Major Overhaul

I might be nuts but I realized that the only disappointing aspect of my kit built rifle was the carving quality and wood finish quality. So tonight I have stripped all the old stain and True Oil and I will clean up my carvings, add some new carving and redo my muzzle cap and so forth. My stock is curly maple (not the fanciest but there is about 50% stripe coverage) and I had originally stained it VERY dark. What are some suggestions about a possible wood finish for it. I'm afraid to mess with AF, I would probably end up with a green stock. I should've been more patient when I built it :curse: There's a lesson to be learned here.

I vote aqua fortis. Nothing is better in my book. ::

I have had my best results with Danglers Stains as they are alcohol based & you can make it deeper or wash it out easily. Also had good luck with Fiebing's leather dye & you can darken or wash it out the same way.

I have seen Aquafortis on some guns that I liked, but they are few. In my experience it is few I find that it will look good on to me, it as most of the time the rifle ends up too dark for my taste. I usually try it on a sample piece of wood from the stock, but seldom use it. I guess it is just according to what you want to see when ya are finished.......... IMHO, if it is a red maple or a soft maple doen't even think of doing it or you will have a green or black rifle.

:m2c:

Some people's two cents worth is certainly worth more than two cents. I will be quite some time with the sanding and other things I'm going to do to it so I'll try to post a photo of the stock in question. I do have a scrap piece of wood from the stock that came with the kit so I can experiment somewhat.

I vote aqua fortis (nitric acid) as well. Nothing brings out the curl and grain like it and it really isn't hard to use. Just practice on a scrap or two to see what it does and you should be fine.

I've used it on only 2 stocks, but dozens of smaller maple items like knife handles, bullet blocks, powder horn plugs etc. and I've tested different homemade nitric based stains on dozens more scrap pieces of maple and I've never seen one turn any shade of green. Not saying that it's never happened but I sure was surprised to read in forums like this that "my friend's gun turned green!" and so on. I wonder how prevalent it actually is.

I was taught to apply the acid, heat it, neutralize it, then apply chromium trioxide and let it dry. Perhaps this step is what prevents some maple from turning green, but I've skipped the chromium with good results too.

To keep an acid stained gun from getting darker in the future you need to neutralize the acid with a baking soda or lye wash. The gun will get darker EVENTUALLY, but it'll take a long time.

I stained a pipe box with an alcohol based stain a few years ago, and contrary to the rumors, it raised the grain just as much as the acid, and I've noticed the color fading too. It just didn't look as good as the acid either. Others may have had better luck with it.

I finished my first rifle, Ol Firewood, w/ aquafortis following a gunsmith's recommendations. When I turned the torch on it, it turned VERY dark. Black, actually. So I was afraid I was burning the stock, & didn't heat it as much as I should. The stock did turn a deep dark green about two years later (gradually). Now it dosen't took too bad, & only a few folks chided me about my lack of stock finishing skills. And 20 years later, the green is less noticeable.

The next attempt was a Hawkin style pistol: heated it sufficiently & it turned out great: good wood grain show, good color. So as w/ many things we do, it's all in the trials & learning.

Here's a couple of photos of my jaeger stock after removing my previous crappy attempt at wood finishing. The curl is mainly from the butt to the lockplate area and a bit on the nose. I have more sanding to do and some carving to add to the forestock area. I may keep the wood muzzle and forget about the horn cap. Should I keep the lock in the white or darken it to match the barrel? Is there any store bought stain that would do well with my maple stock? The figure in the wood is not very spectacular so I'm not aiming at making the stripes "pop out" at you or anything like that. It really isn't the prettiest wood around. Help me dress her up a bit.

I also vote aqua fortis for maple. It's important to neutralize it with baking soda if you don't want the green hue as it ages.

I would experiment a whole bunch, but certainly try various concoctions of FN crystals. Also, experiment with your neutralizing agent. You have your choices of household ammonia, baking soda, and lye. I found with lye that it made the stripes pop more (after the FN blush), and lent an orangish tint to it, which is what I wanted. Be careful with concentrated potions of lye though. Lye burns are just as nasty as acid burns. Once the AF / FN is neutralized you can take steel wool to the stock to knock things back without fear of speckling.

14 year old thread? How did that happen? What did i miss?

jdw276 said:

14 year old thread? How did that happen? What did i miss?

Click to expand...

The flux capacitor was down and just got repaired.

Back in the early 1970's I used nitric acid and tried aquafortis , etc.. Allthose guns are perminantly green.
So....learned to emulate the effects of those failed finishes by first...after final steel wool stock prep , 50% Fiebing alcohol based black stain. apply heat gun to dry stock. more steel wool....next...any color alcohol base orange , yellow , red, or mix of same . Dry w/heat gun do steel wool again , and start w/ thin runny finish like boiled tongue oil ,Danish oil , etc.. Finish coats of Gel Polyurethane are trouble free and super easy to apply. Yields a professional water resistant finish.
Linseed based finish is totally not water resistant. Charlie

OOPs....Forgot the final part of the finish process...Coat or 2 of Minwax Special dark furniture wax. And also , after the initial coat of runny finish , let the stock day for a day or 2. The final finish of poly urethane wont dry like it should. charlie

This thread is from 2005. Hopefully the original poster was not waiting for today’s responses. Ya never know though.

Maybe his finish is still drying.........

For what it's worth, once I made the mistake of using steel wool on a stock before applying a acid or water based stain.
The nearly invisible pieces of steel wool that were remaining on the wood turned to rust giving the wood a severe case of the freckles. Thousands of them all over the stock.

I had to sand the entire stock down to get rid of the freckles and redo the whole thing. Lesson learned: Never use steel wool on a stock before any kind of stain except oil based stains are applied. (IMO, there is not one oil base stain that should ever be used on a gunstock. Use an acid, alcohol or water based stain only unless you like the appearance of a cheap book case.)