And the Purest Scream “ Just wipe it off with a dry paper towel “.
I’m a Purest at heart when it comes to collecting surplus weapons, but I’m also a Realest. I see where many of the Purest will clean the metal of a gun, but won’t touch the stock for fear of damaging the weapon.
But there are the Hard core Purest that believe you should do nothing to a gun but keep it as you found it.
But 9 out of 10 of these Purest were never in the military and have no clue as to what was done to keep these weapon while in service. Yes, there are military manuals that tell you what they did, but to the soldiers, the manual was a guideline, not the Bible.
Many will tell you that if you clean the stock, you will remove the original finish. Let me tell you, the last time your rifle’s stock had an original finish was when it left the factory. Weapons are used, and many times in not so nice of conditions. They get rained on, they get muddy and sometimes covered in blood, sweat and tears.
The normal upkeep was to clean, dry and re-oil the stock. In many cases standard issued cleaning gear was not available and soldiers had to make do with what was available. I remember reading where a German soldier talked about using axle grease to wipe down the stock of his rifle, on the Russian front, to keep the melting snow from soaking into it.
My neighbor Jim was a Marine. He told me that in Vietnam he carried an M14. After long patrols their rifles were filthy. They would use gasoline to clean the stocks and the re-oil them.
Well, enough of all that. I’ll get to question about cleaning your stock. My answer is yes you should clean it. But remember that you don’t want to remove the patina and history. Now there’s a big misunderstanding of what patina is on a stock. It is not the buildup of dirt and oil on the stock, that is called crud. Patina is the aging of the surface of the wood. As long as you don’t remove the the top layer of wood, you will not remove the patina.
Some will call me crazy, but I’ve been doing stock work and restoration for over 30 years. The key to clean a stock is to do what would have been done if the rifle was still in service. This can be as little as a light cleaning to as muck as a heavy cleaning.
For a little cleaning, you can do an oil scrub. This is very simple. Apply a thick coat of BLO to the stock and let it sit for 30 minutes. Then use 0000 steel wool to lightly scrub the stock. You are not trying to scrub the wood, but the crud that is on the surface. The scrub is just to loosen the dirt. A nylon brush can also be used. After the scrub, wipe the stock dry. Let the stock sit for 3 to 4 days and then apply a wax top coat.
Now you can go all out and do a heavy cleaning. This will remove the dirt from the surface and some of the oil from the stock. Don’t worry, the oil that you remove wasn’t put there by the factory that built the gun.
For a heavy cleaning you will have to use a cleaner. You may has to clean the stock a couple of times. Yes, this will require you to use water that will most likely cause the wood grain of the surface of the stock to rise. You will need to Bone the stock to compress the surface, making it smooth without removing the patina. Then you will need to apply a coat of BLO. Nothing heavy, just a light coat rubbed into the stock. This will bring back the color of the stock. Wait 3 to 4 days and then apply a coat of wax.
Here’s the reason for waiting to apply the wax. If you apply it before the oil in the surface of the wood has dried enough, your wax top coat will turn cloudy so, don’t be in a rush to finish.
Now after a heavy cleaning, your stock will not be as dark, but that is because it is no longer covered in dirt. But remember that over the years several coats of oil were applied to the stock and a lot of it is deeply soaked into the wood. As time goes by, you will notice the stock getting darker. This is some of that deep soaked in oil coming to the surface. This will start to happen within the first week or so.
What you will end up with is a rifle that looks like it was just issued from the Armory while it was still in service.
Now I have never been one that will just tell you how to do something, I will also show you.
Here’s a link to a post I did on cleaning on a vz24 rifle.
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/quick-cleanup-vz24-stock.868982/#post-11522402
This is before and after pics of another vz24