Jungle George]

Thanks for the quick reply, I suspected it might be a case of stripping back to unstained wood. Was hoping I could cheat somehow.

[Rickenbacker]

Tips:

I'd sand it with the buttpad on, otherwise you might be disappointed if the pad is too big when the stock's all finished.

I'd always use a sanding block wherever possible (hard or flexible, depending on which bit of the stock), otherwise the surface will end up wavey.

I'd mask up the chequering to avoid sanding off the points.

As the stock is beech (HW77?), I'd consider finishing it with coloured lacquer ... for one thing, you'll probably never get all of those dark patches out, and dark-ish lacquer will cover them up. Saving you a lot of sanding work... and it'll look much more like a factory finish.

[Airsporterman]

You have to remember that wood is a porous material and the end grain is open and more porous than the rest and therefore will absorb more stain/varnish resulting in those areas appearing darker, the stain etc will penetrate deeper and therefore will be more difficult to remove.
The secret is to seal the end grain before applying finishes if you want a 'uniform' look, otherwise, you are just going to have to accept it!

ASM

[Jungle George]

Thanks again, I have some very dark danish oil left over from another project and I am hoping this might hide the stains where I cant get them out. Will have to look into lacquer as this is not something I had considered. Have been using both hard and flexible sanding blocks for the majority of the stock and have just purchased some sanding drums for my drill, am hoping these might do a better job around the grip where the blocks are a bit too large. The gun is a Webley Eclipse.