I just saw this thread because I am refinishing an old stock for a friend.
It is a bolt action sporterized Mauser he bought about 40 years ago.
The wood is good but the finish has varnish and it is pretty beat up. But the wood is good underneath......he has kept the rifle in good shape. I already have the varnish stripped off and the stock didn't need much sanding to get it to bare wood. I told him I need to get it to bare wood if the oil finish will work properly. It is nice walnut so he doesn't mind at all.
(ETA: The metal is in extremely good shape also. My friend treats it like his baby.)
It is an 8mm Mauser and my friend says it was made at the Brno[sp?] factory, but someone sporterized it decades ago, prior to my friend buying it. He put a scope on it and uses it for deer hunting up here in Michigan every year.
(I have no idea what company made the stock but it really is in good shape other than the varnished finish. It has also been glass bedded.)
He LOVES this gun and asked me to "fix up the wood for him". I was honored he wants me to refinish his favorite rifle.
(He doesn't shoot it much other than right before and during deer season. Then it is cleaned up and stored in his safe until next deer season. He must shoot it well because, like this year, he usually gets a deer.)
Anyway, and
finally getting to the point, I have always used the stuff
dfariswheel suggests and was searching the internet to see if the pros or more experienced people felt it was really all that good.
I was happy to see my
favorite pro gunsmith touting the old Minwax Antique Oil Finish stuff. (I always referred to it as "the stuff in the red can made by Minwax", when telling people about it. I always forget the darn name!
)
What I
didn't do in the past though was steel wool all the finish off after a few coats.........I'll try that this time.
What I used to do was steel wool the finish agressively after about 5 sealing coats and put another 3 coats on, then, after 10 minutes, wiping with cotton cloth. I have alot of store bought burlap also lying around. So, I'll try that.
Once again, THANKS DFARISWHEEL!! (You are the tops!!)
This is the kind of thing I can accomplish because I don't have much machinery and am basically an ordinary Joe.
One little trick you can use dfariswheel is to mix a little minwax stain with the oil on one of your later "final" applications to give the stock a little more color. Not much, just a little. (My friend doesn't want this on his because the walnut is dark enough in his opinion.)
You might try this mixing on your first "final coat" the next time you do this.......if it doesn't turn out good in your opinion, it is easy to remove. But you'll be set back about 2 "preliminary coats" Oh, maybe not set back that much but you get what I mean.
You might already know this but you can also use
water based stains first.....I have some old water based stuff that I use if I KNOW the owner wants that color because I don't want to try and sand off the soaked in water based stain if he doesn't like it.
I would always use the water based stain when I used to make the old types of persimmon wood heads for golf clubs. Works good but I don't like to sand it off......worried it might remove too much wood in the process. (Most people liked the red tinted walnut water based stain color FWIW.)
(With the old persimmon wood heads, it DID remove too much material from what the old golf refinishing pros told me. Maybe that is unique to persimmon but I never tried water based stain unless I was told by the owner that he WANTED it stained that color. And, I never removed it so I don't really know if too much wood is removed if the guy didn't like the color. They just had to live with it I told them in advance.....but no one ever minded in the end.)
With persimmon wood heads you had to worry about removing too much wood because of the fitted metal sole plate and overall swingweight of the club. That's why I told them......"you have to live with this color if that is what you choose".