Excellent piece on stock finishing

[jameswrx]

Interesting thread. I did more than 15 years with lots of experience finishing wood on high end products.

I recently bought an FX T12 that I bought via a picture on gun trader. I hate red colour wood finishes and saw this 'walnut' gun which was pleasant to my eye, very yellow and nice dark grain striping. It turned up and what I received was a horrible red, plain wood. I rang the gun shop and they said it's the same gun! Luckily for me I kept a copy of their pictures and emailed them. They then suddenly realised it was a picture of an old stock gun and had long gone.

Left with the option of sending it back or keeping it and refinishing, I didn't have a lot of choice really. My mate said send it back but it'd cost me £40 to get (postage and my RFD's fee) so sending it back and buying another would have been £15 to send back and another £40 for the next gun.

So now I've started refinishing my stock! It's a time consuming process removing the old finish. It took many hours of stripping with nitromors and that got me down to the red stained wood. I've just about finished sanding one side and it already looks 100 times nicer.

I'm actually going to spray my stock using my spray gun. I have light fast black which I'm going to pick out the grain with and then I'm going to do some shading too.

[ratgunner]

Find it here http://members.aol.com/illinewek/faqs/stock.htm

Excellent link, Thanks very much.

[rockabilk]

dont know if it will work but on some timbers i have used tea bags and allso camp coffe to stain oh and on ocasion brown boot polish

[Br0dy]

i agree with rockabilk.... Ive had really excellent results with good quality boot polish. Get it nice and warm before application.

[johnbaz]

i managed a good result using william's stock oil kit (on this forum, known simply as william)
here's my first attempt with his excellent kit (original mod45)



and a pic before i replaced the buttpad, trigger and other stuff (and before i made the panels for the stock cut outs


john


btw, it's a beech stock

[poppy]

i managed a good result using william's stock oil kit (on this forum, known simply as william)
here's my first attempt with his excellent kit (original mod45)



and a pic before i replaced the buttpad, trigger and other stuff (and before i made the panels for the stock cut outs


john


btw, it's a beech stock

looks excellent

[Jaarus]

i managed a good result using william's stock oil kit (on this forum, known simply as william)
here's my first attempt with his excellent kit (original mod45)



and a pic before i replaced the buttpad, trigger and other stuff (and before i made the panels for the stock cut outs


john


btw, it's a beech stock

That looks just awesome!

[goldeneye]

Find it here http://members.aol.com/illinewek/faqs/stock.htm

This link no longer works, does anyone know if it has moved somewhere?

[tankosl]

Hi All,

I tried looking at the original link and there it was gone..

Have any of you found it again or something similar???

Mark

[Romfordruffian]

The destination for this link has been shut down. Any chance of re-publishing it as I'm wnting to get my S-200 to look something like.
Thanks
M

[shutt997]

cheers pal

[Bonnox]

Find it here http://members.aol.com/illinewek/faqs/stock.htm

Don't know if its a dead link but that doesn't work for me just takes me to an advert for aol

[thisisdonald]

Ill start with 240 and go right down to 800 - use wt & dry paper.
If you plan on staining the stock, colron stains are water based and can be used like a wetting stage. You can also water them down and mix them to acheive the desired colour. I recently used american walnut on a vulcan stock, if I was going to use this again, Id definatily mix it with something kind of yellowy/goldy to bring some warmer tones into it.

once you have the stock sanded and stained (if you are doing that) to the desired finish, you can seal it or go straight on to the finish.
To seal, mix 50/50 spar varnish with white spirit. Apply as much of this as the wood will soak up in 15min and wipe any residual liquid off after this time. Let this set up for a couple of days to a week. Next take some 600 or so grit wet & dry and put a spot of your homemade sealer on to the wood and sand it in creating a slurry that will fill the pores of the wood as well as flattening any high spots left by the initial application. Wipe clean and let sit for a couple of days.

now you can start your finish..tru oil or boiled linseed oil. apply a drop - and I mean a single drop, and work it into the wood with your hand, spreading it out to cover.. rub until there is no surface residue - you are looking at making a film coating on the wood. let dry for a day or until completely dry to touch and repeat as many times as you want. minimum about 3 or 4 if you are just a wham bam thank you man, or many more if you plan on making sweet sweet love to your rifle and showing pictures of said love on this forum! Dont ever apply over the top of tacky or wet linseed oil, it will turn gooey and yucky.

when finished and the action is back in your baby, buff it with a soft rag and then apply turtle wax, carnuba wax or a good non abrasive paste wax to the entire gun and buff it to a gleaming finish! bingo, several weeks after you started the rewards are paid off!

[1988rapid7]

what an excellent thread, going to refinish my stock for sure, picked up a few marks over the years and looking grubby, this has gave me the confidence to give it a go, fantastic!

[Tallyho]

when finished and the action is back in your baby, buff it with a soft rag and then apply turtle wax, carnuba wax or a good non abrasive paste wax to the entire gun and buff it to a gleaming finish! bingo, several weeks after you started the rewards are paid off!

I have a silicon cloth to wipe my guns down and keep them looking nice after use, but a long time shooter and all round good bloke recently advised me not to use it or put silicon polish on the bluing as it makes it impossible to re-blue well if you have the need. Anyone agree or dispute this? I don't have any experience of re-bluing.