Oh yeah, and brushes for practice: hazard fraught sells some decent bristle brushes for a buck. I used those to practice and for the first few coats on the rifle, before realizing I needed to sand and finish it with a good brush.
I'm pretty big into surplus firearms, as is my neighbor and a couple of our friends (one old timer has a few million dollars into his collection, easily). I hate to mess with stuff, but in situations where you do need to do it (because someone else already butchered it), then you wanna do it right.
I then sanded down the wood with 200, then 400, and finally 800 grit paper. I hate to sand wood furniture ever but it was so beaten up and the pressure washer raised the grain so much, that it absolutely needed it. I didn't take off enough to hide all the old marks and divets, but it worked for some of them. I used some beeswax from a local apiarists on a few deeper divets to help hid them better before the shellac was applied. Rubbing it around on the stock a bit allowed it to pick up the dirt and color of the wood and it blended in very nicely.
Then I did two coats of purified boiled linseed oil (not the chemical-laden stuff from box stores), and let it dry out for about 3 weeks. The wood soaked it up and after drying it looked so good I almost wanted to leave it that way.
But... I did the shellac, it looked great when it was done, and my buddy was so happy with it that all he did was reimburse me for the shellac flakes. Thanks, guy.
When I come back from deployment I will do that, thanks man.
Oh yeah, and brushes for practice: hazard fraught sells some decent bristle brushes for a buck. I used those to practice and for the first few coats on the rifle, before realizing I needed to sand and finish it with a good brush.
I'm pretty big into surplus firearms, as is my neighbor and a couple of our friends (one old timer has a few million dollars into his collection, easily). I hate to mess with stuff, but in situations where you do need to do it (because someone else already butchered it), then you wanna do it right.
So... just in case this helps you out:
https://i.imgur.com/uhrv9vz.jpg & https://i.imgur.com/2SkOqyH.jpg- this was the gun before I started. It was beat up pretty good, the pressure washer had removed some of the original shellac, and the grain was pretty raised because of it.
I stripped it all off with CitriStrip, which I have found to be pretty easy on wood furniture. It already looked better just by doing that.
But then I baked it in the oven on 160 for about 8 hours, wiping it down with paper towels every 30-45 minutes, to suck out as much cosmo as possible, and then spent some more time with critristrip and toothpicks to scrape away every drop of excess cosmo and shellac, especially in the grip area of the forend.
I then sanded down the wood with 200, then 400, and finally 800 grit paper. I hate to sand wood furniture ever but it was so beaten up and the pressure washer raised the grain so much, that it absolutely needed it. I didn't take off enough to hide all the old marks and divets, but it worked for some of them. I used some beeswax from a local apiarists on a few deeper divets to help hid them better before the shellac was applied. Rubbing it around on the stock a bit allowed it to pick up the dirt and color of the wood and it blended in very nicely.
Then I did two coats of purified boiled linseed oil (not the chemical-laden stuff from box stores), and let it dry out for about 3 weeks. The wood soaked it up and after drying it looked so good I almost wanted to leave it that way.
But... I did the shellac, it looked great when it was done, and my buddy was so happy with it that all he did was reimburse me for the shellac flakes. Thanks, guy.