restore a wooden stock that has been painted

[6.5x55swm]

i picked up a Remington 700 in 7-08 and i thought it was a plastic stock. When i got home and took the stock off and found out it was wood and that some one primed it then painted it black. How do i restore this?

 

[Potashminer]

Remove all parts - metal and plastic. Paint and varnish remover - like Heavy Body Circa 1850 - just follow directions that are on the can. But then likely discovering wood filler, Bondo, or whatever that was used to fill dings or gouges underneath the paint job. Always an adventure to strip off someone else's paint job, when you do not really know why he had painted it in the first place... Then into clean up and re-finish to your tastes. Tend to not want to use sandpaper - often ends up very noticeably "wavy" if a rigid backing block not used - often round out what should be square, square up what should be round, and remove too much wood at edges, so the metal bits end up sitting proud of the wood. Very difficult to put wood thickness back on - very easy to remove with sandpaper or other abrasives...

 

[brybenn]

Circa 1850

 

[Winchester-1897]

I have a Garand M1 Stock that was painted black. It was shinny and smooth so having nothing to lose I put the paint remover to it and stripped it right down to the wood. As Potashminer said there was dents etc filling dents and holes. I dug that ####e out and using my Wife's Iron and a damp towel on the dents put the heat to them. The process reduced the size of the dings and dents. Looked a heck of lot better than using filler and paint. Any that didn't disappear or reduce gave the stock character. Several coats of raw Tung oil and it was beautiful!!