So i bought a pre-64 model 94 off the EE. Sadly, the gun was mildly misrepresented. Fortunately the price was decent enough that i wasn't holding my breath for a safe queen. It was billed as a gun in "very good shape". And it was in ok shape. The barrel was good, and aside from some surface rust speckling on the receiver, mechanically it was sound.
The wood was not so great. There was a large chunk out of the end of the forearm about 3/4" square. And someone along the line had tried to refinish the wood , and stopped at 80 grit in a few places. When they applied the finish, it looks like they never took the gun apart, and there was over-cover on the receiver.
The butt-plate was also rusting underneath where it meets the wood, and was beginning to do 2 things-- it was causing the 2 components to wedge away from each other, and it was blackening the wood and making it brittle.
Since the value is gone by the previous bubba, there really isn't anything to lose by this bubba trying to clean it up. (well, thats not totally true-- i could technically make it all worse, ,,, but i digress..)
So i decided i would redo the furniture, and reblue the receiver. The barrel is in surprisingly good condition, and since i don't have a long bluing tank, the receiver would be the extent of it.
The wood would be done in tung oil. Not the Home depot tung oils (which really isn't tung oil at all), but rather pressed seed tung oil and polymerized tung oil that you can really only get at lee valley. I have seen fine furniture makers use this stuff to make wood look simply breathtaking. Most oil finishes will make wood get that "3D" figuring, but pure and polymerized (heated) tung oil take it one step further and also can be layered for different effects.
The beauty about oil finishes is that even a pure newby like me can use it. All it takes is patience. Application is done by dripping on a few drops , and rubbing it in with a bare hand. As the coats build, less and less is needed to cover the piece. Any excess is wiped off before it dries.
I started by stripping the old finish, letting the wood dry for a day, then going at it with the oil. The first layer was 25% pure oil with 75% mineral spirits. The wood drank this mix up like kool-aid. The next was a 50-50 mix, letting the first coat dry over night. After the second coat, i began sanding in the finish, so the third coat was layered on liberally (the wood is all wet with oil) then i quickly sanded the entire surface with 400 grit. i let the wood sit for 10 minutes, then wiped across the grain to remove excess oil/dust slurry. 4th coat was also sanded with 400 grit, then 5th through 8th coat was at 600 grit, and 9th through to 13th was at 800 grit.
From 14th coat on, i flipped to polymerized oil, which is quicker drying, so you need to work faster. The next 5 coats were "wet sanded" with 1000 grit. It is done in the same fashion as the earlier coats, but 1000 grit does little to the actual wood under it , and more to smooth and polish the built layers.
After 20 coats, the grain was completely filled and the stock was like glass. Not thick like Browning's fancier stocks, but thin and beautiful. The last 3 coats were rubbed on supper thin and allowed to dry without any sanding . When i say thin, i mean like 2 or 3 drops of oil total.
Each coat in this whole process never took much longer than 5 minutes to apply, and never longer than 24 hours to dry, so the whole process took a month, but there is very little elbow grease in that number. the result is hard and glass smooth, with a mile deep figuring.
Here are some photos of the gun, but they don't do the wood justice. When you hold this in sunlight you really appreciate the grain.
And, for comparison purposes, here is a pristine stock off a post-64 94 (also bought off the EE, and WAYYY short-sold by the seller -- this thing is right out of a box) . The post 64 is a 1977 model, with factory finish (open grain and satin sheen) --
here they are side-by side.
The wood was not so great. There was a large chunk out of the end of the forearm about 3/4" square. And someone along the line had tried to refinish the wood , and stopped at 80 grit in a few places. When they applied the finish, it looks like they never took the gun apart, and there was over-cover on the receiver.
The butt-plate was also rusting underneath where it meets the wood, and was beginning to do 2 things-- it was causing the 2 components to wedge away from each other, and it was blackening the wood and making it brittle.
Since the value is gone by the previous bubba, there really isn't anything to lose by this bubba trying to clean it up. (well, thats not totally true-- i could technically make it all worse, ,,, but i digress..)
So i decided i would redo the furniture, and reblue the receiver. The barrel is in surprisingly good condition, and since i don't have a long bluing tank, the receiver would be the extent of it.
The wood would be done in tung oil. Not the Home depot tung oils (which really isn't tung oil at all), but rather pressed seed tung oil and polymerized tung oil that you can really only get at lee valley. I have seen fine furniture makers use this stuff to make wood look simply breathtaking. Most oil finishes will make wood get that "3D" figuring, but pure and polymerized (heated) tung oil take it one step further and also can be layered for different effects.
The beauty about oil finishes is that even a pure newby like me can use it. All it takes is patience. Application is done by dripping on a few drops , and rubbing it in with a bare hand. As the coats build, less and less is needed to cover the piece. Any excess is wiped off before it dries.
I started by stripping the old finish, letting the wood dry for a day, then going at it with the oil. The first layer was 25% pure oil with 75% mineral spirits. The wood drank this mix up like kool-aid. The next was a 50-50 mix, letting the first coat dry over night. After the second coat, i began sanding in the finish, so the third coat was layered on liberally (the wood is all wet with oil) then i quickly sanded the entire surface with 400 grit. i let the wood sit for 10 minutes, then wiped across the grain to remove excess oil/dust slurry. 4th coat was also sanded with 400 grit, then 5th through 8th coat was at 600 grit, and 9th through to 13th was at 800 grit.
From 14th coat on, i flipped to polymerized oil, which is quicker drying, so you need to work faster. The next 5 coats were "wet sanded" with 1000 grit. It is done in the same fashion as the earlier coats, but 1000 grit does little to the actual wood under it , and more to smooth and polish the built layers.
After 20 coats, the grain was completely filled and the stock was like glass. Not thick like Browning's fancier stocks, but thin and beautiful. The last 3 coats were rubbed on supper thin and allowed to dry without any sanding . When i say thin, i mean like 2 or 3 drops of oil total.
Each coat in this whole process never took much longer than 5 minutes to apply, and never longer than 24 hours to dry, so the whole process took a month, but there is very little elbow grease in that number. the result is hard and glass smooth, with a mile deep figuring.
Here are some photos of the gun, but they don't do the wood justice. When you hold this in sunlight you really appreciate the grain.
And, for comparison purposes, here is a pristine stock off a post-64 94 (also bought off the EE, and WAYYY short-sold by the seller -- this thing is right out of a box) . The post 64 is a 1977 model, with factory finish (open grain and satin sheen) --
here they are side-by side.
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