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patchbox,nose cap,ramrod thimble, help

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Hi,
Start with 5 parts water to 1 part ferric nitrate. Do a little testing on scrap wood. If it is not dark or red enough try a second coat or a higher concentration of ferric nitrate. If too dark, use a lower concentration. The color comes from the iron oxide molecules (rust) being bonded to the wood fiber through reaction with a weak acid. The more iron, the redder and darker the color. Jim Kibler does not neutralize his stain after blushing. Theoretically, the heat drives off the hydrogen ions (acid part) leaving iron oxide behind and thus there is no acid left. Just for insurance, I wipe my stock with ammonia to make sure any acid residue is neutralized so there is no chance it will corrode the metal parts. Below are photos of another rifle I made for a member of this forum. It is stained with ferric nitrate and although the wood was plain, the stain brought out whatever curl there was and produced nice warm tones. The photos are part of a tutorial I recently posted in this section on building a Chamber's Little Fella's rifle. The last photo of me holding the gun in sunlight really shows the warm reddish color.

dave
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this has gone from install a few parts to a rebuild. awsum!
Dave, I found a little scraper an thought what the heck no sence stopping now, I'll try a bit of scraping, man scraping the finish off works great. in 15 minutes 1/2 the forstock is scarped.
I think this is the best.
thanks :)
tom
ou
 
Dave,
When you say 5 parts water to 1 part ferric nitrate, are you talking wt/wt or volume? I just orders some yesterday as well. I watched another video from Kilber and he was applying bone black to certain areas to for darkening to show faux aging. I see it is bone charcoal, would bio-char work for this as well? I have a nearly unlimited supply of that...
 
Hi,
The ratio is by volume. The end result should look like tea. Bone black is charred animal bones that is ground very, very fine. I don't know what bio char is and how much vegetable matter it contains. It may not work as well but certainly why not experiment on some scrap? It has to be ground very fine like pigments used in oil paint. I don't age my finishes but I bet after Jim's videos go viral everybody will be doing it. It does add a nice accent.

dave
 
The bio-char we use is made from either wood waste or coconut shells and for some applications it is ground to less than 40 microns, so I would think it would be fine enough. I will give it a try, although I would use just for a bit of contrast here and there not so much wear/age.
 
Another question.
I’m reshaping the stock in some places and removing quite a bit of wood. Other spots I can only sand just the surface, but, the old stain has sunk quite deep into the softer grain leaving small lines like spider webs and I don’t think I can sand those spots deep enough to remove them.
Are those lines going to affect the ferric nitrate?
Thank you
Tom
Ou
 
Hi Tom,
Probably not. They may disappear with the new stain. Try rubbing the area with some acetone (wear gloves) and see if it removes the color.

dave
 
when it comes time to do the ferric nitrate staining, how much stuff do you remove ? I can,t remove the nose cap, the patchbox bezel and the ramrod entry pipe would be nice to stay on, will they be ok?
thanks
tom
ou
 
when it comes time to do the ferric nitrate staining, how much stuff do you remove ? I can,t remove the nose cap, the patchbox bezel and the ramrod entry pipe would be nice to stay on, will they be ok?
thanks
tom
ou
I remove all metal parts before staining & finishing so I can seal all wood (including the wood under any metal part, inside the barrel channel and inside the lock mortise).
 
I used the ferric nitrate method on the stock it has a real nice color, working now on a finish. I don't think i would use anything else again. its not hard to do and its cool to watch the wood change color when the heat is applied
I like it
thanks all for your help.
tom
ou
 

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