Winchester 67 Beater Stock Rehab

[zesty]

Test fit done and I did some more shaping on the stock. No more pistol grip look to it and I smoothed the hard turns. Think I'm ready to move to 220 grit now.

I'm going to have to stain it and probably need to go darkish. It still has some blotchy color and I don't think I should sand much more in some spots.

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[loadnplenty]

That has turned out really well. Good job

 

[Freshly Minted Georgian!]

Be wary on the stain, there may be residual oil soaked into the wood that won't take stain very well, may leave you with a blotchy finish.

 

[zesty]

Be wary on the stain, there may be residual oil soaked into the wood that won't take stain very well, may leave you with a blotchy finish.

Thanks for the tip. There are definitely some areas of concern like that. It's blotchy now, lol. Anything I can do about that? Is there another finish alternative?

Would stain prep work?

 

[Freshly Minted Georgian!]

Any stain that works by soaking into the wood will carry this risk. Alternative is to use a finish that sits on the surface of the wood rather than soaking in.......specifically a tinted polyurethane. For a stock I personally don't like that approach since if you scratch it the blemish will stick out like a sore thumb. Only other alternative that comes to mind is to go with a clear finish, boiled linseed comes to mind. You could also do a shellac based finish, maybe a french polish. Cerakote type finish potentially but latent oil is a problem there too.

For the record I don't have much experience with rifle stock refinishing. I do however have extensive experience with wood finishing for various projects including guitars, ukuleles and violins, all of which I build. Good idea to bounce this project off BLIP , he does this specific type work with regularity and does superb work.

 

[Freshly Minted Georgian!]

I'm personally a fan of light colored stocks so if it was me after all the sanding and raising of dents I'd wipe it all down with acetone, do a final sand to 2000 grit and put on a french polish with a darker shade of shellac. It's time consuming to do a french polish properly but it's durable and beautiful.......just gotta keep alcohol away from it!

 

[zesty]

I'm personally a fan of light colored stocks so if it was me after all the sanding and raising of dents I'd wipe it all down with acetone, do a final sand to 2000 grit and put on a french polish with a darker shade of shellac. It's time consuming to do a french polish properly but it's durable and beautiful.......just gotta keep alcohol away from it!

Thanks for all the info. Really appreciate it. Yeah, Blip has helped be via PM already some. Just trying not to bug the guy too much but thanks for pinging him on this.

I was thinking that I'd need to stain it to mask some of the problem areas but didn't think about the remaining oil being a problem. Now I am thinking natural finish. No mater what, this won't be a fancy show piece. There are some remaining problem areas and my kids will be banging this around soon. I'm mostly having fun with it.

2000 grit! I was just about to go to 400 and thought that was overkill, LOL. I have up to 2500 grit on hand, just didn't think it was needed for this. I assume that the finish dictates the final grit? I was planning on using Tru-Oil. That seems like the right balance between quality and my impatience.

 

[Freshly Minted Georgian!]

I take guitars and violins up to 4000. I have up to 12,000 around but rarely used it except on wood pens on the lathe.

 

[zesty]

Well getting to 320 grit highlighted a problem area so I'm back to reshaping some. Also, another test fit revealed that the bolt handle touches the stock. I made a deep pencil mark (both sides) and I'll sand until that's gone and check fit again.

Edit: maybe I'm not getting a consistent fit because I'm missing the barrel escutcheon. Test fit #3 seems much better. Time to work on hardware, I think. I'm going to add sling mounts too.

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