headoftheholler
Member
- Joined
- Jan 18, 2012
- Messages
- 345
I will be honest, never a huge fan of shotguns, went forever with just a singleshot in the gun cabinet that I used forever. Then a friend brought in his Ithaca 37 and I fell in love. The 37 is on a John Browning patent, unique with a super short stroke, bottom feed and ejection, takedown, and able to slamfire (will fire continuously holding down the trigger and working the pump). Finally on facebook one popped up and I jumped on it. Here we have it as I picked it up:
It was made in '74 and had a funky weaver red dot of the same vintage. Some previous owner had slopped some time of finish on it (without removing the metal) but I could see some pretty wood peeking behind the almost 40 years of dirt and dents.
First job was to break everything apart and strip the stock and forearm with a chem stripper. One one side was a huge chunk of wood missing, so I mixed some of the sanding dust with epoxy to fill and sanded smooth, Hello tiger stripes:
Next I started on the metal, breaking all the small parts out , soaking in kerosene and wiping off and into baggies with CLP, the reciever was sanded down to bare metal (note the numerous D&T holes from the red dot sight)
I am really digging the rust bluing. Not as high gloss as hot salt bluing but more durable and I can do it at home, used Herters Belgian Rust blue.
In the meantime every moring and every night (before and after work) the stock and forearm got light coats of truoil till the grain was filled and refinished the old recoil pad that was very springy still. Damn shes lookin hot now:
Ordered some positive stop plug screws to fill the holes in the reciever and got her put together, what do you think?
It was made in '74 and had a funky weaver red dot of the same vintage. Some previous owner had slopped some time of finish on it (without removing the metal) but I could see some pretty wood peeking behind the almost 40 years of dirt and dents.
First job was to break everything apart and strip the stock and forearm with a chem stripper. One one side was a huge chunk of wood missing, so I mixed some of the sanding dust with epoxy to fill and sanded smooth, Hello tiger stripes:
Next I started on the metal, breaking all the small parts out , soaking in kerosene and wiping off and into baggies with CLP, the reciever was sanded down to bare metal (note the numerous D&T holes from the red dot sight)
I am really digging the rust bluing. Not as high gloss as hot salt bluing but more durable and I can do it at home, used Herters Belgian Rust blue.
In the meantime every moring and every night (before and after work) the stock and forearm got light coats of truoil till the grain was filled and refinished the old recoil pad that was very springy still. Damn shes lookin hot now:
Ordered some positive stop plug screws to fill the holes in the reciever and got her put together, what do you think?
