Refinished a second stock

[Rob]

I just refinished my second stock and I think it came out OK

I am selling a muzzle loader for a buddy of mine (it was listed for a while in the classifieds and will be back soon).
The stock was a classic dark stain and if you looked closly you could see there was wood grain, but it did not pop. I am looking for some practice before building a kit gun, and asked my buddy if I could take a whack at re-doing his stock since he was selling it anyway.  He told me to go for it.

I removed all the old stain and finish with sandpaper, and then re-sanded it down starting with 180 grit and moving down to 240, 320, 400 and then finishing off with crocus cloth (that stuff is amazing!)  I whiskered between sandings on the finer grits.

I put on coats of minwax stain until it would not take anymore.  I think it was about 4 coats.  I then tried to bypass the spar varnish and went directly to boiled linseed oil, but after 3-4 coats of oil, the stain started to rub off and I was not pleased with the way it looked.

I did another round of sanding with 400 grit and crocus cloth and re-stained with 3 or so more coats of stain.
I then put on 4 coats of spar varnish, rubbing it down with fine steel wool between coats.
I finished it off with 4 coats of linseed oil.

The nipple was missing and there was some pitting in that area as well, so I polished it and removed a bit of the bluing and touched it up with some fresh bluing. 

All in all I am happy.  Learned some stuff and the rifle looks better than when I started.

First set of photos are the “before” shots.  The second set is the “after”.

 

[Rob]

here are the "after" shots

[rasbo]

looks good,another good oil is tung...now ya got me wanting to do one

[Rob]

It's addictive and satisfying.  I have another stock already stripped and just about ready for the detailed sanding.  I have two more in the cabinet waiting in line.

I spend about an hour a night on and can have one done in about a week and a half.

I'm a firearm romantic and love wood stocks with character.  I have a hard time getting into the synthetic stocks (although I have a couple).

I'll look into that other oil.

[JackOfAllTrades]

That's pretty! A job well done! I have this rifle for sale... It's really a good rifle, but the stock needs serious attention. Because it's ugly.. I bet that's why it's not selling.   I really should put some time into it.  The last stock I did was also with Lindseed oil. 

-Steve